LONDON – Najla Shawa and her circle of relatives are secure for now after fleeing their house in Gaza City, however she’s frightened she might by no means be capable to go back.
Shawa, a Gaza local who works for the world support team Oxfam, is sheltering with her husband, two daughters and about 50 others at a compound in Zawaida, a neighborhood simply south of the space Israeli forces ordered citizens to evacuate prior to an anticipated ground offensive.
The adults are drowsing in shifts and the team is rationing food and water amid an Israeli siege that has blocked provides from getting into the Gaza Strip. But the compound has sun panels, so they’ve a couple of lighting, web provider and are ready to fee their telephones.
Aid paintings has stopped as Shawa and her colleagues focal point on their households.
“The worry is now sinking in, in a way that we need to be prepared for all scenarios,” Shawa, Oxfam’s Gaza-based nation director, instructed The Associated Press in a video name. “There are no answers, really, because the destruction, the scale of destruction, that we have been seeing is terrifying.”
“I was talking to someone (and they asked) why didn’t you decide to stay? … I’m in Gaza because I want to be in Gaza. I mean, in general, with my family. But at the same time, I’m going to see myself and my daughters hurt. So if there’s any chance I can prevent that, I would.’’
About 500,000 people, almost a quarter of Gaza’s population, are sheltering in U.N. schools and other facilities across the territory, according to the U.N. refugee agency. The Gaza Health Ministry said that 2,450 Palestinians have been killed and 9,200 others wounded during a week of Israeli airstrikes that have razed apartment buildings, offices and mosques.
Now that her family is safe, at least for the time being, Shawa is thinking of what comes next.
The events of the past week have reminded Palestinians of the hundreds of thousands of people who were forced from their homes and became refugees after the creation of Israel in 1948. Now some people are talking about Gaza residents being evacuated to the Sinai Desert in Egypt, she said.
“We don’t want to be refugees again,’’ Shawa said. “But to what extent can you bear the suffering, can you bear that possibility of even losing your life?’’
But as a parent, Shawa is more worried about her children than her own safety.
“Losing our lives, it’s OK, it’s God’s will,” she mentioned. “But the suffering, seeing our kids torn or severely injured, etc., not being able to treat them, to hospitalize them. It’s really just beyond thinking.”