ZIAD IN GAZA

 New areas were asked to evacuate. People who have evacuated once or several times before and “settled” in new places, were asked, again, to leave. But there are no spaces left. Last week, a new family joined us, and this week another one did. The situation is getting worse and worse.

My sister’s friend and her two daughters come to visit. They have been staying in a school for more than two months now. But after the evacuation announcement to their new area, most families there left, and they had no place to go to. They asked if it is possible to stay with us. But the hosting family apologised, simply because two new families are staying with us. The woman’s eyes were full of tears when she was explaining how scared she was for her, and her two daughters’ lives. Finding an apartment is impossible right now. But we contacted everyone we knew to search for available places for them to put a tent.

I feel awful about them and am very worried for their safety. I talk to Ahmad and he promises me he will do his best to help them. On his way out of the room, I hear him talking to himself: “Today is their turn, in a few days, it will be ours.”

The misery continues. A guy I know is staying with his family in a friend’s apartment. When they had to evacuate, the apartment was empty. But with the new evacuation process, the hosting family itself had to move in as well. “We offered to leave immediately, but the hosting family members started crying and begged us not to. Now, there are 60 people in a three-room apartment.”

I just cannot believe that our utmost hope became finding a space for a tent. This is inhumane.