I’m a doctor and psychiatrist, and before the war in Gaza, my days followed a reliable routine. I would go to work in the clinic, visit my friends and spend time with my family. I lived a normal life. Now, my family and I are refugees in Rafah, after the Israeli army ordered us to leave our home in Khan Younis. We are living in the worst conditions imaginable. We spend our days waiting. We wait in queues for two or three gallons of drinkable water, or for food or plain flour to make bread over a fire, after months without electricity.
In the last few days, as we heard that Israel was preparing for a ground invasion in Rafah, we knew that there was nowhere else for us to go. Israel claims it will evacuate civilians, but how can we believe that when there seems to be no plan and we have repeatedly seen what they have done before? All we can do – all 1.4 million of us – is wait for the worst. Life feels like one eternal, never-ending day. It is filled with suffering and scenes of horror that you see so often, they begin to blend together. It is our collective new routine to hear, witness, sit with, and walk beside death. Death felt closer than ever when the Israeli military launched extensive airstrikes overnight on 12 February.
I have spent my career working in mental health and community trauma in Gaza, but even that couldn’t prepare me for the profound sense of hopelessness that has spread through our community now, permeating everything. Almost all of the people around me have lost family members, whether they’ve been killed by Israeli airstrikes or snipers, taken by the Israeli army, or displaced to other areas. It is the uncertainty that is killing us slowly. We don’t know who will be next to die or lose their family….
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/feb/15/rafah-gaza-israel-airstrikes-war
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