Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
I’m not going back 310 posts, but….we really need to be giving “military assistance” to a situation where it’s a full, modern army against rocks and bottles?
If I had known then what I know now...
Vegas 93, Vegas 98, Vegas 00 (10 year show), Vegas 03, Vegas 06
VIC 07
EV LA1 08
Seattle1 09, Seattle2 09, Salt Lake 09, LA4 09
Columbus 10
EV LA 11
Vancouver 11
Missoula 12
Portland 13, Spokane 13
St. Paul 14, Denver 14
The situation is not dire enough, do we really need misinformation comparing Iran and its proxies to “bottles and rockets?” Cmon.
Share information, misinformation, information with context, information without it, everyone on here is kidding themselves if they think this, or any discourse, will amount to a damn thing if the leaders don't give a shit about global rhetoric, and if support flows based on existing allies anyways. I don't know why anyone cares to have these talks anymore, it's an exercise in willingly accepting misery and futility into one's life.
'05 - TO, '06 - TO 1, '08 - NYC 1 & 2, '09 - TO, Chi 1 & 2, '10 - Buffalo, NYC 1 & 2, '11 - TO 1 & 2, Hamilton, '13 - Buffalo, Brooklyn 1 & 2, '15 - Global Citizen, '16 - TO 1 & 2, Chi 2
EV
Toronto Film Festival 9/11/2007, '08 - Toronto 1 & 2, '09 - Albany 1, '11 - Chicago 1
Israeli airstrikes have caused extensive damage to Gaza hospital, aid organization says
From CNN’s Abeer Salman and Jessie Gretener
Israeli airstrikes have “caused extensive damage to hospital departments and exposed residents and patients to suffocation” at the Al-Quds Hospital, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society said Sunday.
The aid organization accused Israel of “deliberately” launching the airstrikes “directly next to Al-Quds Hospital, with the aim of forcing the medical staff, displaced people, and patients to evacuate the hospital.”
Videos from the Palestinian Red Crescent show dust clouding up hallways in the hospital, with some people trying to put on face masks. Other video obtained by CNN appears to show the aftermath of a strike, with a cloud of dust rising next to the hospital.
The director of Al-Quds Hospital, Dr. Bashar Mourad, told CNN the vicinity of the hospital had been targeted three times by Israeli airstrikes Sunday as of 4:45 p.m. local time (10:45 a.m. ET).
CNN has asked the Israel Defense Forces about the aid organization's reports that theAl-Quds Hospital was specifically targeted by airstrikes.
Some background: Al-Quds Hospital is treating hundreds of patients, including wounded people, patients in intensive care and children in incubators, the Palestinian Red Crescent said. In addition, approximately 12,000 internally displaced civilians are currently sheltering at the hospital.
The hospital is located in the Tal Al Hawa neighborhood in Gaza City, north of Wadi Gaza — the line south of which Israel has urged people in Gaza to flee.
Earlier Sunday, the Palestinian Red Crescent had said it received a warning to immediately evacuate the hospital. The World Health Organization has said the order is impossible without endangering the lives of patients.
In response to questions about the evacuation warning and medical workers' response, Israel Defense Forces spokesperson Maj. Nir Dinar told CNN, "They received much more than two (warnings) for the last three weeks."
Israeli airstrikes have caused extensive damage to Gaza hospital, aid organization says
From CNN’s Abeer Salman and Jessie Gretener
Israeli airstrikes have “caused extensive damage to hospital departments and exposed residents and patients to suffocation” at the Al-Quds Hospital, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society said Sunday.
The aid organization accused Israel of “deliberately” launching the airstrikes “directly next to Al-Quds Hospital, with the aim of forcing the medical staff, displaced people, and patients to evacuate the hospital.”
Videos from the Palestinian Red Crescent show dust clouding up hallways in the hospital, with some people trying to put on face masks. Other video obtained by CNN appears to show the aftermath of a strike, with a cloud of dust rising next to the hospital.
The director of Al-Quds Hospital, Dr. Bashar Mourad, told CNN the vicinity of the hospital had been targeted three times by Israeli airstrikes Sunday as of 4:45 p.m. local time (10:45 a.m. ET).
CNN has asked the Israel Defense Forces about the aid organization's reports that theAl-Quds Hospital was specifically targeted by airstrikes.
Some background: Al-Quds Hospital is treating hundreds of patients, including wounded people, patients in intensive care and children in incubators, the Palestinian Red Crescent said. In addition, approximately 12,000 internally displaced civilians are currently sheltering at the hospital.
The hospital is located in the Tal Al Hawa neighborhood in Gaza City, north of Wadi Gaza — the line south of which Israel has urged people in Gaza to flee.
Earlier Sunday, the Palestinian Red Crescent had said it received a warning to immediately evacuate the hospital. The World Health Organization has said the order is impossible without endangering the lives of patients.
In response to questions about the evacuation warning and medical workers' response, Israel Defense Forces spokesperson Maj. Nir Dinar told CNN, "They received much more than two (warnings) for the last three weeks."
Justice is destroying critical infrastructure and punishing the entire populace based on the actions of a few. It's how colonizers do.
Or killing civilians and declaring them just a tragedy of war. How many is “enough?”
Israel claims responsibility for Jabalya attack, says civilian deaths are ‘tragedy of war’
Israel confirmed it was responsible for an attack on the Jabalya refugee camp in northern Gaza on Tuesday that Palestinian officials said left hundreds dead and injured.
The Israel Defense Forces targeted and killed a senior Hamas commander, Ibrahim Biari, said IDF spokesman Lt. Col. Richard Hecht.
Soldiers on the ground and in an IDF aircraft were used in the offensive, the IDF said, adding that a number of Hamas militants were killed and that tunnel entrances, weapons and military equipment were destroyed.
But the attack also appears to have had a far wider, and fatal, impact on civilians. Exact figures on the number of dead and injured were not immediately clear in the aftermath of the strikes, but footage of the scene streamed by Al Jazeera showed dozens of civilians digging through the rubble to reach trapped people.
Asked on CNN by Wolf Blitzer about why the IDF pressed ahead with the attack even though it was aware of the large civilian population in the area, Hecht said it was a “very complicated battle space” and that Biari, the Hamas commander, “killed many, many Israelis.”
“But you know that there are a lot of refugees, a lot of innocent civilians, men, women and children in that refugee camp as well, right?” Blitzer asked Hecht.
I dunno, the US government thinks civilians are "tragedies of war" too. since 2002 they've murdered an estimated 1100 civilians with drone strikes in Pakistan, Somalia, and Yemen. and Obama was the worst of them.
I dunno, the US government thinks civilians are "tragedies of war" too. since 2002 they've murdered an estimated 1100 civilians with drone strikes in Pakistan, Somalia, and Yemen. and Obama was the worst of them.
No argument from me on that one. The violence perpetrated by Israel in Gaza is curtesy of US taxpayers.
I dunno, the US government thinks civilians are "tragedies of war" too. since 2002 they've murdered an estimated 1100 civilians with drone strikes in Pakistan, Somalia, and Yemen. and Obama was the worst of them.
Agreed. Totally wrong when the US does it as well.
Or killing civilians and declaring them just a tragedy of war. How many is “enough?”
Israel claims responsibility for Jabalya attack, says civilian deaths are ‘tragedy of war’
Israel confirmed it was responsible for an attack on the Jabalya refugee camp in northern Gaza on Tuesday that Palestinian officials said left hundreds dead and injured.
The Israel Defense Forces targeted and killed a senior Hamas commander, Ibrahim Biari, said IDF spokesman Lt. Col. Richard Hecht.
Soldiers on the ground and in an IDF aircraft were used in the offensive, the IDF said, adding that a number of Hamas militants were killed and that tunnel entrances, weapons and military equipment were destroyed.
But the attack also appears to have had a far wider, and fatal, impact on civilians. Exact figures on the number of dead and injured were not immediately clear in the aftermath of the strikes, but footage of the scene streamed by Al Jazeera showed dozens of civilians digging through the rubble to reach trapped people.
Asked on CNN by Wolf Blitzer about why the IDF pressed ahead with the attack even though it was aware of the large civilian population in the area, Hecht said it was a “very complicated battle space” and that Biari, the Hamas commander, “killed many, many Israelis.”
“But you know that there are a lot of refugees, a lot of innocent civilians, men, women and children in that refugee camp as well, right?” Blitzer asked Hecht.
“This is the tragedy of war, Wolf,” Hecht said.
Does anyone still think this is justified? And if so did you think all the killing the US did in Iraq and Afghanistan was justified? and why?
Or killing civilians and declaring them just a tragedy of war. How many is “enough?”
Israel claims responsibility for Jabalya attack, says civilian deaths are ‘tragedy of war’
Israel confirmed it was responsible for an attack on the Jabalya refugee camp in northern Gaza on Tuesday that Palestinian officials said left hundreds dead and injured.
The Israel Defense Forces targeted and killed a senior Hamas commander, Ibrahim Biari, said IDF spokesman Lt. Col. Richard Hecht.
Soldiers on the ground and in an IDF aircraft were used in the offensive, the IDF said, adding that a number of Hamas militants were killed and that tunnel entrances, weapons and military equipment were destroyed.
But the attack also appears to have had a far wider, and fatal, impact on civilians. Exact figures on the number of dead and injured were not immediately clear in the aftermath of the strikes, but footage of the scene streamed by Al Jazeera showed dozens of civilians digging through the rubble to reach trapped people.
Asked on CNN by Wolf Blitzer about why the IDF pressed ahead with the attack even though it was aware of the large civilian population in the area, Hecht said it was a “very complicated battle space” and that Biari, the Hamas commander, “killed many, many Israelis.”
“But you know that there are a lot of refugees, a lot of innocent civilians, men, women and children in that refugee camp as well, right?” Blitzer asked Hecht.
“This is the tragedy of war, Wolf,” Hecht said.
Does anyone still think this is justified? And if so did you think all the killing the US did in Iraq and Afghanistan was justified? and why?
I was and am totally against the war in Iraq, was critical of Afghanistan and thought we should have pulled out as soon as Obama was killed in Pakistan.
Or killing civilians and declaring them just a tragedy of war. How many is “enough?”
Israel claims responsibility for Jabalya attack, says civilian deaths are ‘tragedy of war’
Israel confirmed it was responsible for an attack on the Jabalya refugee camp in northern Gaza on Tuesday that Palestinian officials said left hundreds dead and injured.
The Israel Defense Forces targeted and killed a senior Hamas commander, Ibrahim Biari, said IDF spokesman Lt. Col. Richard Hecht.
Soldiers on the ground and in an IDF aircraft were used in the offensive, the IDF said, adding that a number of Hamas militants were killed and that tunnel entrances, weapons and military equipment were destroyed.
But the attack also appears to have had a far wider, and fatal, impact on civilians. Exact figures on the number of dead and injured were not immediately clear in the aftermath of the strikes, but footage of the scene streamed by Al Jazeera showed dozens of civilians digging through the rubble to reach trapped people.
Asked on CNN by Wolf Blitzer about why the IDF pressed ahead with the attack even though it was aware of the large civilian population in the area, Hecht said it was a “very complicated battle space” and that Biari, the Hamas commander, “killed many, many Israelis.”
“But you know that there are a lot of refugees, a lot of innocent civilians, men, women and children in that refugee camp as well, right?” Blitzer asked Hecht.
“This is the tragedy of war, Wolf,” Hecht said.
Does anyone still think this is justified? And if so did you think all the killing the US did in Iraq and Afghanistan was justified? and why?
I was and am totally against the war in Iraq, was critical of Afghanistan and thought we should have pulled out as soon as Obama was killed in Pakistan.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Or killing civilians and declaring them just a tragedy of war. How many is “enough?”
Israel claims responsibility for Jabalya attack, says civilian deaths are ‘tragedy of war’
Israel confirmed it was responsible for an attack on the Jabalya refugee camp in northern Gaza on Tuesday that Palestinian officials said left hundreds dead and injured.
The Israel Defense Forces targeted and killed a senior Hamas commander, Ibrahim Biari, said IDF spokesman Lt. Col. Richard Hecht.
Soldiers on the ground and in an IDF aircraft were used in the offensive, the IDF said, adding that a number of Hamas militants were killed and that tunnel entrances, weapons and military equipment were destroyed.
But the attack also appears to have had a far wider, and fatal, impact on civilians. Exact figures on the number of dead and injured were not immediately clear in the aftermath of the strikes, but footage of the scene streamed by Al Jazeera showed dozens of civilians digging through the rubble to reach trapped people.
Asked on CNN by Wolf Blitzer about why the IDF pressed ahead with the attack even though it was aware of the large civilian population in the area, Hecht said it was a “very complicated battle space” and that Biari, the Hamas commander, “killed many, many Israelis.”
“But you know that there are a lot of refugees, a lot of innocent civilians, men, women and children in that refugee camp as well, right?” Blitzer asked Hecht.
“This is the tragedy of war, Wolf,” Hecht said.
Does anyone still think this is justified? And if so did you think all the killing the US did in Iraq and Afghanistan was justified? and why?
What’s happening is prophetic. The war in Israel was to begin in 2023. In late 2024 a king Herod type will start nuclear war. This will be the beginning of the end and the last generation will be born. So about 70 or so more years. Trump is believed to be the next king Herod, but not Satan (surprisingly).
What’s happening is prophetic. The war in Israel was to begin in 2023. In late 2024 a king Herod type will start nuclear war. This will be the beginning of the end and the last generation will be born. So about 70 or so more years. Trump is believed to be the next king Herod, but not Satan (surprisingly).
“What’s happening in Gaza?” a friend recently texted Atef Abu Saif, who’s a novelist and the minister of culture for the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.
Where to begin? The constant explosions? The buildings that “fall like columns of smoke”? The bread lines a half-kilometer long? The body parts? Their smell?
Or the inescapable knowledge that all this has come before and will come again, because “the proper question is not what is happening, but what has been happening for more than 75 years”?
Abu Saif was visiting family in Gaza on Oct. 7, the day Hamas attacked Israel — and Israel embarked on a massive counteroffensive. He began journaling then about the experience and has not stopped. He recently shared those journals with The Post.
Atef Abu Saif is the author of six novels and since 2019 has been minister of culture for the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.
Abu Saif was visiting family in Gaza, where he grew up, when bombs began to fall Oct. 7 — in retaliation for Hamas’s surprise attack earlier that day that killed 1,400 Israelis. He began sending voice notes to friends abroad, describing the fraying texture of everyday life, creating a diary of life under siege.
The following excerpts, which have been edited for length, clarity and style, track roughly three weeks, from Oct. 7 to 26, a time when about 7,000 Gazans were killed.
Saturday, Oct. 7
I never could have imagined that the war would begin while I was swimming. I had risen around 5:30 a.m. Today is going to be a good day, I’d thought. I’d have a swim, then take a shower in my flat in Saftawi, near Jabalya, the refugee camp where I was born and spent most of my life.
At the beach, tiny fishing boats headed toward shore after a night at sea. There were four of us: my brother Mohammed, my 15-year-old son, Yasser, my brother-in-law Ismael and me. I was visiting from the West Bank and planned to be around for only a few days. Yasser had asked to accompany me: He missed his grandparents.
We drove to the northern end of the beach, parked on the main road, then walked down onto the shell-flecked sand. As usual, Israeli warships squatted on the horizon.
The sea was so inviting. Ismael and I stripped down to our shorts. Yasser took photos; Mohammed chain-smoked, the way he always does in the morning.
Suddenly, explosions sounded in all directions, the rockets tracing lines across the sky. It’s a training maneuver, I thought, and carried on swimming. It might last an hour or two, I told myself.
I swam back to shore, calling on Ismael to come with me. He shrugged as we made our way out of the water. I shouted to him that it didn’t seem to be stopping. Suddenly, everyone on the beach began to run. “We have to get out of here!” Mohammed shouted. Explosions rang louder and louder. Ismael and I ran barefoot, carrying our clothes and shoes close to our chests. Everyone around us was doing the same.
When we reached the car, I hit the accelerator before the others had even closed their doors. I drove like mad, as people leaped in front of our car, hoping to get a lift. We stopped and let five men pile into the back. We sped off again, honking to clear the way. I turned to Mohammed: “Where is Ismael? Did we leave him to the rockets?”
Mohammed laughed. “No, we left him to the sharks.” He had told Ismael to go on: His house wasn’t far from the beach. Mohammed’s shark joke didn’t make me feel any better.
For hours, no one knew what was going on. Then the news trickled in. A friend, a young poet and musician named Omar Abu Shawish, had been swimming, just like us, in the sea in front of Nuseirat Camp when he and a friend were hit by a shell from a passing warship. They were reportedly the first two Gazan victims.
Egypt condemns Jabalia strikes amid reports Rafah may open to wounded
Egypt
on Tuesday condemned the Israeli strikes on Jabalia camp “in the
strongest terms”, warning against “the consequences of the continuation
of these indiscriminate attacks that target defenceless civilians” in a
foreign ministry statement.
Egypt is preparing
to treat wounded Palestinians from the bombarded Gaza Strip starting
Wednesday, with the opening of a border crossing to people after weeks
of war, medical and security sources told AFP.
Egypt
is reportedly preparing to receive wounded Palestinians from the Gaza
through the Rafah border crossing for medical treatment, medical and
security sources said on Tuesday.
“Medical
teams will be present tomorrow (Wednesday) at the crossing to examine
the cases coming (from Gaza) as soon as they arrive... and determine the
hospitals they will be sent to,” a medical official in Egypt‘s city of
El Arish told AFP.
Ambulances
are seen on the day of Egyptian Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly's visit
to the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and the Gaza Strip, amid the
ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestinian Islamist group Hamas,
in Rafah, Egypt, 31 October 2023. Photograph: Mohamed Abd El Ghany/Reuters
An AFP photographer on Tuesday saw a large number of ambulances gathered at the Egyptian side of the crossing.
The
border authority in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip said that Egypt had
agreed to let in 81 of the most badly wounded on Wednesday through
Rafah, the only crossing not controlled by Israel.
A
security source at the Rafah crossing confirmed the information, which
was earlier reported by the state-affiliated Al-Qahera news channel.
The
medical official added that a field hospital with an area of 1,300
square metres (about 14,000 square feet) would be built to receive the
wounded Palestinians in the city of Sheikh Zuweid in northern Sinai,
about 15 kilometres (nine miles) from Rafah.
“The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man [or woman] who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.”
There were 13 of us in the Roots Hotel: 10 guests and three attendants. Breakfast was served on tables in the corridor between the lift and the staircase. Whenever bombing starts — and there’s bombing virtually every month in Gaza — you must move to the middle of the building, usually a corridor or a stairwell, because it’s farthest from flying window glass, the most fortified part of a building. During the 2008-2009 war, my wife, Hanna; the kids; and I spent 22 nights sleeping in the corridor at home. This is surely what kept us alive.
Through the curtains, I glimpsed the bright blue sea below the small cliff on which our hotel perched. Fishing boats idled in the harbor, rocking in time with the swaying curtains. Farther off, three warships hovered. As I ate, I thought about the soldiers inside watching us. With their infrared lenses and satellite photography, could they count the loafs of bread in my basket, or the number of falafel balls on my plate?
Yasser — who, at 15, has witnessed only two wars — is still scarred by memories of the 2014 war. He was 7 at the time and remembers it vividly. His sister Jaffa, who was only 2, claims she remembers it, but when she describes it, I suspect she’s describing videos she has seen. She has a kind of nostalgia for it. Memories of war can be strangely positive, because to have them at all means you must have survived.
Survival was the topic of conversation today. The hotel’s other guests — all from the West Bank — had decided to leave through the Rafah Crossing Point into Egypt. They held passports, and many had diplomatic clearances. Before breakfast was finished, arrangements had been made with the Egyptian side. My name and Yasser’s were included, and we packed our things. Then, as Mohammed headed to the car, I announced that I’d be staying. This might not prove to be the wisest decision I’ve ever made, but it felt like the right one. I couldn’t flee out of fear, abandoning my father, brothers and sisters Eisha and Asma. I was only 2 months old when my first war broke out, in 1973, and I’ve been living through wars ever since. Just as life is a pause between two deaths, Palestine, as a place and as an idea, is a timeout in the middle of many wars.
I told Yasser to leave with the others, but he wanted to stay by my side. I was torn — the idea of leaving him on his own at the Rafah crossing, which is always bombed by Israel at the start of these wars, and not being with him as he crossed Northern Sinai, which is its own war zone these days, terrified me. In the end, I did what he asked.
On our way to drop off Yasser at his grandparents’ place, I asked Mohammed to stop by the patch of land I own so I could water the trees. It’s a small plot that I intend to build a house on one day. “Are you joking?” Mohammed screamed. “It’s far too dangerous.”
“Leaving the trees without water is dangerous, too,” I replied. “If the war goes on for long, they’ll die.”
Mohammed laughed. “They’ll die anyway if there’s an invasion. The tanks will bulldoze them as they always do.” I insisted nevertheless.
Mohammed and I dropped Yasser off with his grandparents, who live near one of the schools run by the United Nations. Afterwards I met up with Ali, my friend Hisham’s son, who told me they’d had to leave their homes in Beit Hanoun. Many families are sheltering in Jabalya’s U.N. schools. The street in front of one of the schools was heaving with people: confused children, angry men, tired women. All of them seemed lost. Farmers herded their animals along the school walls. A single teacher stood in the middle, desperately trying to create order out of the chaos.
The city has become a wasteland of rubble and debris. Beautiful buildings fall like columns of smoke. I often think about the time I was shot as a kid, during the first intifada, and how my mother told me I actually died for a few minutes before being brought back to life. Maybe I can do the same this time, I think.
Today is Monday, which means the weekly West Bank government cabinet meeting was at 10 a.m. I attended on my phone via Zoom but couldn’t fully concentrate as news alerts kept popping up. The screech of missiles from the gunships was deafening.
The alerts informed me that an airstrike had killed 50 in Al Tirrans. I apologized to the other ministers and headed back to the camp. Al Tirrans is the heart of Jabalya. All the transport links to nearby towns and villages converge at that point: taxis and minibuses to Beit Hanoun, Beit Lahia, the Bedouin Village and elsewhere in the north of the Strip.
On our way to Al Tirrans, Yasser and I passed by families wandering in a daze. They seemed to be carrying all their worldly possessions — mattresses, bags of clothes, food and drink.
When we arrived at the site of the attack, I was horrified to see the entire place flattened. The supermarket, the bureau de change, the falafel shop, the fruit stalls, the perfume parlor, the sweets shop, the toy shop — all burned.
Blood was everywhere, along with bits of kids’ toys, cans from the supermarket, smashed fruit, broken bicycles and shattered perfume bottles. The place looked like a charcoal drawing of a town scorched by a dragon.
I asked Yasser to stay in his grandparents’ house. The Palestinian logic is that in wartime, we should all sleep in different places, so that if part of the family is killed, another part lives. The U.N. schools are getting more crowded with displaced families. The hope is that the U.N. flag will save them, though in previous wars, that hasn’t been the case.
I went to the Press House, where journalists were frantically downloading images and writing reports for their agencies. I was sitting with Bilal, the Press House manager, when an explosion shook the building. Windows shattered, and the ceiling collapsed onto us in chunks. We ran toward the central hall. One of the journalists was bleeding, having been hit by flying glass. After 20 minutes, we ventured out to inspect the damage. I noticed that Ramadan decorations were still hanging in the street.
Back in the hotel, I felt exhausted and unable to concentrate. I had pain in my wrists. Bilal told me it was from overusing my phone. I spend hours clutching it, desperate for news.
I see death approaching, hear its steps growing louder. Just be done with it, I think. It’s the 11th day of the conflict, but all the days have merged into one: the same bombardment, the same fear, the same smell. On the news, I read the names of the dead on the ticker at the bottom of the screen. I wait for my name to appear.
In the morning, my phone rang. It was Rulla, a relative in the West Bank, telling me she had heard there’d been an airstrike in Talat Howa, a neighborhood on the south side of Gaza City where my cousin Hatem lives. Hatem is married to Huda, my wife’s only sister. He lives in a four-story building that also houses his mother and brothers and their families.
I called around, but no one’s phone was working. I walked to al-Shifa Hospital to read the names: Lists of the dead are pinned up daily outside a makeshift morgue. I could barely approach the building: Thousands of Gazans had made the hospital their home; its gardens, its hallways, every empty space or spare corner had a family in it. I gave up and headed toward Hatem’s.
Thirty minutes later, I was on his street. Rulla had been right. Huda and Hatem’s building had been hit only an hour earlier. The bodies of their daughter and grandchild had already been retrieved; the only known survivor was Wissam, one of their other daughters, who had been taken to the ICU. Wissam had gone straight into surgery, where both of her legs and her right hand had been amputated. Her graduation ceremony from art college had taken place only the day before. She has to spend the rest of her life without legs, with one hand. “What about the others?” I asked someone.
“We can’t find them,” came the reply.
Amid the rubble, we shouted: “Hello? Can anyone hear us?” We called out the names of those still missing, hoping some might still be alive. By the end of the day, we’d managed to find five bodies, including that of a 3-month-old. We went to the cemetery to bury them.
In the evening, I went to see Wissam in the hospital; she was barely awake. After half an hour, she asked me: “Khalo [Uncle], I’m dreaming, right?”
I said, “We are all in a dream.”
“My dream is terrifying! Why?”
“All our dreams are terrifying.”
After 10 minutes of silence, she said, “Don’t lie to me, Khalo. In my dream, I don’t have legs. It’s true, isn’t it? I have no legs?”
“But you said it’s a dream.”
“I don’t like this dream, Khalo.”
I had to leave. For a long 10 minutes, I cried and cried. Overwhelmed by the horrors of the past few days, I walked out of the hospital and found myself wandering the streets. I thought idly, we could turn this city into a film set for war movies. Second World War films and end-of-the-world movies. We could hire it out to the best Hollywood directors. Doomsday on demand.
Who could have the courage to tell Hanna, so far away in Ramallah, that her only sister had been killed? That her family had been killed? I phoned my colleague Manar and asked her to go to our house with a couple of friends and try to delay the news from getting to her. “Lie to her,” I told Manar. “Say the building was attacked by F-16s but the neighbors think Huda and Hatem were out at the time. Any lie that could help.”
In the morning, I rejoined the search for bodies. The building was, as T.S. Eliot would say, “a heap of broken images.” We searchers picked through the ruins under the cricket-like hum of drones we couldn’t see in the sky.
This is my second night in Jabalya Camp, where I should’ve been from the beginning, where my family — father, sisters, brothers — have gathered. There’s no internet. No social media. We’re back in the radio age. Explosions continue, each one feeling closer than the last, each one inspiring me to reach for my own body to see whether I’ve been hit.
Why do I even want to survive? What is survival good for, if I live only to spend another day fearing my death?
It’s been a dark and terrible night. Hundreds were killed at al-Ahli Hospital last night. They’d sought life and a future in the sanctity of this hospital, thinking, mistakenly, that it would be safe.
The hospital was built by the British, or I should say the Church of England, about 150 years ago. We used to call it the English hospital. It was here that I was saved by an English surgeon after being shot as a teenager in the first intifada, a bullet lodged in my liver.
I could barely sleep, thinking of the children who had been sleeping on the grass in the gardens of the hospital in front of the church, lying under the darkening sky, protected by only a few scattered clouds, awaiting the morning sun they would never wake up to. I closed my eyes and tried to imagine not waking up myself.
A friend texted: “What’s happening in Gaza?”
I replied: “The proper question is not what is happening, but what has been happening for more than 75 years.”
We live in a war film, and the producer doesn’t want it to end. The studio keeps feeding the script with new scenes, keeps adding millions of dollars to the budget. It’s going be a blockbuster, as long as they never stop filming.
I headed to the Press House to charge my phone and watch the news. Last night, this whole neighborhood was hit and everything shattered — windows, floors, ceilings, shelves, doors. The only things that didn’t fall were the photos of Gaza City that hung around the internal courtyard. If Yasser and my brother Ahmed and I had spent the night there, as we did during the first week, we wouldn’t have survived. Nobody knows what is safe and what is dangerous. You have to roll the dice.
News came that the Israelis wanted to evacuate more than 60 percent of the Strip’s inhabitants, presumably so they could flatten Gaza City. Helicopters dropped leaflets everywhere. In Arabic, they announced that anyone who remained north of the Wadi waterway would be considered a partner to terrorism — meaning the Israelis can shoot on sight. I will not obey their orders. I’ve spent this whole time in northern Gaza City and Rimal, two of the hardest-hit areas. Sometimes all you have are the choices you make.
Hanna pleaded with me by text to relocate to Rafah, so Yasser and I could be close to the crossing. “I don’t trust the Israeli army,” I replied. “So why should I obey them?”
Yesterday, my friend Mohammed’s brother was killed with his family in Nuseirat Camp, having moved south from Gaza City as the Israelis ordered. Others who obeyed didn’t get even that far. Dozens were killed yesterday in a cluster of missile strikes on the Salah al-Din Road, the main artery heading southward.
Like the sound of a drone outside, or the persistent buzz of a mosquito indoors, danger is everywhere. No place is safe in the Gaza Strip.
This is my second night in Jabalya Camp, where I should’ve been from the beginning, where my family — father, sisters, brothers — have gathered. There’s no internet. No social media. We’re back in the radio age. Explosions continue, each one feeling closer than the last, each one inspiring me to reach for my own body to see whether I’ve been hit.
Why do I even want to survive? What is survival good for, if I live only to spend another day fearing my death?
It’s been a dark and terrible night. Hundreds were killed at al-Ahli Hospital last night. They’d sought life and a future in the sanctity of this hospital, thinking, mistakenly, that it would be safe.
The hospital was built by the British, or I should say the Church of England, about 150 years ago. We used to call it the English hospital. It was here that I was saved by an English surgeon after being shot as a teenager in the first intifada, a bullet lodged in my liver.
I could barely sleep, thinking of the children who had been sleeping on the grass in the gardens of the hospital in front of the church, lying under the darkening sky, protected by only a few scattered clouds, awaiting the morning sun they would never wake up to. I closed my eyes and tried to imagine not waking up myself.
A friend texted: “What’s happening in Gaza?”
I replied: “The proper question is not what is happening, but what has been happening for more than 75 years.”
We live in a war film, and the producer doesn’t want it to end. The studio keeps feeding the script with new scenes, keeps adding millions of dollars to the budget. It’s going be a blockbuster, as long as they never stop filming.
I headed to the Press House to charge my phone and watch the news. Last night, this whole neighborhood was hit and everything shattered — windows, floors, ceilings, shelves, doors. The only things that didn’t fall were the photos of Gaza City that hung around the internal courtyard. If Yasser and my brother Ahmed and I had spent the night there, as we did during the first week, we wouldn’t have survived. Nobody knows what is safe and what is dangerous. You have to roll the dice.
News came that the Israelis wanted to evacuate more than 60 percent of the Strip’s inhabitants, presumably so they could flatten Gaza City. Helicopters dropped leaflets everywhere. In Arabic, they announced that anyone who remained north of the Wadi waterway would be considered a partner to terrorism — meaning the Israelis can shoot on sight. I will not obey their orders. I’ve spent this whole time in northern Gaza City and Rimal, two of the hardest-hit areas. Sometimes all you have are the choices you make.
Hanna pleaded with me by text to relocate to Rafah, so Yasser and I could be close to the crossing. “I don’t trust the Israeli army,” I replied. “So why should I obey them?”
Yesterday, my friend Mohammed’s brother was killed with his family in Nuseirat Camp, having moved south from Gaza City as the Israelis ordered. Others who obeyed didn’t get even that far. Dozens were killed yesterday in a cluster of missile strikes on the Salah al-Din Road, the main artery heading southward.
Like the sound of a drone outside, or the persistent buzz of a mosquito indoors, danger is everywhere. No place is safe in the Gaza Strip.
@Lerxst1992 serious question, what do you think of perspectives like this?
war is horrible. I wish it were over. As far as the suffering people in Gaza - Why does the leadership of Gaza bear no responsibility for instigating this war on Oct 7? Why is no one calling for Hamas to surrender? Why aren’t the Palestinian people shouting at the cameras “we want peace with our neighbors, and Israel has the right to exist peacefully?
Comments
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Libtardaplorable©. And proud of it.
Brilliantati©
Vegas 93, Vegas 98, Vegas 00 (10 year show), Vegas 03, Vegas 06
VIC 07
EV LA1 08
Seattle1 09, Seattle2 09, Salt Lake 09, LA4 09
Columbus 10
EV LA 11
Vancouver 11
Missoula 12
Portland 13, Spokane 13
St. Paul 14, Denver 14
EV
Toronto Film Festival 9/11/2007, '08 - Toronto 1 & 2, '09 - Albany 1, '11 - Chicago 1
"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
Israeli airstrikes have caused extensive damage to Gaza hospital, aid organization says
From CNN’s Abeer Salman and Jessie Gretener
Israeli airstrikes have “caused extensive damage to hospital departments and exposed residents and patients to suffocation” at the Al-Quds Hospital, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society said Sunday.
The aid organization accused Israel of “deliberately” launching the airstrikes “directly next to Al-Quds Hospital, with the aim of forcing the medical staff, displaced people, and patients to evacuate the hospital.”
Videos from the Palestinian Red Crescent show dust clouding up hallways in the hospital, with some people trying to put on face masks. Other video obtained by CNN appears to show the aftermath of a strike, with a cloud of dust rising next to the hospital.
The director of Al-Quds Hospital, Dr. Bashar Mourad, told CNN the vicinity of the hospital had been targeted three times by Israeli airstrikes Sunday as of 4:45 p.m. local time (10:45 a.m. ET).
CNN has asked the Israel Defense Forces about the aid organization's reports that the Al-Quds Hospital was specifically targeted by airstrikes.
Some background: Al-Quds Hospital is treating hundreds of patients, including wounded people, patients in intensive care and children in incubators, the Palestinian Red Crescent said. In addition, approximately 12,000 internally displaced civilians are currently sheltering at the hospital.
The hospital is located in the Tal Al Hawa neighborhood in Gaza City, north of Wadi Gaza — the line south of which Israel has urged people in Gaza to flee.
Earlier Sunday, the Palestinian Red Crescent had said it received a warning to immediately evacuate the hospital. The World Health Organization has said the order is impossible without endangering the lives of patients.
In response to questions about the evacuation warning and medical workers' response, Israel Defense Forces spokesperson Maj. Nir Dinar told CNN, "They received much more than two (warnings) for the last three weeks."
Libtardaplorable©. And proud of it.
Brilliantati©
There are no kings inside the gates of eden
Israel claims responsibility for Jabalya attack, says civilian deaths are ‘tragedy of war’
Israel confirmed it was responsible for an attack on the Jabalya refugee camp in northern Gaza on Tuesday that Palestinian officials said left hundreds dead and injured.
The Israel Defense Forces targeted and killed a senior Hamas commander, Ibrahim Biari, said IDF spokesman Lt. Col. Richard Hecht.
Soldiers on the ground and in an IDF aircraft were used in the offensive, the IDF said, adding that a number of Hamas militants were killed and that tunnel entrances, weapons and military equipment were destroyed.
But the attack also appears to have had a far wider, and fatal, impact on civilians. Exact figures on the number of dead and injured were not immediately clear in the aftermath of the strikes, but footage of the scene streamed by Al Jazeera showed dozens of civilians digging through the rubble to reach trapped people.
Asked on CNN by Wolf Blitzer about why the IDF pressed ahead with the attack even though it was aware of the large civilian population in the area, Hecht said it was a “very complicated battle space” and that Biari, the Hamas commander, “killed many, many Israelis.”
“But you know that there are a lot of refugees, a lot of innocent civilians, men, women and children in that refugee camp as well, right?” Blitzer asked Hecht.
“This is the tragedy of war, Wolf,” Hecht said.
Libtardaplorable©. And proud of it.
Brilliantati©
www.headstonesband.com
Libtardaplorable©. And proud of it.
Brilliantati©
There are no kings inside the gates of eden
There are no kings inside the gates of eden
Libtardaplorable©. And proud of it.
Brilliantati©
oSama
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Libtardaplorable©. And proud of it.
Brilliantati©
“What’s happening in Gaza?” a friend recently texted Atef Abu Saif, who’s a novelist and the minister of culture for the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.
Where to begin? The constant explosions? The buildings that “fall like columns of smoke”? The bread lines a half-kilometer long? The body parts? Their smell?
Or the inescapable knowledge that all this has come before and will come again, because “the proper question is not what is happening, but what has been happening for more than 75 years”?
Abu Saif was visiting family in Gaza on Oct. 7, the day Hamas attacked Israel — and Israel embarked on a massive counteroffensive. He began journaling then about the experience and has not stopped. He recently shared those journals with The Post.
Atef Abu Saif is the author of six novels and since 2019 has been minister of culture for the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.
Abu Saif was visiting family in Gaza, where he grew up, when bombs began to fall Oct. 7 — in retaliation for Hamas’s surprise attack earlier that day that killed 1,400 Israelis. He began sending voice notes to friends abroad, describing the fraying texture of everyday life, creating a diary of life under siege.
The following excerpts, which have been edited for length, clarity and style, track roughly three weeks, from Oct. 7 to 26, a time when about 7,000 Gazans were killed.
Saturday, Oct. 7
I never could have imagined that the war would begin while I was swimming. I had risen around 5:30 a.m. Today is going to be a good day, I’d thought. I’d have a swim, then take a shower in my flat in Saftawi, near Jabalya, the refugee camp where I was born and spent most of my life.
At the beach, tiny fishing boats headed toward shore after a night at sea. There were four of us: my brother Mohammed, my 15-year-old son, Yasser, my brother-in-law Ismael and me. I was visiting from the West Bank and planned to be around for only a few days. Yasser had asked to accompany me: He missed his grandparents.
We drove to the northern end of the beach, parked on the main road, then walked down onto the shell-flecked sand. As usual, Israeli warships squatted on the horizon.
The sea was so inviting. Ismael and I stripped down to our shorts. Yasser took photos; Mohammed chain-smoked, the way he always does in the morning.
Suddenly, explosions sounded in all directions, the rockets tracing lines across the sky. It’s a training maneuver, I thought, and carried on swimming. It might last an hour or two, I told myself.
I swam back to shore, calling on Ismael to come with me. He shrugged as we made our way out of the water. I shouted to him that it didn’t seem to be stopping. Suddenly, everyone on the beach began to run. “We have to get out of here!” Mohammed shouted. Explosions rang louder and louder. Ismael and I ran barefoot, carrying our clothes and shoes close to our chests. Everyone around us was doing the same.
When we reached the car, I hit the accelerator before the others had even closed their doors. I drove like mad, as people leaped in front of our car, hoping to get a lift. We stopped and let five men pile into the back. We sped off again, honking to clear the way. I turned to Mohammed: “Where is Ismael? Did we leave him to the rockets?”
Mohammed laughed. “No, we left him to the sharks.” He had told Ismael to go on: His house wasn’t far from the beach. Mohammed’s shark joke didn’t make me feel any better.
For hours, no one knew what was going on. Then the news trickled in. A friend, a young poet and musician named Omar Abu Shawish, had been swimming, just like us, in the sea in front of Nuseirat Camp when he and a friend were hit by a shell from a passing warship. They were reportedly the first two Gazan victims.
Libtardaplorable©. And proud of it.
Brilliantati©
Egypt condemns Jabalia strikes amid reports Rafah may open to wounded
Egypt on Tuesday condemned the Israeli strikes on Jabalia camp “in the strongest terms”, warning against “the consequences of the continuation of these indiscriminate attacks that target defenceless civilians” in a foreign ministry statement.
Egypt is preparing to treat wounded Palestinians from the bombarded Gaza Strip starting Wednesday, with the opening of a border crossing to people after weeks of war, medical and security sources told AFP.
Egypt is reportedly preparing to receive wounded Palestinians from the Gaza through the Rafah border crossing for medical treatment, medical and security sources said on Tuesday.
“Medical teams will be present tomorrow (Wednesday) at the crossing to examine the cases coming (from Gaza) as soon as they arrive... and determine the hospitals they will be sent to,” a medical official in Egypt‘s city of El Arish told AFP.
An AFP photographer on Tuesday saw a large number of ambulances gathered at the Egyptian side of the crossing.
The border authority in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip said that Egypt had agreed to let in 81 of the most badly wounded on Wednesday through Rafah, the only crossing not controlled by Israel.
A security source at the Rafah crossing confirmed the information, which was earlier reported by the state-affiliated Al-Qahera news channel.
The medical official added that a field hospital with an area of 1,300 square metres (about 14,000 square feet) would be built to receive the wounded Palestinians in the city of Sheikh Zuweid in northern Sinai, about 15 kilometres (nine miles) from Rafah.
Sunday, Oct. 8
There were 13 of us in the Roots Hotel: 10 guests and three attendants. Breakfast was served on tables in the corridor between the lift and the staircase. Whenever bombing starts — and there’s bombing virtually every month in Gaza — you must move to the middle of the building, usually a corridor or a stairwell, because it’s farthest from flying window glass, the most fortified part of a building. During the 2008-2009 war, my wife, Hanna; the kids; and I spent 22 nights sleeping in the corridor at home. This is surely what kept us alive.
Through the curtains, I glimpsed the bright blue sea below the small cliff on which our hotel perched. Fishing boats idled in the harbor, rocking in time with the swaying curtains. Farther off, three warships hovered. As I ate, I thought about the soldiers inside watching us. With their infrared lenses and satellite photography, could they count the loafs of bread in my basket, or the number of falafel balls on my plate?
Yasser — who, at 15, has witnessed only two wars — is still scarred by memories of the 2014 war. He was 7 at the time and remembers it vividly. His sister Jaffa, who was only 2, claims she remembers it, but when she describes it, I suspect she’s describing videos she has seen. She has a kind of nostalgia for it. Memories of war can be strangely positive, because to have them at all means you must have survived.
Survival was the topic of conversation today. The hotel’s other guests — all from the West Bank — had decided to leave through the Rafah Crossing Point into Egypt. They held passports, and many had diplomatic clearances. Before breakfast was finished, arrangements had been made with the Egyptian side. My name and Yasser’s were included, and we packed our things. Then, as Mohammed headed to the car, I announced that I’d be staying. This might not prove to be the wisest decision I’ve ever made, but it felt like the right one. I couldn’t flee out of fear, abandoning my father, brothers and sisters Eisha and Asma. I was only 2 months old when my first war broke out, in 1973, and I’ve been living through wars ever since. Just as life is a pause between two deaths, Palestine, as a place and as an idea, is a timeout in the middle of many wars.
I told Yasser to leave with the others, but he wanted to stay by my side. I was torn — the idea of leaving him on his own at the Rafah crossing, which is always bombed by Israel at the start of these wars, and not being with him as he crossed Northern Sinai, which is its own war zone these days, terrified me. In the end, I did what he asked.
On our way to drop off Yasser at his grandparents’ place, I asked Mohammed to stop by the patch of land I own so I could water the trees. It’s a small plot that I intend to build a house on one day. “Are you joking?” Mohammed screamed. “It’s far too dangerous.”
“Leaving the trees without water is dangerous, too,” I replied. “If the war goes on for long, they’ll die.”
Mohammed laughed. “They’ll die anyway if there’s an invasion. The tanks will bulldoze them as they always do.” I insisted nevertheless.
Mohammed and I dropped Yasser off with his grandparents, who live near one of the schools run by the United Nations. Afterwards I met up with Ali, my friend Hisham’s son, who told me they’d had to leave their homes in Beit Hanoun. Many families are sheltering in Jabalya’s U.N. schools. The street in front of one of the schools was heaving with people: confused children, angry men, tired women. All of them seemed lost. Farmers herded their animals along the school walls. A single teacher stood in the middle, desperately trying to create order out of the chaos.
Libtardaplorable©. And proud of it.
Brilliantati©
Monday, Oct. 9
The city has become a wasteland of rubble and debris. Beautiful buildings fall like columns of smoke. I often think about the time I was shot as a kid, during the first intifada, and how my mother told me I actually died for a few minutes before being brought back to life. Maybe I can do the same this time, I think.
Today is Monday, which means the weekly West Bank government cabinet meeting was at 10 a.m. I attended on my phone via Zoom but couldn’t fully concentrate as news alerts kept popping up. The screech of missiles from the gunships was deafening.
The alerts informed me that an airstrike had killed 50 in Al Tirrans. I apologized to the other ministers and headed back to the camp. Al Tirrans is the heart of Jabalya. All the transport links to nearby towns and villages converge at that point: taxis and minibuses to Beit Hanoun, Beit Lahia, the Bedouin Village and elsewhere in the north of the Strip.
On our way to Al Tirrans, Yasser and I passed by families wandering in a daze. They seemed to be carrying all their worldly possessions — mattresses, bags of clothes, food and drink.
When we arrived at the site of the attack, I was horrified to see the entire place flattened. The supermarket, the bureau de change, the falafel shop, the fruit stalls, the perfume parlor, the sweets shop, the toy shop — all burned.
Blood was everywhere, along with bits of kids’ toys, cans from the supermarket, smashed fruit, broken bicycles and shattered perfume bottles. The place looked like a charcoal drawing of a town scorched by a dragon.
I asked Yasser to stay in his grandparents’ house. The Palestinian logic is that in wartime, we should all sleep in different places, so that if part of the family is killed, another part lives. The U.N. schools are getting more crowded with displaced families. The hope is that the U.N. flag will save them, though in previous wars, that hasn’t been the case.
I went to the Press House, where journalists were frantically downloading images and writing reports for their agencies. I was sitting with Bilal, the Press House manager, when an explosion shook the building. Windows shattered, and the ceiling collapsed onto us in chunks. We ran toward the central hall. One of the journalists was bleeding, having been hit by flying glass. After 20 minutes, we ventured out to inspect the damage. I noticed that Ramadan decorations were still hanging in the street.
Back in the hotel, I felt exhausted and unable to concentrate. I had pain in my wrists. Bilal told me it was from overusing my phone. I spend hours clutching it, desperate for news.
Libtardaplorable©. And proud of it.
Brilliantati©
Tuesday, Oct. 17
I see death approaching, hear its steps growing louder. Just be done with it, I think. It’s the 11th day of the conflict, but all the days have merged into one: the same bombardment, the same fear, the same smell. On the news, I read the names of the dead on the ticker at the bottom of the screen. I wait for my name to appear.
In the morning, my phone rang. It was Rulla, a relative in the West Bank, telling me she had heard there’d been an airstrike in Talat Howa, a neighborhood on the south side of Gaza City where my cousin Hatem lives. Hatem is married to Huda, my wife’s only sister. He lives in a four-story building that also houses his mother and brothers and their families.
I called around, but no one’s phone was working. I walked to al-Shifa Hospital to read the names: Lists of the dead are pinned up daily outside a makeshift morgue. I could barely approach the building: Thousands of Gazans had made the hospital their home; its gardens, its hallways, every empty space or spare corner had a family in it. I gave up and headed toward Hatem’s.
Thirty minutes later, I was on his street. Rulla had been right. Huda and Hatem’s building had been hit only an hour earlier. The bodies of their daughter and grandchild had already been retrieved; the only known survivor was Wissam, one of their other daughters, who had been taken to the ICU. Wissam had gone straight into surgery, where both of her legs and her right hand had been amputated. Her graduation ceremony from art college had taken place only the day before. She has to spend the rest of her life without legs, with one hand. “What about the others?” I asked someone.
“We can’t find them,” came the reply.
Amid the rubble, we shouted: “Hello? Can anyone hear us?” We called out the names of those still missing, hoping some might still be alive. By the end of the day, we’d managed to find five bodies, including that of a 3-month-old. We went to the cemetery to bury them.
In the evening, I went to see Wissam in the hospital; she was barely awake. After half an hour, she asked me: “Khalo [Uncle], I’m dreaming, right?”
I said, “We are all in a dream.”
“My dream is terrifying! Why?”
“All our dreams are terrifying.”
After 10 minutes of silence, she said, “Don’t lie to me, Khalo. In my dream, I don’t have legs. It’s true, isn’t it? I have no legs?”
“But you said it’s a dream.”
“I don’t like this dream, Khalo.”
I had to leave. For a long 10 minutes, I cried and cried. Overwhelmed by the horrors of the past few days, I walked out of the hospital and found myself wandering the streets. I thought idly, we could turn this city into a film set for war movies. Second World War films and end-of-the-world movies. We could hire it out to the best Hollywood directors. Doomsday on demand.
Who could have the courage to tell Hanna, so far away in Ramallah, that her only sister had been killed? That her family had been killed? I phoned my colleague Manar and asked her to go to our house with a couple of friends and try to delay the news from getting to her. “Lie to her,” I told Manar. “Say the building was attacked by F-16s but the neighbors think Huda and Hatem were out at the time. Any lie that could help.”
In the morning, I rejoined the search for bodies. The building was, as T.S. Eliot would say, “a heap of broken images.” We searchers picked through the ruins under the cricket-like hum of drones we couldn’t see in the sky.
Libtardaplorable©. And proud of it.
Brilliantati©
Wednesday, Oct. 18
This is my second night in Jabalya Camp, where I should’ve been from the beginning, where my family — father, sisters, brothers — have gathered. There’s no internet. No social media. We’re back in the radio age. Explosions continue, each one feeling closer than the last, each one inspiring me to reach for my own body to see whether I’ve been hit.
Why do I even want to survive? What is survival good for, if I live only to spend another day fearing my death?
It’s been a dark and terrible night. Hundreds were killed at al-Ahli Hospital last night. They’d sought life and a future in the sanctity of this hospital, thinking, mistakenly, that it would be safe.
The hospital was built by the British, or I should say the Church of England, about 150 years ago. We used to call it the English hospital. It was here that I was saved by an English surgeon after being shot as a teenager in the first intifada, a bullet lodged in my liver.
I could barely sleep, thinking of the children who had been sleeping on the grass in the gardens of the hospital in front of the church, lying under the darkening sky, protected by only a few scattered clouds, awaiting the morning sun they would never wake up to. I closed my eyes and tried to imagine not waking up myself.
A friend texted: “What’s happening in Gaza?”
I replied: “The proper question is not what is happening, but what has been happening for more than 75 years.”
We live in a war film, and the producer doesn’t want it to end. The studio keeps feeding the script with new scenes, keeps adding millions of dollars to the budget. It’s going be a blockbuster, as long as they never stop filming.
I headed to the Press House to charge my phone and watch the news. Last night, this whole neighborhood was hit and everything shattered — windows, floors, ceilings, shelves, doors. The only things that didn’t fall were the photos of Gaza City that hung around the internal courtyard. If Yasser and my brother Ahmed and I had spent the night there, as we did during the first week, we wouldn’t have survived. Nobody knows what is safe and what is dangerous. You have to roll the dice.
News came that the Israelis wanted to evacuate more than 60 percent of the Strip’s inhabitants, presumably so they could flatten Gaza City. Helicopters dropped leaflets everywhere. In Arabic, they announced that anyone who remained north of the Wadi waterway would be considered a partner to terrorism — meaning the Israelis can shoot on sight. I will not obey their orders. I’ve spent this whole time in northern Gaza City and Rimal, two of the hardest-hit areas. Sometimes all you have are the choices you make.
Hanna pleaded with me by text to relocate to Rafah, so Yasser and I could be close to the crossing. “I don’t trust the Israeli army,” I replied. “So why should I obey them?”
Yesterday, my friend Mohammed’s brother was killed with his family in Nuseirat Camp, having moved south from Gaza City as the Israelis ordered. Others who obeyed didn’t get even that far. Dozens were killed yesterday in a cluster of missile strikes on the Salah al-Din Road, the main artery heading southward.
Like the sound of a drone outside, or the persistent buzz of a mosquito indoors, danger is everywhere. No place is safe in the Gaza Strip.
Libtardaplorable©. And proud of it.
Brilliantati©
There are no kings inside the gates of eden
Why does the leadership of Gaza bear no responsibility for instigating this war on Oct 7?
Why is no one calling for Hamas to surrender?
Why aren’t the Palestinian people shouting at the cameras “we want peace with our neighbors, and Israel has the right to exist peacefully?