Khawla, daughter of Jabalia camp in northern Gaza Strip, where the walls witnessed her childhood and the alleys taught her the meaning of belonging and memory. A refugee—having inherited the status from her father—and now displaced, she lives in an overcrowded camp south of Gaza City, burdened by the pain of loss and the harshness of repeated displacement.
Khawla tries to hide the trembling of her hands, but she cannot hide her pain as she recounts how she was forced to move from place to place, from street to street, until she ended up in a tattered tent that offers no protection from the cold of winter or the heat of summer: “I suffered a lot during this aggression. Before the aggression, my financial situation was already very bad, but it only got worse after I lost my home. The only thing I had left was my husband and children.”
After the beginning of the October 7th Israeli aggression, Khawla found her home in the line of fire, but she and her family miraculously survived, as she recounts: “I used to live in Jabalia camp, and at the start of the aggression, they bombed our house and we got injured, but they rescued us. Then the (Israeli) army invaded the area, so we fled to a shelter nearby.” She continues: “We stayed at the school (shelter) for two days, and then suddenly the army advanced with its tanks, surrounded the school, and arrested the men, leaving us women behind. After a while, they let us go, and thank God, my husband was released the next day. We then moved to another shelter in Gaza City. There, my husband searched desperately for water, but he couldn’t find any. The children were exhausted, and the situation became more dangerous. The shelling was heavy, and people were being killed in front of us, so we started running to escape that danger in that area.”
For nearly two years, Khawla has not known a single quiet night. As the Israeli aggression intensified and living conditions worsened, she fled again with her family from the north of the Gaza Strip to the south, to the so-called “safe humanitarian zones” as claimed by the Israeli occupation, which turned out to be far from anything humanitarian or safe. There, Khawla and her family faced a new episode of starvation and even more difficult living conditions. She says, “We lived through starvation. We ate fodder and barley. My children survived on lemons, and my husband wandered around trying to get aid and food. When we couldn’t bear the hunger anymore, we fled south to Rafah. Then Rafah was invaded, so we fled to Khan Yunis, where a second starvation began in the south. All we gained from moving south was more displacement.”
In addition to starvation and a complete lack of privacy inside the camp, Khawla and her family endured the brutal cold of winter and the hellish heat of summer inside their tent. “In winter, we were flooded. Sewage water soaked our blankets and mattresses. I held my children in a corner of the tent, and the rain fell on us from above and below. In summer, we couldn’t stand the heat. I started going to the soup kitchens, and tried to sell anything I could to be able to feed my children.”
Displacement after displacement, suffering piled upon suffering, until a temporary ceasefire agreement was announced, and displaced families were allowed to return to the north of the Gaza Strip after Israeli occupation forces withdrew from the Netzarim checkpoint, which separated the north from the south of the Gaza Strip. Khawla and her family went back to Jabalia, only to find unprecedented destruction of homes and infrastructure. Yet, they sought shelter in what remained of their home, and tried to make a new life for themselves on its ruined roof.
Khawla recounts their return: “After the truce, we returned to find most of our house destroyed, so we decided to put up a tarp, made it like a tent on the collapsed rooftop. It became like a floor, and we lived on it. The life conditions in the north were very difficult. We were cut off from fresh and salt water, and the sewage system was destroyed.” She adds: “But we had to live and find a way to survive, so we tried this and that, and my husband thought of starting a farming project to grow food for ourselves and to sell. We brought soil and seeds and planted vegetables on half of the remaining roof. My husband and I took care of it and watered it, and whatever grew, we ate and sold.”
On the ruins of her home, Khawla clung to a thin thread of life and tried to survive by growing plants that sprouted from the rubble. She planted both patience and seeds, but she did not get to witness the harvest season, as she and her family were forced to flee once again, throwing them in a renewed state of instability. This time, the blow was harder: she lost her husband, who was killed while trying to secure food for their starving children.
“We went back to living in a tent, and my husband kept going to look for aid so we could feed the kids. He always told me he wanted to check on the crops and the house. I begged him not to go—it was too dangerous. But he didn’t listen, because our son went to him crying, ‘Baba, I’m starving.’ He risked his life and went to Jabalia,” Khawla recalls, tears of loss streaming down her cheeks. “He left and we didn’t hear from him for two weeks. He left and never came back. I didn’t know anything about him. Then I got the news that he had been killed even before he could reach the house and see it again.”
Overnight, Khawla became a widow, bearing immense responsibility. The Israeli aggression stripped her of her home and her husband, —like thousands of other women who lost both shelter and loved ones.
Khawla concludes her story by reminding us that the return of life, dignity, and security begins with reconstruction: “He went out to get food for his children. He was hungry himself, and he never returned. More than once, he risked his life to provide for his children. It was hard for him to see his children like that, and now I am left alone in a torn-up tent and a deserted place, not knowing how to manage, how to raise and provide for my children, when I have no home and nowhere to go. I have the right to rest. I have the right to settle down in a home.”
Disclaimer: The names used in the previous testimony are aliases.
“This document has been produced with the support of the Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung. The views expressed herein are those of the author(s) and therefore do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung.”
