See How Israelis Celebrated Yom Kippur

Laura is an ISM volunteer in Rafah, Gaza Strip. What she did not know as
she wrote this is that seven Palestinians, including two children, were
killed in the invasion she describes.



1) RAFAH UPDATE

by Laura


1) RAFAH UPDATE. October 9, 2003

On Yom Kippur (to specify, October 6), the most holy day on the
Jewish calendar, the day of atonement in which we are supposed to
cease every form of work in order to pray and request forgiveness
from God, the army began construction on a new permanent checkpoint
in the Gaza Strip, another slice. Tanks cut off the main road
between Rafah and Khan Younis (the city just north of Rafah) by
driving ten tanks right in front of the European Gaza Hospital, the
only decent hospital south of Gaza City, and the road has been
closed for days. Nothing can get to Rafah, many things in Rafah are
simply not available right now, things like medicine, the ability to
cash checks, basic supplies. People who study or work in Gaza City
and Khan Younis haven't been to work or university for days. It
makes me think of high school, when snow and ice could shut a city
down. Upstairs from our apartment, Rasha can't hide the small
relief she feels from this reprieve of study. I wonder how much the
relief Rasha feels has to do with getting let off the hook from
dealing with checkpoints. The week before this closure, she spent 5
hours one day waiting for Abu Holi to open so she could go home and
the next day it closed all night, leaving her to sleep at her
friend's sister's house in Gaza City after waiting for 4 hours in a
hot taxi in line with hundreds of cars waiting for the checkpoint to
open. I compare our worlds, like parallel universes, squinting at
each other from both sides of a mirror.

When tanks cut off the main road people trying to get home used the
sandy road and tanks cut that road too, shooting all the time, and
bulldozers followed, demolishing anything anywhere near Moraj
settlement, mostly olive trees. They are still demolishing.
They've also started construction of something, people are saying
it's a permanent checkpoint, another Abu Holi. Nobody knows much,
not even the human rights organizations are going, nobody is risking
going near the place because the tanks are shooting anyone who
approaches. Nobody has dared approach since the first day of the
incursion, when the army invaded without announcement, taking people
by surprise as they drove to and from work. They injured four
people, including a doctor who was shot in the head and is in
critical condition in the European Gaza Hospital where he used to
work. In addition Rafah has accumulated another shaheed, Said Abu
Azzum, 26 years old, who was driving with his wife and their two
sons on a routine trip to Khan Younis, without any idea what was
happening some meters down the road; shot in the heart as he turned
a corner. He had no job, no money, and no house, and now he leaves
behind a 21-year-old widow with nowhere to go, a 4-year-old and a 6-
year-old with nowhere to go. They couldn't even have the wake in
his sister's house where he used to stay because it's near the
border and because it's too small to accomodate visitors, so they
sat for three days in a cousin's house in Shabura so that people
wouldn't be afraid to come and pay their respects. When I went on
the third day, his mother was angry. She said, where is your
camera, where are the journalists. Not one person from the media
had come to photograph her. I was embarrassed. I hadn't brought my
camera, thinking it disrespectful to bring journalism to a wake.
She said, if you're going to write, at least take notes that I can
see, write in your book that Sharon and Bush murdered my son, from
the comfort of their offices.

On the same day Said Abu Azzum was killed, Mohammed's older sister
Wisam was coming home from the European Gaza Hospital where she
works as a nurse when she hear the army had cut the road, and her
taxi went with the other taxis towards the sandy road to bypass the
tanks, but not fast enough. Tanks drove into the road as they were
crossing into Rafah and began shooting indiscriminately, and it was
at this point that people were injured and killed upon running from
their cars to try to reach safety. Wisam was part of a group of
women that walked together after the men had left, holding a white
mendeel to signify surrender and peace. The tanks shot at them
anyway, is this the way to tell this story? as they were walking
(the words are so vile), and they lay down on the ground in the sand
for a half an hour while a tank rode back and forth right next to
them, a meter away, vile bastards, before retreating. Wisam did not
walk to Rafah, she ran, in bare feet (having left her sandals
somewhere on the ground), and arrived in her family's home, her
abaya torn, with the black glove of a woman she didn't know that
somehow found its way to her shoe, found her family and cried for
hours, she says she's never going back to work. The road is closed
in any case so for now it's not a question. She is taking her
respite with her family, in Tel Zorrob, farther from the border than
the main street in town but not far enough that their third floor
flat can't be seen by the Zorrob sniper tower, which effectively
keeps them from using the kitchen and one bedroom. The tower shoots
all day and night. It shot at us while we were eating kabbab in the
living room, and as Wisam impressed me from room to room with the
delicate furnishings in her home. She said, "Yesterday, I couldn't
stop thinking about your friend Rachel. I thought I was going to
meet the same fate."

So it goes. There is nobody in Rafah who doesn't feel the effect of
this new blockage. Feryal is wondering where she will go if the
road is closed when she gives birth to her fifth child, who is
turning in her belly for the ninth month. When I visit them, her
daughter Rula tells me, they've closed the road. What can we do?
We want to see the world, we want some fresh air, we can't go
anywhere, we're Palestinians. Rula is 7 years old. Her older
brother Mohammed, 11 years old, has been given an assignment by
school to draw something related to human rights. He draws a world,
an armed man shaking hands with an unarmed figure. The armed figure
is America, he tells me, and the unarmed is Israel. Palestine is a
cloud raining down lightning bolts of anger onto them, separate,
alone, excluded from the conversation, unable to hold anything but
its own fire and tears.