From October 2023 to January 2025, Benjamin Netanyahu managed to displace about 1.9 million Palestinians – virtually the entire inhabitants of Gaza. He have to be proud. The Israeli prime minister can now go down within the Guinness E-book of Information as the person who single-handedly displaced the most individuals inside the smallest territory.
I, myself, am considered one of these 1.9 million. I used to be displaced twice: the primary time firstly of the genocidal conflict after which once more a 12 months later.
Many Palestinian households had been displaced repeatedly, some 10 occasions or extra.
It was a transparent technique by Netanyahu to divide us. The north was minimize off from the south. “Northerners” had been forcibly expelled to the south. Then “southerners” and the opposite displaced had been compelled to maneuver to the centre.
However this was not sufficient for him. The Israeli prime minister authorised a large-scale marketing campaign to wipe out housing throughout the Gaza Strip, particularly within the north and south. He additionally ordered the blocking of humanitarian support to starve us.
In keeping with the United Nations Workplace for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, 92 p.c of houses within the Gaza Strip, or about 436,000 buildings, had been destroyed or broken on account of the Israeli aggression. In keeping with Al Mezan Heart for Human Rights, the Israeli military has not stopped demolishing houses in Rafah all through the ceasefire.
In keeping with the World Meals Programme, as of January, greater than 2 million folks had been absolutely depending on meals help, and lots of of hundreds had been going through “catastrophic ranges of meals insecurity”.
Netanyahu has now ordered all humanitarian support to be minimize off once more and is planning to forcibly expel Palestinians from the north to the south as soon as once more.
His goal is evident: to tear aside communities, to separate and weaken us, to show us in opposition to one another via excessive deprivation. However his technique failed previously 16 months, and it’ll fail once more.
Within the face of a genocidal conflict, the folks of Gaza confirmed immense solidarity with one another. Whoever had a house standing would open it to shelter the displaced, together with their households, mates, neighbours and even strangers. Whoever had some meals would additionally share.
After we had been beneath siege in our neighbourhood, Sheikh Radwan, in December 2023, we used to throw water bottles via the home windows to our neighbour and his daughter to ensure they’d one thing to drink. We additionally supplied meals to different folks in want by throwing it over the wall separating our dwelling from different houses.
Throughout our second displacement, a buddy of my father’s opened his dwelling for us within the south, and we remained there for 4 months.
On January 15 when the ceasefire was introduced, the folks of Gaza received in opposition to Netanyahu and his technique of “divide and rule”. 4 days later, a few of the displaced from Rafah had been in a position to return.
Then on January 27 got here the “large return”. Tons of of hundreds of Palestinians headed again to the north.
For almost all of the displaced, “return” meant discovering homelessness. Folks walked lengthy distances on foot simply to seek out their homes broken or destroyed. The phrase we use to explain wrecked houses in Gaza proper now could be “biscuit” – a house smashed flat like a biscuit.
The homeless returnees had few choices: to go to varsities was shelters, to pitch a tent in open areas or subsequent to the rubble of their houses, or to attempt to restore any standing partitions right into a dwelling house.
Households are struggling within the heavy rain, robust wind and chilly. Many, whereas cleansing, repairing or looking within the rubble to seek out their belongings, have discovered the our bodies of family members and dug them out to bury them.
However even within the harsh actuality of homelessness, Palestinians nonetheless discover solidarity.
Folks share what little they’ve of meals, water and even house in overcrowded tents. Neighbours work collectively to restore damaged partitions and roofs. Some with half-damaged homes supply shelters to these in want. Volunteers provoke campaigns for distributing meals and garments to varsities, shelters and tent camps.
Some youth collect day by day to prepare dinner in communal kitchens, guaranteeing nobody is left hungry. Folks present emotional help via WhatsApp teams and psychological well being conferences. At night time, households collect to share tales and luxury one another to scale back the loneliness.
The lads of our neighbourhood made a schedule to assist one another in making shelters in broken homes. They helped us put up tarps and safe them with poles to the bottom and mend partitions in our broken dwelling. We helped others by offering electrical energy to energy the gear via our barely functioning photo voltaic panel.
“House” is now what most individuals in Gaza lengthy for. It’s presupposed to be a heat place of candy reminiscences you possibly can escape to when the world turns into an excessive amount of to bear. It’s not presupposed to be a tent, a faculty or a destroyed home.
However Palestinians have been right here earlier than. Three-quarters of the inhabitants of Gaza are refugees or descendants of refugees who misplaced their houses within the Nakba. My very own ancestors had been expelled from their houses within the city of al-Majdal.
What Netanyahu and different Israeli leaders like him appear to not perceive is that Gaza is not only a spot for us, it’s our dwelling.
Nonetheless many occasions Israel cuts off support and assaults, destroying houses and displacing folks, we are going to rebuild, not by magic, however by our personal solidarity, resilience and the world’s help.
The unity that has been handed from era to era has constructed a neighborhood that refuses to be erased. That is what is going to assist Gaza rise once more.
The views expressed on this article are the creator’s personal and don’t essentially replicate Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.
