Gaza Speaks: This is What the Decade-long Siege Has Done to Us
14 February 2016By Ramzy Baroud
(With reporting from Yousef Aljamal in Gaza)
Whenever Mariam Aljamal's children hear the sound of thunder at night, they
wet their beds. Their reaction is almost instinctive, and is shared by a large
number of children throughout the Gaza Strip.
Mariam's three children – Jamal, Lina and Sarah – were all born a few years
after the Gaza siege was first imposed in 2006, and all of them have
experienced at least one Israeli war.
''My kids feel scared when the electricity goes off, which is most of the
time,'' says the 33-year-old mother from Nuseirat Refugee Camp, who has a
degree in Communication and is currently pursuing her MA. ''They are still
living the trauma of the 2014 offensive. War is still haunting my family, and
life has become so hard for us.''
Indeed, after years of trying, Mariam is yet to find work. Unemployment in
Gaza is the highest in the world, according to the World Bank.
The siege on Gaza was imposed in stages, starting January 2006, when the Hamas
movement won the legislative elections in the Occupied Territories. Donors'
money was immediately withheld, so the new Government could not pay the
salaries of its employees. The conventional wisdom, then, was the new
Government would soon collapse, and Hamas' rival, Fatah, would quickly resume
its control over the Palestinian Authority (PA).
The Israeli hope, which was reinforced by the US and also shared by PA
President Mahmoud Abbas and many in his party, never came to fruition. To
speed up the projected collapse, Israel began sporadic bombardment of Gaza and
carried out a sweeping campaign to arrest many of its elected MPs, coupled
with a Fatah and Hamas dispute, which eventually turned into street battles in
the summer of 2007.
It was then that the siege became complete, now ongoing for ten years. During
this time, Fatah resumed its control over the PA in the West Bank,
reconciliation between Hamas and Fatah largely failed, the Rafah border has
been mostly sealed, and Israel has launched three major wars that have killed
thousands.
The destruction in Gaza as a result of three consecutive wars (2008-9, 12 and
14) has been so severe, it has affected almost every aspect of the Strip's
already dilapidated infrastructure. Power outages, for example, have become
part of life in Gaza. If all goes according to plan, Palestinians here have
only 8-10 hours, per day, to utilize electricity, and for the rest of the day
they suffer in darkness. The UN had already declared that life in Gaza will
become ‘uninhabitable' by 2020.
But there are aspects of this drama that do not receive a fair share of
attention, such as how the siege is hindering human development for an entire
generation.
When the siege was imposed, Ahmad Ghazal was only 13-years-old. Now, he is 23
and works at a local library in Gaza City. ''Life here is not pleasant,'' he
says. ''In the last ten years my family has suffered the lack of food, clean
water, proper medical care and the most basic of human needs. But what
frustrates me most is the fact that I am not able to move freely. The
Israeli-Egyptian shut down of border crossings has brought our life to a
standstill. I feel trapped.''
Maher Azzam is 21 years of age and he, too, feels imprisoned. He teaches
English at Smart International Centre for Languages and Development and
aspires to be a writer. However, he sees life in Gaza as a slow death.
''The number of martyrs in the Strip over the course of 10 years has exceeded
4,000, but those innocent people only died once,'' he says. ''People who are
still alive in Gaza, have been dying every day for a whole decade. But we must
stay optimistic and hopeful. We have learned to be creative to survive, to
express ourselves and to carry on without submitting, despite Israel's ongoing
crimes and the silence of the international community.''
Heba Zaher, a 21-year-old graduate from the Islamic University, also
understands the centrality of hope to the Gaza narrative. She says, ''We have
survived all of these years without losing hope, we certainly can't lose it
now. Ten years of hardship have taught us to be stronger, to cope with life
and to defeat the siege.''
But defeating the siege is not an easy endeavor, as it has ''affected all
aspects of our life,'' according to Heba. ''Many students have lost their
opportunities of studying abroad. Many patients have died, waiting for the
crossings to open so that they may get proper treatment. Construction is tied
to the crossings, and life is now more expensive than ever.''
The consequences of the siege are far-reaching to the extent that Anas
Almassri, a student-intern at the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor in
Deir al Balah, says that whatever remained of Gaza's middle class is now
dwindling. ''The middle class in Gaza continues to shrink as a result of the
diminishing economic opportunities, and this affects the income of families
terribly, who cannot send their kids to universities and, therefore, cannot
maintain their standard of living.''
For Ghada Abu Msabeh, 20, also from Deir Al-Balah, the siege has now become so
rooted in the collective psyche of Gazans that it has grown to become the new
norm. ''I think that we have come to the point that the siege has become a part
of our daily life and routine,'' she argues. ''I honestly cannot imagine what
life would be if we are able to move freely or even go for an entire day
without power outage. It is honestly difficult to remember how life used to be
before the siege.''
Hana Salah, 25, a writer and humanitarian worker with Oxfam Italy, tried to
seek an opportunity outside Gaza, but she was not successful. ''I didn't try
again because seeing others' attempt and fail was enough to depress me,'' she
says. ''I feel that we are living in a cage and have no idea what is
transpiring outside this cage. I don't know what will happen, but can only
hope and pray for God's mercy.''
Some of those who were able to leave to pursue their education outside Gaza,
were stuck when they attempted to return for a visit. Rafaat Alareer, a writer
and lecturer, embarked on his PhD studies at Universiti Purra Malaysia in
2012, but has been trapped in Gaza since 2014. He came to visit his family as
the 2014 offensive destroyed their home and killed his brother. ''It's been a
year and a half now, and I cannot go back because of the siege and the closure
of the Rafah crossing,'' which has been practically shut down for a year.
The same was experienced by Belal Dabour, a young doctor at the Shifa
Hospital, who is unable to leave Gaza to gain more experience and attend
conferences, which he had hoped could bolster his academic qualifications. ''I
had just graduated when the 2014 war started,'' he says. ''It was very
traumatic. What I have experienced in one month at Al-Shifa is more than what
other doctors would experience in many years of their practice. But now I have
no job and like many of my colleagues have no source of income.''
Walaa Al-Ghussein, a 23-year-old student at Al-Azhar University, concludes
that, although more people now acknowledge the existence of a cruel siege on
Gaza, life for Gazans remains the same. ''We need more than just protests; real
pressure needs to be exerted on Israel so that this siege ends. Hundreds of
patients are dying, students are losing their opportunities of studying abroad
and a whole people are stranded.''
– With reporting from Yousef Aljamal in Gaza.
– Dr. Ramzy Baroud has been writing about the Middle East for over 20
years. He is an internationally-syndicated columnist, a media consultant, an
author of several books and the founder of PalestineChronicle.com. His books
include ‘Searching Jenin', ‘The Second Palestinian Intifada' and his latest
‘My Father Was a Freedom Fighter: Gaza's Untold Story'. His website is:
www.ramzybaroud.net.
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