Two mothers of six children each are living through the Israeli military’s assault in Gaza, which began last October. Both women’s houses were destroyed multiple times by previous Israeli attacks since Israel set up an air, sea and land blockade of Gaza in 2007. Here, in their own words, they describe the past year in Gaza.

Andaleeb Abu Al Qumbuz

I’m 59 years old. I have six children, three daughters and three sons. Two are disabled. My youngest daughter would be in 10th grade. We are residents of Gaza, and we lived on the eastern border since 1994.

Oh, the first days of the war were very tragic. We lived next to a border area, so from the beginning we could not stay there. Everyone only took one set of clothes. We didn’t take anything to sleep on, no blankets, no fuel or anything. We just left.

We must buy at high prices, and we have no income. We are living a very primitive life that doesn’t look in any way like our lives before.

Before our house was destroyed [in this war], it was in the middle of a garden. We used to call it the green island, and life was good.

Our house was equipped with air conditioning. My son Amjad and my daughter [both disabled] each had a bathroom that was accessible. Now we are all living in a tent.

This is the most difficult thing. You start all over again. I am 59 years old, and I am washing my clothes by hand. The water is not suitable; it’s very salty. We are baking our food in mud ovens.

I am suffering from displacement. Three times — no, four times — from the day we left our house, we keep moving from place to place. You want to sit for a while until your psyche adapts — if you adapt.

Now I feel that even my children have lost their hopes. I feel that my children have aged, and now they seem to be 100 years old. Now their biggest wish is to go fetch wood or fill water.

“Mama, there’s water here.” Or “Give me your phone to charge.” These are their aspirations. This is tragic.

My daughter Shaima is 37. She reached high school as a teenager and was moving around everywhere, normally. It is not known what is causing her paralysis now.

From the day the war started, she hasn’t taken her medication. When I change her, I must ask everyone to leave [the tent], so I don’t expose her privacy to anyone. She doesn’t get her treatment or physiotherapy. By God, her wheelchair is broken. We must carry her everywhere. I implored the whole world, and no one came out to help. This is the hardest part I’m suffering from.

Before the war, we were able to support Shaima because of a rabbit-rearing project from Al-Najd Developmental Forum [a Mennonite Central Committee partner]. We started with one cage of rabbits. It was a success for three years.

Shaima got so much out of it. Even Amjad, with his disability, was in charge of cleaning. It was the primary source of income for the whole family. Now we depend on charity.

People and children, their lives are destroyed. Innocent people have died, under the pretext that [the Israeli government] wants to eliminate terrorism. Terrorism? In the last raid, my niece died with her husband, children and her mother-in-law. All these people died, 16 people died, and by God, they were not guilty of anything. What crime did they die for?

We never have seen such destruction. Yes, there was war and destruction, but not like this one. It is enough. Enough death, enough bloodshed.

Islam Jameel Ali Al-Mufti

I live in Gaza, and I am 40 years old. My husband and I have five sons and a daughter, Jude, who should be in first grade. The oldest is 19. We lived in the center of Beit Lahia for almost 22 years. [Now they are displaced and living in a tent.]

We didn’t expect there would be a war. We left our homes thinking it’s going to be a couple days and then we would go back to our home. I did not take anything except one change of clothes.

We stayed at the Abu Asim school for almost a month and a half. [Israeli soldiers] raided and shot at the school, so we went to Al-Shifa Hospital. We have been displaced nine times since the day the war started.

I wake up in the morning. I send my daughter or son to find some paper to use for making a fire to cook. And then we wait for our turn for the water at the well. We can wait for two, three, four, five, seven hours until we can fill one or two water bags. Sometimes we can’t get water.

Everything is expensive. The bottle of soap used to be half a shekel; now they sell it for five shekels. A bottle of shampoo went from 10 shekels to 120 shekels [from $2.70 to $32.36].

We can’t keep up.

Al-Najd [with MCC support] gave us a food parcel. It had important things in it like cereal, rice, lentils, bulgur, oil, canned tomatoes. They provided important things that we can’t buy. I mean, by God, it was like an oil that soothed our wounds. It provided food for 15 days.

I can barely cope with seeing [my children’s] fear when they see an airplane flying above them. We’ll be sitting, and suddenly we hear a rocket exploding, and then my daughter screams and cries. I hug her and say, “They are far away from us.” But the explosions are very close.

Yesterday she asked, “If a rocket hit, who is going to collect my body?” I didn’t know what to answer.

I have a son, Muhammad. He was in his second year of high school. He was a high achiever. Soon after the war started, he saw the tanks at Al-Shifa and saw how the soldiers took over the streets. He was so frightened that they would come near us. Muhammad couldn’t recognize us because he was traumatized. Now, just recently, Muhammad started to recognize who his mother and father and his brothers are. I want him back. I want support for Muhammad, someone who can treat him. I want Muhammad to get back to his old self.

We want the world to stand with us and stop the war. We want to put mercy in their hearts. They need to stop the war for the sake of the children.

This is the third time our house was damaged by Israeli assaults. My bedroom and my furniture were burned by a shell hitting them. The first time, an aid agency helped us restore it, and the second time Al-Najd helped. This was when my oldest boys were young.

They did a complete restoration for everything in the house — three rooms, a bathroom, a kitchen and a living room. I was very happy and I prayed for the [organizers]. May God protect them.
O Lord, have mercy and restore my house one more time.

All we want is to return to our home, even if we put up a tent in the middle of our house that has been torn down. It is better than nothing. We only want the war to be over.

Sally Al Turk is a videographer based in Gaza. Editing by Linda Espenshade, news coordinator for MCC U.S., and AW staff.