Friday At the Beach in Gaza

In Gaza the beach is more packed than ever

Everyone's at the beach

Hamas is still permitting a little dancing

Hamas members play volleyball

Hamas is still allowing cigarettes to be sold, but the closure does not make for much choice

Going Home

Visiting The Dead in Gaza

Jamal’s car was sounding more and more rickety I noticed as we drove to his house for lunch. He was late since he had spent the entire day at the Rafah border with some neighbors who were trying to cross to Egypt for medical care. They had gotten there at the crack of dawn only to turn back in the late afternoon without success. Of the thousands gathered a select few had made it across, but they were not among the lucky few. I have to be honest, I have no idea what the hell must be like crossing that border because I have never had the privilege or bad fortune to attempt to do so. When it is actually open, only Palestinians are permitted to cross.

The Rafah border is operated by Palestinians on one side, by Egyptians on the other and has a European mission monitoring the process on the Palestinian side. One of the more positive things to come of the Israeli disengagement is that they no longer man this border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt and yet Israel still controls it from a distance. On a daily basis the European mission is prepared to travel from their headquarters in the Israeli city of Ashqalon 45 minutes away to the Southern most tip of the Gaza Strip to allow passage for Gaza’s inhabitants to the rest of the world. All it takes for the trip and thus the operation of the border to be canceled is Israel’s discouragement from doing so… like the rest of Israeli decision making, for reasons of security precautions of course. Yesterday the border was open after almost two weeks of closure, whereas the agreement that was established between Israel, Palestine and the Egyptians was for its daily opening. In a report written one year after the signing of the agreement, the border had been closed during the final six months phase for 86% of the time. Jamal was exhausted and after a short lunch took a nap in the corner of one of the two rooms in his house.
Jamal’s oldest daughter had just finished her final exams, Hamza, Jamal’s favorite had completed kindergarten and was about to tear up his graduation certificate when I got hold of it. The others had just a few more days to go before the summer break. I asked them what they would do during the summer, “stay home” Maysa told me, “and visit my grandmother,” Om Daher’s mother lived a few houses away. Jamal had drawn a tarp across the open air sitting space in his courtyard to spare us a little from the sun. The boys were running around and his wife Om Daher would order them out of the room every time they got too rowdy. I couldn’t imagine the entire summer going by like this with none of them involved in any activity but being home.
Meanwhile the Israeli surveillance balloon was not far away and the rockets flew overhead at night. I wondered what effect this was having on these kids. Jamal explained that during the past week Daher, his oldest son and him had been standing at the door of their house when they saw a guided missile heading into their neighborhood, “Daher was scared,” he laughed. He described the missile as weaving around homes until reaching its destination, a Hamas facility not too far from their home. Jamal said he had not slept much the night before because of the sound of the missiles overhead and Om Daher complained they could not watch TV, one of the rare distractions and forms of entertainment here, because of the static caused by the movement in the air. I learned that the large picture hanging on the wall was of Jamal’s recently deceased mother. For the past year he had not been to visit her because the cemetery she was buried in was located too close to the border with Israel. I knew Israel controlled water, airspace and borders, but in Gaza, even the dead were off-limits to visit.

*first photo is by my friend Wessam Nassar

Walking and Real Sardines

While I was crossing the border from Jordan I got a call from my friend Naser in Bethlehem. He had wonderful news for me, his oldest boy was going to have surgery to try and fix his walking disability that he has had since birth. The only bad news was that Naser was not yet able to collect the percentage of the surgery costs ($2,750) that he needed to cover. Mu'ad is one of the most expressive and happiest boys I have ever met. His difficulty in walking has not stopped him in the least from being an active and excited kid who mainly just wants to have fun and play with his father's friends.

On the road to Gaza Abu Alaa, my driver today translated the Hebrew news for me. Ismail Haniyeh the Palestinian prime minister threatened to kill Israeli captured soldier Gilad Shalit if Israel were to begin an incursion into Gaza. If this act were to be carried out Israel promised to kill Ismail Haniyeh and every other Hamas cabinet official.

After a 10 day trip to Cairo I am back in Gaza, home, sweat home. After walking through the corridors of the daunting Erez checkpoint I arrived at the last turnstile at which point I found Abu Amjad sitting on the floor waiting for the sliding gate to open which releases every traveler into the open-air prison of Gaza. Abu Amjad owns a factory in Gaza, he has been selling his goods to Israel for the past 22 years and today, without explanation, he was rejected entry there for the first time. Just another usual day for another Palestinian lacking the right of most any other human being traveling in a seemingly dignified country.

Jamal picked me up at the Gaza border and invited me to his house for lunch. We had sardines, I had never had the pleasure of eating anything but sardines from a can until I moved to Gaza. These fish are so small that you can actually just eat the whole thing, save the tail. Of course we also had mulukheya, and a nice little tomato/ onion dip and humos. Daher was sleeping when we arrived around 2pm and was rudely woken and dragged out of the room so we could sit there. Abdallah, the youngest met us at the door and spread the rumor that I was there for a visit.

Arriving at my house I found Ayman and Mohamed watching a movie there. I filled them in on my travels. Mohamed is just recovering from a fever. Tonight I ate two cookies I got at a goodbye party in Jerusalem yesterday. On the balcony I had a glass of wine that I bought at a monastery on my way to Gaza and smoked a cigarette. The fishing boats were out and their little lights filled the horizon, surrounded by the darkness, down below the presidential guard were making their rounds, chanting unintelligible chants, sirens filled the night from time to time, far away gunshots were heard at times.

slowly spiraling out of control

After a weekend away I arrived at the Erez border to return to Gaza. At the checkpoint I ran into a Frenchman, with a worried look on his face. I realized later he was escorting injured journalist Didier Francois out of Gaza. Francois was shot in the leg earlier in the day while coming into the line of fire of Hamas and Fateh clashes.

Throughout the day tensions were high as fighting between Hamas and Fateh broke out all across the Gaza Strip. The restraint on both sides that depicted the past many days was broken down today as Fateh aligned forces took over two ministries and the Hamas Foreign Minister Mahmoud A-Zahar’s vehicle was fired on. The president’s office was attacked numerous times throughout the day.

Jamal, having had his car returned on Thursday, took me through back roads and alleys avoiding likely clash points. For Jamal thirteen days of fear and anticipation had come to a close Thursday night. For those thirteen days Hamas’s security forces together with the Palestinian police had negotiated with a local mafia to return the car. When Jamal reported the incident at the police station he learned that at least five cases of car theft were being registered daily just at this station in the Northern Gaza Strip. With no one power really in control the lawlessness is naturally spiraling out of control.

Tonight ambulance sirens and gunfire make up the evening landscape.