13-7-2006

When Faten hugged Marwan (4 years old, coming back from the hospital) as soon as he entered her flat, Nour (two years old) started crying loudly. Everybody thought that Nour is jealous, so Faten went to hug him, but he left her and went to his cousin Marwan and started hugging him and saying for the first time in his life HABIBI (Darling) repeatedly.
Marwan and Nour live with their parents in Suadi Arabia, where their dad works. They came this summer to visit the family in Gaza with their mother Ghada. Because of the current situation they decided to stay at their uncle and aunt's house near the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
On another part of the world, mainly in Saudi Arabia, the dad was watching the news at 1.30am. Suddenly he saw his sister and her kids in the ambulances and then in the hospital. He kept looking for his family, wife and kids but didn't see them on the screen. He saw shaking Marwan in the hospital bed with his mother and sister all treated by the hospital staff, but no sign for his kids. Of course he thought that they are dead under the rubbles.
After a few calls and awaking all the members of the family in Gaza he realized that all are safe in another brother's house.
Laila, an employee in our organization Faten's sister was telling us this story next morning, while we were watching the news on TV and saw the same pictures the father was watching last night. We all had tears in our eyes. After that the news and the scenes from Lebanon. The destruction of the infrastructure, the destruction of houses full of families, the same scenes every where, in Gaza, in Ramallha, in Nablusm, in the villages of Southern Lebanon, in Beirut, in Saida, in Sour..etc.
The same aggressor everywhere also, Israel. The sameF16s, the same apaches, the same canons, the same soldiers and the same excuse always.
Today s 16-7-2006, I started writing this message three days ago, but because of the electricity and the flood of the different news I could not continue.
Now we are almost 24 hours following the news, by TV rarely, but mainly by radio. The Israeli aggression is continuing and at the same time the Israeli complain is continuing too.
Israel starts hitting the infrastructure of it's neighbors targeting civilians, who have to return back and defend themselves. Israel, the owner of the fourth strongest army in the world, the owner of atomic bombs, the occupier of the lands of Lebanon, Syria and Palestine, the holder of thousands of Palestinian and Arab prisoners in its jails, the holder of the Palestinian civilians in the occupied territory as hostages, is the one who needs to defend itself????
It is really a strange world, all the governments of the so called democratic world are strongly protesting against the kidnapping of a regular army SOLDIERs, but non of these democratic states stands firmly against the brutality and aggression of the Israeli state terrorism against the civilians surrounding them.
The Un resolutions guarantee the rights of the Palestinians, Lebanese and Syrians to have their occupied lands back and the Palestinian right for forming their state in the land occupied in 1967, but Israel does not obey on the contrary there are building an apartheid wall in the West Bank that destroys the future state of Palestine and puts the basis for the final illegal borders of Israel. Still the democratic world is accusing us the victims of being terrorists and asking us to recognize the right of Israel to kill each one of us as a self-defense.
The news are still coming, in Beit Hanoon, northern town in the Gaza Strip. The Israeli forces are surrounding four families (each family counts at least 15 members) living in four houses and asking them to leave their houses because they want to destruct the houses. The families refused to leave their houses. The army is giving the families a half an hour chance to leave the houses or they will destroy them over their heads.
The occupation army, still in the same town, is destroying the fences around the governmental schools.
The occupation army is occupying a five story building which includes a kindergarten, a library, a women's center and the administration of the trade union of the female workers in the kindergartens.
The news is still coming while I'm writing this. I've been asked by a friend to write our suffering in Gaza and that an Israeli woman and a Lebanese will write too and it will be published in France. I wonder what to write? I know that the suffering of civilians anywhere in such circumstances is the same. I know that mothers, regardless of the nationality of religion suffer the same if she loses a child. I know that the look of a child subjected to war is the same. Please give us a chance as women, as mothers as human beings to raise our children in peace and loving atmosphere instead of fear and hatred.
The people living in the "first democratic world" can hardly feel what are we in the region going through, especially now, when it's their summer vacation times. Still we are asking their support to put pressure on their governments to ask to stop this madness of the Israelis that wants to destroy the whole region.
I believe in the peaceful solution for the conflict in the region, based on the international law and the UN resolutions. But where is the UN, it's only defending the aggressor now, isn't it?
I have nothing to add, I have a big anger inside me, like everybody living in the region. It’s a scream for all people in the world, believers in god, or different gods, or non believers, but definitely we all believe in the human being and in his right to live in dignity and safe, it's a scream to move and protest against the Israeli brutality and stop their madness here.