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“We are staying in this tent because this is our place and home.
It’s our house, we can’t abandon it, it has our dreams and
memories," said Umm Nael al-Kahloot, whose son was killed
earlier in the Hamas-Israel war.
"We had good memories in this house, I’m trying to heal our pain
and find a place to stay. We can’t stay away from our home, even
if there are fierce (Israeli) strikes, we'd leave for a day or
two then we’d be back in our place.”
Many Palestinian families share their plight as Israeli air
strikes and heavy shelling has killed tens of thousands of
people and reduced much of the Gaza Strip to ruins since Hamas
carried out a cross-border attack on Israel on Oct. 7, killing
1,200 people and taking about 250 hostage.
Many homes like that of the al-Kahloots have been pulverised,
displacing families, some of whom have returned in hope that at
least part of their dwellings might have survived air strikes
and shelling.
The al-Kahloots' house, part of a vast swathe of concrete rubble
in the densely built-up northern Gaza town of Beit Lahia,
consisted of five floors, which all collapsed. But the family
remain attached to their home, clinging to the destruction.
"Despite all of this struggle that we are going through and the
tragedies we have witnessed, we have roamed around, and we
couldn’t live anywhere else but here," said Ismail al-Kahloot,
Umm Nael's husband.
"Five families eat, sleep, and stay in this tent you see here."
Umm Nael hangs clothes to dry on a rope and waters her plants.
She sorts food pots and places them on an open fire.
"Why all this suffering? What did we do wrong to deserve all of
this? We are helpless, we don’t have any hand in all of this
(war)," she said.
"We couldn’t save anything from the house, from the work
(studio) or from the furniture, everything went under the
rubble. These are old items. I'm cleaning them up as much as I
can."
(Writing by Michael Georgy; editing by Mark Heinrich)
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