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We came to live in Khan Younis in 1996. We were living in Saudi
Arabia and like everybody else we wanted to return to our own country
after the Oslo agreement and the formation of the Palestinian Authority
(PA).
My husband is a construction engineer and the PA had commissioned
a lot of work in Palestine. Now he is working in Abu Dhabi in the
United Arab Emirates but he cannot rejoin me in Palestine.
I live here alone with my three daughters and, when he was alive,
with Ahmed. Ahmed and Shadi had a deep bond of friendship between
them, even deeper than family bonds, they were always out together,
they stayed very little at home.
Once Shadi's younger brother went to throw stones at the Al Tufah
check-point, so Shadi and my son went to fetch him and bring him
home. But on the way back they split up, Shadi and his little brother
went one way and Ahmed the other.
On the way home Ahmed took shelter behind a wall because soldiers
were shooting at him but some dumdum bullets hit the corner of the
wall. They exploded a few centimetres from his face and fragmented
the corner so that splinters from the wall went into one eye.
When they brought him to hospital they said he would have to be
operated on because he risked losing the sight of the eye. Then
the PA had him transferred to Saudi Arabia where they operated on
him twice and managed to save the sight even though he had to wear
glasses.
It was on a Friday evening when Ahmed told me that he was going
to a wedding at Raffah with his friends Shadi and Muhammad. I never
knew a thing of what Ahmed did in the resistence, but I felt something
bad was going to happen though I didn't know what.
Later on I twice phoned my sister who lives in Raffah. The first
time I asked her to send her son to see where Ahmed was and the
second time I spoke directly with her son,who had already returned
home, and he told me that Ahmed was still at the celebration.
It was already night when my daughter's husband called me to ask
if Ahmed had returned home. I answered no, he hadn't yet returned.
When my sister came to Khan Younis and knocked on my door in tears
I understood that Ahmed was dead.
Three days after this blow Shadi's mother and sister came to visit
me. He had died together with my son, but I couldn't yet manage
to cry, I don't know why, perhaps my grief was too great.
Today when I see the TV and look at all those youngsters who are
dying on the West Bank, I cry a lot but I can't do it before my
daughters. I cry by myself, I don't want others to see my grief.
Ahmed was my only boy and when all my daughters will have married
I will remain alone,
I dont have any other sons to take care of me when I will be old.
Greetings,
Maurizio
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