Tag: Beit Lahiya

17 January 2012 | Palestinian Centre for Human Rights

“Madleen refuses to sleep by herself; she will only sleep in her parent’s room” says Nujoud, “she’s afraid to be by herself at all. The other day we were in the garden and I asked her to go to the bedroom to bring something. She refused to go without me.”

On 17 January 2009, at approximately 05:30, the area surrounding the UNRWA school in Beit Lahiya came under attack from Israeli forces. The area was bombarded using both high explosive, and white phosphorous artillery; white phosphorous is an incendiary chemical which ignites on contact with oxygen, its use in civilian populated areas violates the principle of distinction, and the prohibition of indiscriminate attacks. Nujoud Al Ashqar, along with approximately 1,600 others, was taking shelter in the school at the time of the attack. Nujoud sustained severe head injuries as a result of the bombing, and also losing her right hand. Two of her sons Bilal, 6, and Muhammed, 4, were killed in the attack.

When PCHR first spoke to Nujoud in the aftermath of the attack three years ago, her life had become extremely difficult, particularly her relationship with her husband, Mohammed. “At first my husband blamed me for the death of the boys. He used to threaten me every day that he would re-marry” says Nujoud, “but things have got better between us since the birth of our daughter Haneen. He loves her deeply and she loves him.”

Nujoud’s daughter Haneen, 1, was both a blessing and a severe challenge for Nujoud, who, despite being thankful she was able to give birth to another child after the loss of Muhammed and Bilal, is faced with extreme difficulties caring for herself, the household and her children given the loss of her arm and other medical difficulties following the attack. “I get most frustrated when trying to care for Haneen” says Nujoud, “I need help form my daughter Madleen all the time to care for her. I always feel sad for her because she sacrifices so much of her education to care for the house and her sister. But I need her to do it” says Nujoud. “Her grades in school have suffered as a result. It’s made worse by the fact I find myself with no patience to help her with her school work anymore since the attack.”

Madleen was herself in the UNRWA school at the time of the attack and faces difficulties with both the memory of that day and the loss of Bilal and Muhammed. “Madleen refuses to sleep by herself; she will only sleep in her parent’s room,” says Nujoud, “she’s afraid to be by herself at all. The other day we were in the garden and I asked her to go to the bedroom to bring something. She refused to go without me.”

Nujoud shares Madleen’s fear of the past and apprehension of the future. “Sometimes when there are rumours of a new war or Israeli incursions Madleen will start asking me about it and speaking of the incident. But I can’t bear to talk with her about what happened and I just ask her not to talk about it.”. The memory of the attack remains so moving for Nujoud that she does not speak with it to anybody. “Sometimes visitors will come over and ask to hear about that night. I don’t talk to them about it though. If I do I will spend the rest of the day and the whole night going over it in my head.”

Apart from the loss of one hand Nujoud has been left with severe pain in her head. When PCHR spoke to her three years ago she would wear her head scarf everywhere, including inside the house, as she had lost all her hair due to severe burns. “Now most of my hair has grown back” says Nujoud, “except for small patches due to injuries, but still when Madleen combs my hair I’m in agony.”

The loss of Bilal and Muhammed is especially painful for Nujoud. “I could never forget my children. If I stayed alive for 200,000 years I would not forget them.” Bilal and Muhammed were always a huge pillar of stability and support in Nujoud’s life. “When I used to get angry with my husband I would want to leave the house and go to my family. Bilal and Muhammed would calm me down and get me to stay. Now, when my husband and I argue, I just go to my room and think of them.” For Nujoud’s husband, Muhammed, who is deaf and dumb, the loss of Bilal, who used to help him communicate with others outside the house, was also devastating.

With another child on the way, Nujoud is hopeful for her health and for another baby boy in the future, who she also plans to call Bilal. “Me and my husband had been waiting for Bilal, he was so dear to our hearts, I hope to have a son so I can name him after his brother.”

PCHR submitted a criminal complaint to the Israeli authorities on behalf of the Al Ashqar family on 18 May 2012. PCHR have received an interlocutory response noting receipt of the original complaint. To date, however, and despite repeated requests, no further information has been communicated to PCHR, regarding the status of any investigation, and so on.

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The series of narratives:

16 January 2009 – The Shurrab family
15 January 2009: The al-Nadeem family
14 January 2009 – Muhammed Mousa
13 January 2009: Hibba al-Najjar
12 January 2009 – The Ayad family
11 January 2009: The Hamouda family
10 January 2009: Wafa al-Radea
9 January 2009 – The Abu Oda family
8 January 2009: The Al-Rahel family
7 January 2009 – The Mattar family
6 January 2009: Al-Dayah family
5 January 2009: Amal al-Samouni
4 January 2009: The Abdel Dayem family
3 January 2009: Motee’ and Isma’il as-Selawy
2 January 2009: Eyad al-Astal
1 January 2009: The Nasla family
31 December 2008: The Abu Areeda family
30 December 2008: The Hamdan family
29 December 2008: Balousha family
28 December 2008: The Abu Taima family
27 December 2008: The Al Ashi family

10 January 2012 | Palestinian Centre for Human Rights

“When I left my children I was walking and my children had not seen my wounds. The most difficult moment was when I came back with only 1 leg and many injuries. I was a different Wafa. When I came back I was supposed to happy and the people were supposed to be happy for seeing me but everyone was crying.”

On 10 January 2009, at around 16:30, Wafa al-Radea (39) and her sister Ghada (32) were targeted by two Israeli drone missiles while walking on Haboub street, one of the main roads in Beit Lahiya. The sisters were walking during the Israeli announced hour long ceasefire, and were on their way to a clinic nearby because Wafa felt that she was close to delivering a baby. Both women were severely injured in the attack.

“When people came to help I could hear them speak but was unable to respond. They were saying that I was dead,” remembers Wafa. While Ghada was taken to hospital with severe injuries to her legs, people had covered Wafa as they thought she was dead. Eventually an ambulance brought her to a hospital where doctors carried out a caesarean section surgery in an attempt to save her baby. It was only during the surgery the doctors realized Wafa was still alive. While her son, Iyad, was born, doctors amputated Wafa’s right leg and attempted to treat her other injuries. On 12 January both sisters were transferred to a hospital in Egypt for additional medical treatment. Wafa underwent a series of operations until the end of April and then had 3 months of rehabilitation. Wafa and Ghada returned to Gaza on 29 and 27 June 2009.

Wafa vividly remembers the months she spent in Egypt. “My clearest memory of that time is the unbearable pain caused by the changing of the bandages. It took nurses 5 to 6 hours each time. I underwent many surgeries. After an operation to transplant skin from my left thigh to a lower part of my leg, nurses removed the transplanted cells by mistake when cleaning the wound. I had to undergo the same surgery again, this time taking skin from my arms. I was screaming because of the pain. My brother Walid (25) lost consciousness and was bleeding from his nose. He couldn’t bear what was happening to me. I was very angry at everyone after the operation.” Wafa’s brother Walid was with her throughout the whole period in Egypt. She didn’t see my other relatives from Gaza. “It was very difficult for them to visit me because travelling to Egypt is costly and they had to look after the children,” she says.

Wafa is the mother of 8 children: Ehab (20), Lina (19), Hani (17), Shourouq (15), Mo’taz (13), Saher (12), Jehad (9), and Iyad (3). During her time in Egypt Wafa had limited contact with her children. She says: “in the first 3 months I couldn’t speak to my children over the phone. I refused. I was unable to talk. They were waiting for me for 6 months. The children were curious to know what happened to me.”

“When I left my children I was walking and my children had not seen my wounds. The most difficult moment was when I came back with only 1 leg and many injuries. I was a different Wafa. When I came back I was supposed to happy and the people were supposed to be happy for seeing me but everyone was crying,” Wafa recalls. “I noticed that my children watched my every move. Jehad kept following me with his eyes, watching how I went to the living room, how I sat down. He refused to go out and play with other children. He just wanted to stay with me in the home. I was very affected by the situation of my children. They are always ready to help me whenever I try to move or do anything.”

Wafa’s eldest daughters, Lina (19) and Shourouq (16) had taken care of Iyad while their mother was in hospital in Egypt. “One of them would go to school in the morning and leave Iyad with her sister. In the afternoon it was the other way around.” She continues: “when I came home they brought Iyad and put him on my lap. He was blond and beautiful and I thought he was a nephew. I couldn’t imagine that he was my son. I asked them about Iyad and they told me that he was on my lap.” Wafa takes a lot of strength from having her children around her. She says “I am very grateful and happy for having my children. They help me with everything and keep my morale high. Even when I am sad, I would smile if my children came to me. I want them to feel that I am happy because I am with them.”

Wafa finds it difficult to accept help from her children: “I always used to be the one who would help them. Before, I used to go to the school to check on the children and walk to the market to do the shopping. Now if want to go out I must use a car. And if I want to move in the house I must use a wheelchair. I also use the walkers and if Iyad wants to take my hand I cannot give him my hand because I am afraid that I will fall. I need my hands to hold the walkers.”

Wafa received one year of physiotherapy in Gaza for her back, pelvis and her left leg. Despite several attempts, so far she has no prosthetic leg. She also still undergoes treatment for her left leg. “My leg is getting better but I am still in hospital from time to time, for example when I have inflammations. One month ago I was in hospital for 6 days. In winter my wounds hurt more and I feel pain in my pelvis, back, abdomen and legs.”

Despite constantly being confronted with the past Wafa tries to focus on the future. “I hope that our children will not have to pass through similar experiences when they are older. I wish that their lives will be better. But my children keep asking me ‘will there be another war, come again and kill us all?’ They are afraid and I see how the war negatively impacted on them,” she says.

Wafa feels great frustration over how the crime against her and her sister caused so much suffering and yet goes unpunished. “It has been 3 years since they [Israel] attacked us and there is still no response. I spoke to many people from human rights organizations about my story and what is the result of it? There is no result or action whatsoever.”

PCHR submitted a criminal complaint to the Israeli authorities on behalf of Wafa al-Radea on 07 October 2009. To-date, no response has been received.

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The series of narratives:

9 January 2009 – The Abu Oda family
8 January 2009: The Al-Rahel family
7 January 2009 – The Mattar family
6 January 2009: Al-Dayah family
5 January 2009: Amal al-Samouni
4 January 2009: The Abdel Dayem family
3 January 2009: Motee’ and Isma’il as-Selawy
2 January 2009: Eyad al-Astal
1 January 2009: The Nasla family
31 December 2008: The Abu Areeda family
30 December 2008: The Hamdan family
29 December 2008: Balousha family
28 December 2008: The Abu Taima family
27 December 2008: The Al Ashi family

8 January 2012 | Palestinian Centre for Human Rights

“The other children keep talking about Dima and the memories of both incidents. ‘We wish to die like Dima’ is what the children sometimes say to me because of all the stress and our poor living conditions.”

On 8 January 2009, at approximately 11:00, four missiles were fired at the house of Juma’a al-Rahel (45) in Beit Lahiya, injuring 3 members of the extended al-Rahel family: Basma (3), Dima (5), and Faten (41). Many of the extended family were inside the house at the time of the attack, as six of the al-Rahel brothers and their wives and children live nearby. Immediately after the attack, the families fled the area and sought refuge in Beit Lahiya’s UNRWA school. On 17 January 2009 the school was targeted with white phosphorus bombs, leaving Dima’s sister, Ansam al-Rahel (13), severely injured. After six weeks of fighting for her life 5-year old Dima eventually died of her wounds in an Egyptian hospital on 1 March 2009.

Saeed al-Rahel (35), the father of Dima and Ansam, remembers the day of the first attack vividly. “I was at home when an explosion took place and all the windows were broken. I got out of the house. I heard people screaming in the house of my brother Juma’a, nextdoor. My daughter Dima was there and I heard people screaming that she was wounded. Several more missiles struck Juma’a’s house and we fled from the area. Dima was taken to hospital. On 13 January she was transferred to Egypt. I went with her.”

Saeed’s wife, Nisreen al-Rahel (33), and their other children, Sunia (17), Dina (15), Ansam (13), Ahmad (11), Mohammed (6), and Ali (4), stayed in the UNRWA school in Beit Lahiya after the attack. Nisreen recalls: “we stayed in the school building from 8 to 17 January. It was winter and very cold. We didn’t have any mattresses. We had to use blankets as mattresses and it was very difficult, especially for the children. We didn’t have enough food. We also had to ask other people to give us water. There was no clean water.”

On 17 January 2009 the Israeli army bombed the school building with white phosphorus shells. “Experiencing the attack on the school was more difficult for me than the attack on the house. At the moment that the bombing of the school started I was in a classroom with my children. The bombing started around 5:00am and it was dark. I heard Ansam cry ‘I am wounded in my head’. The firing of bombs was very intensive.” Ansam was severely injured in the head, she lost her hair in the place of the injury and the scars get infected from time to time as parts of her skull are missing. “She is still suffering because of her injuries. At school she loses consciousness when she is active,” say Nisreen.

Saeed remembers the moment he found out about the bombing of the school: “Before I went to Egypt I stayed in that same classroom with my family. I saw the attack on the television when I was in Egypt and I recognized the classroom. There was blood on the floor. When I called to my family, no one wanted to tell me how my daughter Ansam was doing.”

When Nisreen and her remaining children moved back to their house after the offensive they found it badly damaged and their livelihood destroyed. “Shortly before the war I bought cattle. We had 2 oxen, 17 goats and dozens of rabbits. I kept them next to our house. I took out loans to buy them,” explains Saeed. “When our family returned to our house after the war they found all the animals killed by shrapnel. Only one goat was still alive but he also died after a few days. Now I am stuck with many loans. I can barely provide for the treatment of my daughter Ansam. I was even arrested by the police because I cannot pay back my loans to people. With a complete lack of money I am also not able to repair the severe damage that was done to the windows and walls of our house.” Cardboard and blankets serve to protect the family from the nightly and winter cold.

The events of January 2009 have had a profound impact on the psychological wellbeing of the Saeed, Nisreen, and their children. “It has been very difficult for me because I lost one of my daughters and another one was badly injured. I remember Dima when I see girls going to school,” says Nisreen. “The other children keep talking about Dima and the memories of both incidents. ‘We wish to die like Dima’ is what the children sometimes say to me because of all the stress and our poor living conditions.”

Saeed noticed changes in his children too. “Ansam holds a lot of anxiety and stress since the war. One time I called her and she started screaming and threw a plate at me, screaming to leave her alone. I am her father and she is afraid of me.” Nisreen adds: “Ahmad’s scores were badly affected after the war. He used to be an excellent student. Now he even has problems in reading. He also suffers from bedwetting.”

Fear seems to have become a part of daily life for the family. ”The children, like me, are always afraid when they hear drones or firing. When we hear it, we all sit in a single room,” says Nisreen. The fear of another attack is never far from Saeed’s thoughts either: “I am afraid that another war will come. When people talk about it I feel afraid. When I hear drones in the area, I leave the house. I get afraid that they will target us again.”

PCHR submitted a criminal complaint to the Israeli authorities on behalf of the al-Rahel family on 9 September 2009. To-date, no response has been received.

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The series of narratives:

7 January 2009 – The Mattar family
6 January 2009: Al-Dayah family
5 January 2009: Amal al-Samouni
4 January 2009: The Abdel Dayem family
3 January 2009: Motee’ and Isma’il as-Selawy
2 January 2009: Eyad al-Astal
1 January 2009: The Nasla family
31 December 2008: The Abu Areeda family
30 December 2008: The Hamdan family
29 December 2008: Balousha family
28 December 2008: The Abu Taima family
27 December 2008: The Al Ashi family

1 January 12 | Palestinian Center for Human Rights

“I wish that if our fate is to die, that we die together, I wouldn’t want anybody left to have to bear this sort of pain”

On 1 January 2009 at around 15:00, Israeli military planes targeted a water tower across from the home of the Nasla family in North Beit Lahiya. The family were making lunch when the first bomb hit. As the family were trying to escape the smoke filled house, a second and third bomb struck the area, killing Ayoun Nasla, 6, and M’uz Nasla, 2.

For Ayoun and M’uz’s father, Jihad Nasla, the memory of what happened that day is especially distressing. “I found M’uz with his heart outside his chest and my daughter Ayoun with part of her skull missing and her brains spilt out,” says Jihad. “It is the night time, when I used to tell M’uz the stories of Abraham to get him to sleep, and when I go to visit their graves, when I most vividly recall the incident”. “I can no longer go into clothes shops to buy clothes for my children, I used to buy for three boys and two girl’s; I can’t bear to buy only for three”, added Fatima, 42.

The children’s mother, Fatima, has also given a lot of thought and attention to that fateful day. It is clear that she ruminates on the moments, days and years before the attack took place. “M’uz used to go to the balcony of the house every morning and say “good morning” to Majdal and Herbia, where our family is originally from, and every night he would say “good night.” The day he was killed he had said good morning but he never got to say good night,” says Fatima. “M’uz used to have a favourite resistance song he sang all the time, it reminds me so much of him anytime it is played, especially because it is played a lot on the anniversary of his death, which also happens to be the anniversary of one of the resistance groups.  The title of the song is now written on his grave.”

The family dynamic has been dramatically changed since the attack, a result of the stress they all share; the stress of one family member increases the anxiety of the others.  “My wife now cries every day, I have to try and calm her down every time and this has become a source of conflict between us,” says Jihad, to which Fatima adds: “I cry so often I feel my vision is now starting to be affected.” The children’s anxiety also feeds into the parent’s anxiety. “If Zeid wakes up in the middle of the night, when it’s dark, he starts to scream. I then wake up terrified something is happening” says Jihad.

The anxiety of the children is plain both from their parents discussion of the changes they have gone through since the death of their siblings, and their reaction to the unhappy topic of the discussion. “Mu’tassam was very calm until the incident. But he has started to become violent. His grades have also been lightly affected” says Jihad.

Talk of the future for the couple is largely filled with fear and doubt. “In the future I hope to live in peace with the Israelis, but I doubt this will happen given what the Israelis do to us” says Fatima. “I wish that if our fate is to die that we die together, I wouldn’t want anybody left to have to bear this sort of pain”. Jihad expresses similar feelings, “I am terrified that another attack will take more of us, when planes are flying overhead I tell my children to play so that we are distracted,” he says. “My hope is that the pain we carry will one day come to an end, but I don’t know how this is going to happen.”

PCHR submitted a criminal complaint to the Israeli authorities on 9 September 2009. To date, no response has been received.

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The series of narratives:

31 December 2008: The Abu Areeda family
30 December 2008: The Hamdan family
29 December 2008: Balousha family
28 December 2008: The Abu Taima family
27 December 2008: The Al Ashi family