Released from Gaza Prison to Get Trapped at El Arish Town in Egypt

Around one thousand Palestinian including students who study abroad, disparate patients who need operations, employees reside and work in the Gulf States and worldwide together with their families are stranded at El Arish town in Egypt. They are waiting for the Egyptian authorities to allow them to cross to Cairo.

Gaza borders with Egypt, also known as Rafah borders, were rarely opened since June 2006. Moreover, it was completely closed after Hamas took over Gaza last summer. Needless to say that the rest of the outlets and crossing points to and outside Gaza that controlled by Israel were also barred part of irregular opening times leaving Gaza population subject to the longest and harshest closure ever. This tightened blockade, in the view of many, has turned Gaza into the largest open air prison in the world.

Large part of those stranded at El Arish came to visit their families before June 2007 and got trapped there after Rafah borders were re-sealed The students who already missed two terms of their study hope that the Egyptian administration could stamp their passports in order to be able to resume their studies. Those holding temporary residence outside Gaza and who lived the drastic fear of loosing it during the past few months hope for a permit to cross to Cairo airport in order to catch flights to their ultimate destinations. The patients who are in great need for treatment hope for an end to their suffering by getting a permit to reach Cairo in order to be admitted to hospitals there.

People stranded at El Arish town have contradictory feelings. On one hand, they live the fear of being turned back to Gaza. The hope however, is to let them cross to Cairo. Between optimisms and pessimism, people eyes are directed towards the gates of El Arish office in charge for issuing the permits.

To be continued

The Wall Has Fallen

The rain was so heavy and the pressure of water behind the dam was so high. It could not stand it and therefore collapsed. Such was the situation in Gaza three days ago. The pressure of misery was so bad that people could not stand it anymore. The result was a hole in the wall. Then another hole followed by one more. To make the wall fall, Gaza screamed in one voice, you need the efforts of all.

To Say Or Not to Say: This is the Question

What were the politicians, the international community and the media waiting for after two years of siege to one of the most over populated areas in the world? And what was the Israeli government waiting for after cutting the electricity, fuel, cooking gas, medications and other basic necessities from a civilian population numbered around 1.5 million? Were they waiting for people to die of hunger in silence? Do they expect them to keep looking at their kids suffering from anaemia and malnutrition and take no action? Something ought to take place and must take place to save your life and the life of your family. This is a very natural thing and doesn’t need that many explanations. Around a third of the population of Gaza stormed across the Egyptian border to save their lives.

When I called my mother this morning asking her about their news she had many things to tell. First thing she talked about was the candles. She told me that they have enough candles for a month now. She was so happy that they have them now. She explained that all my nephews and nieces, aged 3, 5 and 7 usually get terrified at night because of the darkness. As a result of such fear of darkness, she and their parents barely get enough sleep.

From candles she moved on to talk about the food they got, to the kerosene for cooking, to the high blood pressure tablets our neighbour Um As’ad succeeded in obtaining, to the radio batteries and to tens of other things that she counted but there is no room to write them. I was listening and for the first time in months I was listening in comfort. Usually when I phone Gaza, the first thing they ask me about after myself is the news in Britain concerning our situation? What is there about us? Is there any solution or hope for a solution to end our siege and stop the daily killings and crimes? What does PM Brown say about us? What is the British people's reaction? These kinds of questions used to put me in a big dilemma. What to say and what to tell them? Shall I say the truth of what I hear here? Shall I say that you were not in the news today as well as yesterday or any of the days before? Or shall I say I missed the news today? Shall I say they are trying but the issue is so complicated? Or what to say?

Over these months my mother was not asking me about a political solution, our demand and right for over 6 decades now. She was not asking me to bring her the moon. She was asking me about some thing more basic and urgent than anything else. She was asking me about a solution to, or action on, their man-made humanitarian crisis. A man made crisis that was a result of the imposed inhumane closure and blockade by the so-called only democracy in the Middle East, in cooperation with the whole world: a world that chose to be deaf and dumb towards the shouts and tears of Gaza's children.

The call has ended and I feel a little bit relieved. My mother has the candles and Um As’ad got the tablets. I escaped the difficult questions my mother often raises. Above all I didn't struggle much to defend western values. Yet I know that such relief is just as temporary as today's solution in Gaza. The same issues will re-appear again and very soon.

My family in Gaza

I was in daily contact with my family all over the past weeks trying to get some news about their situation under the siege, some comfort for my worries and some answers for my questions. My mother, who always tries to hide their news of mounting suffering so that I don’t get too much worried, broke into tears saying that cooking gas has ended, there is no electricity and there is a severe shortage in water. There is nothing in Gaza but cold, darkness, anger, hunger and misery. Our life becomes impossible. When and where does this crisis end my beloved daughter? My sister, Samia, who came to visit the family from Gaza snatched the handset from my mum and started to cheer me up saying we have lived this all our life so don’t worry; carry on the celebration for your graduation and don’t forget to have pictures. Your success is our success. We wished to be with you but you know our wishes remain wishes as usual. Take care of yourself and the family and good bye.

The call has ended. There is nothing before my eyes but my mother’s tears and my sister’s shacking voice. There was bitterness in my mouth and silence for seconds. How can I celebrate my success of having my degree while my family is living the worst barbaric siege in modern history?

Yet, I smiled to my friends in London as I didn’t want to spoil the celebration’s spirit and said: my family is fine, they send you their regards but they have shortage in gas for cooking.

My Graduation Day

It is Saturday, January 19 2008: my graduation day from the University of Exeter in the UK as a doctor of philosophy in political science. It is a day that I have waited for, for so long, almost five years. Only few months ago, my heart used to dance when I used to think of that day while putting the last touch on my final chapters. Yet today things are completely different of what I’ve expected.


I have mixed feelings. I suppose to be happy, very happy in deed yet I don’t feel the happiness. I want to smile but I have a wound in my heart. My body is here but my mind is in Gaza with my people. How can I celebrate and my family and community do live the harshness of the siege imposed since almost two years. Moreover, such closure and siege have been fully tightened two days ago, namely on Thursday January 17, by the orders of the Israeli occupation defense minister Ehud Barak.


Everyone I talked with in Gaza during the past few days ago is reporting that situation is very serious and getting worse by time. There is no fuel and there is a shortage of food aid and supplies. Large parts of the Gaza Strip had no power, no lights and no heating. Bakeries are closed and hospitals began to rely on generators. Simply put, Gaza occupied civilian population live a collective punishment that paralyzes every aspect of life. The same reports concerning Gaza situation has been released by UNRWA, Red Cross, the European Commissioner for external relations and many other world and local humanitarian organizations. The urgent question is when those in charge of causing such desperate humanitarian crisis would have time to look at these reports and take an action? And till when would Gaza people ad children endure such increasingly misery?


I have to stop here and head towards the university to attend my graduation ceremony. My daughter, Ghaida is putting my gown and hood on and laughing and my husband, Nasser is taking pictures for her. She looks cool. She makes me smile.

My Daughter, Ghaida on my Graduation Day

Will peace cost me my home?

Sixty years ago, my grandparents lived in the beautiful village of Beit Daras , a few kilometers north of Gaza . They were farmers and owned hundreds of acres of land.

But in 1948, in the first Arab-Israeli war, many people lost their lives defending our village from the Zionist militias. In the end, with their crops and homes burning, the villagers fled. My family eventually made its way to what became the refugee camp of Khan Yunis in Gaza . We were hit hard by poverty, humiliation and disease. We became refugees, queuing for tents, food and assistance, while the state of Israel was established on the ruins of my family's property and on the ruins of hundreds of other Palestinian villages.

Some people may tire of hearing such stories from the past. "Don't cry over spilled milk" is one of the first sayings I learned in English. But for me, the line between past and present is not so easily broken. I raise this story today because it remains profoundly relevant to the Middle East peace process -- and to help convey the deep-seated fears of Palestinian refugees that we will be asked to exonerate Israel for its actions and to relinquish our right to return home.

That cannot be allowed to happen. All refugees have the right to return. This is an individual right, long recognized in international law, that cannot be negotiated away. Palestinian refugees -- and there are more than 4 million of us registered with the United Nations today -- hold this right no less than Kosovar or Rwandan or any other refugees.

Of course, I understand that the clock cannot be turned back. Most of the Palestinian villages inside what is now Israel no longer exist. And experience shows that when the rights of refugees are recognized and backed by international communities, only a small portion opt to return.

But the option should be open to us. If a refugee decides to return, he or she should not be hindered. Anything less would be unacceptable to Palestinians, two-thirds of whom are refugees. Those who choose not to return must be fairly compensated for their losses.

My fear is that in the months ahead, enormous financial and political pressure may be brought against our fractured leadership to concede the rights of refugees. In 2000, Yasser Arafat was castigated internationally for his refusal to accept what was perversely termed a "generous offer" from then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, even though it made no provision whatsoever for the return of refugees. However, Arafat was greeted as a hero by Palestinians for his principled unwillingness to sanctify ethnic cleansing.

Seven years later, we will perhaps be confronted with another "generous offer" aiming to formalize our dispossession. Tragically, world powers have little stomach to battle Israel for what they view as bygone peccadilloes. There are real consequences for being stateless and weak. For two years, I have been unable to return to my home in Gaza . In 2006, I was stranded in the Sinai with my two small children, unable to get through the closed border from Egypt into Gaza . It is perhaps madness to want to enter such a prison, but it is where my family and loved ones live. I eventually gave up. Last summer, I tried and failed again.

Yet my ultimate destination is not Khan Yunis but Beit Daras. It is fundamentally unjust -- even all these years later -- that the world stands by and countenances the Israeli decision to expropriate my family's land.And it is fundamentally racist to believe that I would pose a threat to Israel if I were to move back to my family's village (which I would do if I were given the option). The notion of a Jewish state that must always retain a Jewish character -- so that people of other ethnicities can be barred from living in their ancestral homes and minorities groups are treated as second-class citizens -- is frighteningly similar to the apartheid state of South Africa , where different ethnic groups were treated unequally under law.

If black and white South Africans could resolve their differences on the basis of equality, why is it inappropriate to insist that Israelis and Palestinians do the same? Surely all modern conceptions of justice and equality must decry a system that places Jews above Palestinians.

Both peoples have suffered enormously over the last several decades. Resolution, however, will not come by the powerful dictating to the weak, but only through insistence on equality between the two peoples.