|
Before coming to Palestine, we lived in Abu Dhabi in the Arab
Emirates -we moved to the Gaza Strip in 1992 following the Oslo
Accords and the creation of the Palestinian National Authority.
Shadi was eleven years old, I (Rina) was 12 and our eldest brother
Fadik was 13, my little sisters were much younger and my two little
brothers were born here.
When we arrived at the outskirts of Khan Younis near the Al Tufah
checkpoint, here there was only sand and the Israeli soldiers
did not shoot at anybody.
My father went back to Abu Dhabi to work for another year and
we stayed here with our grandparents. When my father came back
from Abu Dhabi he had saved enough money to build this house where
we live with all our family. Life was good, there weren't any
problems with the soldiers and we could live in peace. It was
only in the year 2000 that our life has been transformed into
a hell because of Sharon.
I asked my mother if she remembered other periods like this and
she answered no, not even the 1967 war was so terrible -this is
the worst period in Palestinian history. Many of our friends are
dead, they were boys of 21, 20, 19 and 17 years.
My brother was always very angry because of what was happening
here at Al Tufah, at Rafah and also for what we could see on TV.
We had a friend who was studying at Gaza University and every
day he crossed the traffic lights at Abu Holi. One day he was
fired on while he sat in the car waiting to pass, and he was killed.
He only wanted to go to study but he was killed. They fired on
all the cars waiting to cross the traffic lights.
Shadi was very perturbed by this event. Once some Apache helicopters
made an attack near the check point of Al Tufah and bombed some
houses. My brother Fadik had hidden in one of them and a wall
fell on him. One of his friends pulled him out of the rubble saving
his life and took him to hospital. When he came back from the
hospital this friend of ours went on a shooting raid at Al Tufah
and got killed.
That day Shadi said that he too wanted to get a kalashnikov and
go and kill the soldiers. For him the continuing acts of aggression
and all those deaths had become an unbearable nightmare: so together
with his friends he used to go and shoot at the watch tower of
the Al Tufah check point, just for the anger at having lost so
many friends and the feeling of impotence and desperation at not
having any means to defend ourselves from the occupation. Only
in this way he could feel better, because he had done something;
perhaps it was useless but at least it was something.
At that time we didn't know anything of what Shadi was doing,
he didn't say anything to us. Once the Israeli soldiers responded
to the shots with some poisonous gas and also Shadi inhaled it
-they took him to hospital immediately, where for a week he was
immobilized in bed -he was very ill. Many others in this area
have inhaled the Israeli soldiers' poisonous gases.
While he was convalescing in hospital, Shadi met a member of the
Palestinian Armed Resistance who enlisted him to fight against
the Israeli soldiers. Shadi did not want to kill civilians, he
only wanted to fight the soldiers because they were the ones who
were continuously attacking us.
Later on, when he left hospital, he was called to take part in
a mission in Rafah, the city on the border with Egypt. On that
occasion they blew up an armoured car. When he came home he told
me that an Israeli car had been blown up. I asked him how he knew
because there had been nothing about it on TV; he only answered
"I know".
I learned that it had been him only after his death when his friend
told me. He had become an explosives expert and led missions to
blow up armoured cars and the bulldozers which destroyed our homes.
Every day he used to go with his friends and take part in these
missions or he would go and shoot at the checkpoint at Al Tufah;
but he told us nothing, just that he was going out with friends.
One evening he left the house to go to some celebration and my
father said not to be late. Towards 12.30 someone knocked at the
door and told us that someone had been injured during an exchange
of fire at Al Tufah checkpoint. They had brought him in front
of our house, on the street, and wanted a car to accompany him
to the hospital. Farik, my elder brother, went out to get the
car and when he saw the wounded man he realised it was Shadi,
his brother, Shadi unconscious and his body covered with blood.
He just stood there not knowing what to do.
Finally they brought him to the hospital and saw that he had been
hit in a leg. They dressed it and put it in a plaster cast, and
for two months he remained at home immobilised with the plaster
cast. Then he began to get impatient and went to ask the doctor
to remove the cast; but the doctor refused because it had not
yet healed. Shadi insisted and threatened the doctor. He had to
get free of the cast which compelled him to walk with a crutch,
that one hanging on the wall.
Even though the doctor had forbidden him to take off the cast,
Shadi went to a friend's and took it off with his help. When he
returned home he felt very ill and stayed in bed for four days.
Then his friend Ahmed came looking for him. I told him Shadi was
resting and I did not want to wake
him up, but he insisted that it was very important so I went and
called Shadi who went out with Ahmed to go to a friend's wedding.
After the celebration they went on a mission.
My parents had gone to visit some relatives that evening and someone
phoned my father on his mobile to inform him that there had been
three wounded at the Rafah border. My father, who was working
for Palestine TV, gave the news as an item without paying it much
attention. Then his friend phoned him again and asked him where
Shadi was. My father answered that he
was at a celebration. He could not imagine that he was instead
dead in Rafah. His friend did not know how to tell him and so
asked him to send someone to look for him. Fadik went out to look
for Shadi but could not find him anywhere.
My father understood that something serous must have happened
and called his friend again. He told him that Shadi had been seriously
wounded and was in Rafah hospital. So my father took the car and
drove to Rafah. When he arrived at the hospital he saw the three
bodies of Shadi, Ahmed and Muhammad. They were dead.
They had been preparing two antitank mines to use against the
bulldozers but the soldiers had seen them and fired a grenade
at them causing the mines to explode and killing them instantaneously.
Shadi's face was completely lacerated with shrapnel wounds and
the other two were disfigured and unrecognisable.
When they told me that Shadi had been wounded I couldn't believe
it. He had very many friends and thay were all out there in the
street shooting and crying with rage. But I couldn't bring myself
to believe that something had happened to him and I didn't even
want to go out into the street. I didn't want to know anything,
My feelings were choking me and I couldn't move. I stayed in the
house for many hours crying while outside Shadi's friends fired
into the air. Then they brought Shadi's body home for a last farewell
before the funeral. I saw him and believed in his death.
My father told me that God had given us the best thing and that
Shadi had died a martyr.
Shadi always used to say that he lived for this land, our land
and that he wanted nothing for himself.
Greetings,
Maurizio
|
Homepage
Contributions
List
