sabr

I asked Emad to talk about sabr, patience, as the cactus and the noun are essential to life in Gaza.

He replied, somewhat cheekily and with the usual Palestinian dry humour:

“Illi bedo e3esh fi Falesteen o buzzpt fi Gaza lazem yspoor o yokel saber min Gaza. Gher hek, ma begder y3esh fe Gaza.“

If you want to live in Palestine, especially Gaza, you must be patient (yspoor) and eat Gazan cactus fruit (sabr) If not, you won’t make it in Gaza.

Arabic expressions never quite translate into English as the original. Being told to eat cactus fruit actually isn’t as painful or insulting as one might think.  Although stoney and not overly sweet, the fruit is pleasant in its own way, once peeled of its spines.

Gaza abounds with cactus plants, many varieties, but the most common is the broad, flat-stemmed plant that lines roads and is traditionally used as a natural wall between plots.

When I visited Abu Taima land in southeastern Gaza three years ago, Mohammed, a teen, told me the cacti take five years to mature. Like Zionist-bulldozed olive and citrus trees, cacti are sorely missed for the years it takes them to re-grow.

A month later I re-visited after the village elder from the same Abu Taima family called me to tell me the Zionists had just bulldozed his land, once again plowing his crops, including cacti, under the earth.

10 year anniversary of murder of Rachel Corrie, justice activist bulldozed by Zionist army

Rachel Corrie, killed 10 years ago today by a Zionist soldier in his massive, armoured bulldozer, the kind the Zionists use to destroy Palestinian homes to this day. No justice 10 years on for Rachel’s family, nor the families of the thousands of Palestinians rendered homeless by Zionist bulldozers, bombing, and racist laws.

Photo by Richard Purssell, ISM, 4:45PM on 16 March 2003, Rafah, Occupied Gaza. “Other peace activists tend to Rachel after she was fatally injured by the driver of the Israeli bulldozer (in background). This photo was taken seconds after the bulldozer driver dragged his blade over her for the second time while reversing back over her body.

excerpts from life in Gaza

Driving to Gaza one morning, the shared taxi enters a traffic jam outside the UN school. The street is jammed with children, cars trying to butt ahead, a motorcycle sitting in the middle of the mess, clogging everything.

“The police are there when you don’t need them, not there when you need them,” grumbles the driver.

Roadside vegetable vendors: spinach, cauliflower, romaine lettuce, oranges imported from Egypt because the vast majority of Gaza’s trees have long since been bulldozed by the Zionists.

A young man jogs along the sand, past beached fishing boats. Those boats that have ventured the few kilometres out, risking Zionist navy attacks, are not visible through the heavy fog descending. Hassaka fishers 1/2 km out, valiantly fighting choppy water and cold for whatever meagre catch can haul in.

Gaza reconstruction still ongoing after 2012 Israeli bombardment [by Emad Badwan]

scenes of Gaza, where only very little reconstruction has taken place after the Nov 2012 Zionists’ bombing of the Strip. Photographer and text: Emad Badwan

days in Gaza

Fog at 6:30 one morning, the beginning of a hot day, leading to the beginning of a hot season. 

At around 5 am, long after the Azzan (call to prayer) has sounded from various surrounding mosques for the early morning prayer, but still before sunrise, my brother-in-law’s family in the apartment below turn on Quranic recitations—technically not considered music but soothingly melodic nonetheless—as they get their kids ready for school, which they go to in two shifts, starting very early, because all of Gaza’s schools are massively over-crowded.

In the random times when I get up during these quiet hours, I revel in the sounds almost devoid of human noise…no honking taxis, children playing soccer in the streets, street sellers circulating goods…(there’s about a 2 hour window of reverie before these all begin anew).

On many days, I hear the sea’s waves a few hundred metres away rebound off our walls, doves cooing, small birds flitting, roosters, a nearby horse, palm leaves in the wind. It is a tranquility you don’t get after Gaza wakes up, and must wait for till the late hours, after whatever wedding party has stopped blasting celebratory music and stray cats have stopped their mating screams.

Under Siege, Palestinian Women Call for Human Rights on International Women’s Day

Growing old in Jabaliya refugee camp in Gaza. Credit: Emad Badwan/IPS.

*First Published at Inter Press Services (IPS) -By Eva Bartlett

*[blog post longer than original]

“In Gaza we don’t lead normal lives, we just cope, and adapt to our abnormal lives under siege and occupation,” says Dr. Mona El-Farra, a physician and a long-time human rights and women’s rights activist in the Gaza Strip. On International Women’s Day, when many of the world’s women are fighting for workplace equality and an end to domestic violence, Farra and the majority of Gaza’s women fight for the most basic of rights.

“It is difficult to live in this small piece of land, where basic needs like clean water, regular electricity, proper sanitation and means of recreation are not met. Women in Gaza are particularly traumatised by the continuous Israeli military attacks,” says Farra.

Palestinian blogger attacked for speaking truth

Rana Baker, a Palestinian blogger from the Gaza Strip–and a very articulate, politically-astute woman–posts about threats and bigoted insults she received for blogging and tweeting Gaza’s reality:

“You’re a lowlife. And will always be a lowlife. Palestinian trash” Twitter user says to me during “Pillar of Cloud.”

December 12, 2012

Throughout the so-called “Operation Pillar of Cloud” that began on November 14th 2012 and lasted until November 21st 2012, pro-Israel apologists launched another wave of hatred in the cyberspace.

Here are screenshots of some of what I received on my personal Twitter account, timed and dated. I tried to link the screenshots to their users but it seems to me that those apologists either disappeared from Twitter or deleted their posts.

I leave it for you to decide.