“Everyone is huddled together on the ground floor,” he said. “Beds are scarce, so some sit on the floor, trying to find comfort in the chaos. The darkness is oppressive, interrupted only by the flashes of explosions. We do our best to reassure the children, telling them stories or singing softly to drown out the sounds of the bombing. Prayer becomes a collective consolation, a desperate plea.” For safety.
“Communications are tense amidst the noise. Cries of reassurance and whispered conversations mix with the echoes of continuous explosions. Mixed feelings of fear and uncertainty. We share looks filled with dread, realizing that each bomb brings us closer to the impending battle.”
El Saadawi said the uncertainty about what comes next is paralyzing. He said: “Netanyahu’s announcement adds a layer of fear, and the realization that there may be no escape increases the fear.” “It is a feeling of helplessness, exacerbated by the knowledge that destruction is imminent, and we are trapped in its path.
“Mostly, the emotion is a combination of fear, frustration and a feeling of abandonment.”
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese added his voice this week to those of US President Joe Biden and other national leaders calling on Israel to rethink its planned ground offensive in Rafah. For Palestinian Australians with families stuck in Rafah, there is an overwhelming sense of fear.
Hadeel Al-Barqi left Gaza four years ago to study in Melbourne. At the end of last year, her mother, Iktamal, and her brother, Khaled, fled their home in Khan Yunis, which was under attack by Israeli forces, to seek refuge in Rafah.
Akmal Al-Barqi is one of about 1.4 million Palestinians who have taken refuge in the city of Rafah.
They now live with her aunt and four other people in a house with no electricity, no heat, little food and almost no water. Their house in Khan Yunis was destroyed.
“Everyone is very exhausted,” Al-Barqi said. “All my friends and their families who are still in Gaza are in Rafah. They are very afraid of what will happen, but they are all in limbo. Where are they going to go?
“No one expected it to go on for so long. I think we were naive enough to think that the United States and the West would intervene and pressure Israel to stop.”
The head of the Australia-Palestine Advocacy Network, Nasser Al-Mashni, said that the order to evacuate Rafah left the Palestinian community in Australia in a state of shock and despair.
“This is without a doubt an act of genocidal aggression against entire families and communities rounded up and forced to Rafah while Israel systematically destroyed their homes and neighborhoods throughout the rest of Gaza,” he said. Israel sends a telegram about a massacre targeting civilians in Rafah
Thomas White, head of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Refugees, said every open space in Rafah had a makeshift shelter, people were living on footpaths, and the sand dunes west of the city were a sea of tents and huts.
Aid delivery in Rafah is already under severe pressure, and the agency is close to financial collapse after donations were suspended by more than a dozen countries, including Australia, in response to Israeli allegations that dozens of people working for the agency were involved in the operation. The October 7 massacre in southern Israel.
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The United Nations is investigating these accusations and has severed relations with those involved. White said that unless funding is restored quickly, he will not be able to pay the salaries of staff and contractors, not only for aid provision by UNRWA, but also for other humanitarian agencies working in Gaza.
Netanyahu indicated that civilians in Rafah may be able to return north to parts of Gaza where Israel has completed its operations. President Biden called on Israel to prepare a detailed plan to protect civilian lives before it launches its ground attack. For White, the idea of putting a million already displaced people back on the road is untenable.
He added: “We need a ceasefire.” “People have been severely traumatized by this war. They have already moved several times. They are living under very poor sanitation and shelter conditions, and the health care system is collapsing.
