The Abujarads are homeless once again. The 10th time during Israel’s 19-month campaign in Gaza, they were forced to flee, and the latest uprooting was the most painful of all.
In January, during the ceasefire, Nehruman’s Abujarad, his wife and six daughters returned to joy to their home in northern Gaza. They hoped that by crossing the length of the Gaza Strip, it could be the end of their ordeal after escaping Israel’s attacks for more than a year.
A few weeks later, the bomb began to fall again. They tried to hold back, but Abu Jarad eventually abandoned the house for a second time.
“Every time you make this decision, it’s like you’re executing yourself with your own hands,” Nehman said. He spoke in Gaza city. There he and his brothers had set up tents for their families in the tiled rub-studded gardens of the destroyed apartment.
The Associated Press has tracked the Abujarad family’s journey across territory where nearly the entire population of about 2.3 million Palestinians has been driven out of their homes by the war. Like Abujarad, most of them move multiple times.
The latest wave of forced evacuation across the territory accelerated after Israel broke a two-month ceasefire on March 18th and resumed its military campaign.
At least 430,000 people have since moved, and more are sure to follow as an evacuation order in Israeli military affairs covering large territory with accelerated assaults. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last Wednesday that Israel intends to push its population far south of Gaza.
This time, the displacement is widening under the threat of hunger. Israel blocked all food, fuel, medicine and other aid from entering Gaza from March 2nd, pushing hundreds of thousands of people into starvation. The blockade and its reopened military campaign said it aims to force Hamas to disarm and release the 58 hostages it holds. Over the past week, Israel has washed away supplies, but aid groups say it’s far less than what it needs.
Neman and his wife, Majda, were more visibly gowns than in January, when the AP last spoke to them. Like everyone else, they had a hard time feeding their families. Their daughters, from their eldest son in their 20s, are with babies born just before the war began.
“When one of my daughters told me, ‘Baba, I want to eat,’ I give her a bite or two, and her bread lasts until the end of the day,” Nayman said.
Leave a paradise again
It was days after the war that Abujarad first left his home far north of Gaza as Israel began fierce fire on October 7, 2023 in retaliation for an attack on southern Israel. They returned 15 months later, during the January ceasefire, while hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were flowing north on foot.
“Our happiness was…it seemed we were in paradise,” Neman said.
The house was damaged but still standing. Most of their belongings were either stolen or were under the tiled rub. But after living in the tent for months, he said they once again had a sense of home and privacy. They did some repairs. Neman, his passion before the war, revived some of his flowers.
On March 18, Israel resumed its campaign on one of the heaviest nights of war bombings, struggling Gaza, killing about 400 people. The military told the residents of North Gaza to leave.
“We said, let’s be a little patient, maybe things will improve,” Majda said.
They didn’t want to suffer the displacement pain again, Nehman said. His daughters were crying and said, “We want to die in this house, we won’t leave this time,” he said.
But the gunfire and gunfire were intense around them, he said. The water truck was too dangerous and stopped streaming. “When you found death around you… at that point I was forced to make a decision,” he said.
The night of artillery fire
They packed some belongings and went to a land owned by his relatives in an area called Mansiya, on the outskirts of Beit Rahiya town.
They felt safe. Neman’s uncle’s house was nearby, with other relatives in tents around them.
But once again the shelling caught up with them. Last week, Israeli forces began to sabotage Mansiya.
They were afraid to lean into their tents for three days and the night and leave to go to the toilet. At one point the drone was only 20 meters (yards) away.
Another strike struck his uncle’s house and killed one of his cousins. “It was very dangerous. We couldn’t even help him,” Nehman said. His cousin buried him there, he said.
The others around them ran away, but once again Abu Jarad tried to stay as much as he could.
“I was in conflict between the two fires. I’ll have to leave or stay,” Majda said. Some of their daughters wanted to stay. She said the young people were terribly eager to go.
Nehruman and his son-in-law went to Gaza city and scouted where they would move. They found a promising location, an empty lot next to the broken apartment building. They returned to Mansiya and their family left on Sunday.
Building a tent
They walked miles, weighing each with backpacks and plastic bags filled with clothes and other belongings. At the edge of Gaza city, they found a pickup truck and took the rest of the road.
They arrived after sunset and were too late to set up the tent. The family in the unharmed apartment building was kind enough to take them to the night, Nehman said.
Neman’s brothers joined with their family. It took three days to clean up many tiled rubs and debris, smoothen the earth, smash the tents on the ground, and build seven tents for all of them. Majida and her daughters placed the mattress sideways on the ground and placed objects around them.
The man dug a hole at the edge of the lot for all families to use as a toilet.
Then they sat down for the day’s meal. Majida made a little soup of boiled water, tomato sauce and burgur wheat, then mashed shreds of old bread.
Now they face an unknown future.
His daughters are depressed and have little hope, he said. Wherever they move, there are still Israeli artillery fires. All they can do is try and get away from death over and over, Nehman said.
“We want to stop the blood torrent,” he said. “But this is our country, our land. Even if it is soaked in our blood, we will not leave it.”
(Source: AP)