Gaza War Stories

Colours Magazine reader Stefania Mizara has submitted a vivid photographic account of his visit to the war torn region of the world. He captures the lives of the devastated people tries to show a picture of life from behind the barbed wires, something you may not see on Network TV every day. If you like the article why not leave a comment and let us know. You can find out more about the artist by visiting his website and seeing more of his work. Links are at the end of the article.

I entered Gaza the 12th of January 2009 late in the evening with a group of doctors. It was my first time entering an active war zone and I was feeling kind of nervous.
The feeling of anxiety worsened as a sound of bomb dropping near the bus made us all in the “Gaza city” bus that is transferring people from Egyptian to Palestinian border fall under our seats.

You may also like on Colours Magazine

Skin Tales
Young Ghana Dreams
Brothels and Fundamentalism

The distance from the border of Rafa to the center of town is very small. By the time we arrived in the hospital, ambulances with the wounded people from the bomb that had dropped in the main market started arriving. The Greek and French doctors went directly to work. The feeling of human loss is unbearable. When the rush is over, your mind starts thinking of what the eyes have seen. Images of children, women, old people, young boys in blood, missing parts of their body, with crazy eyes come back but are rejected by the filter of logic. I think the human mind has the capacity of forgetting horror images such as these as it can’t bear them.
And then comes fear as sound of dropping bombs wake you up at night. After a while you get used to it, people were saying. You actually do but only superficially. You just learn to get back to sleep even thought anything can happen anywhere and there is no safe place to hide.

The next day Cuewa, an Irish girl from the Free Gaza movement arranged us to go to Gaza city with a convoy of 18 ambulances. “It is safer than any other vehicle” she said, “but still Israelis have already shot on ambulances and medics”. We left at 9 o’clock at night, the ambulance loaded with one dead body of a young man to be carried to the Gaza morgue and the desolated brother of the dead man that didn’t speak though the whole trip. Actually I didn’t speak either as I was wondering if this decision is my last one. The details of arriving in a ghost city, passing some dead zones with tanks looking and targeting us was just the beginning of a week of fear.

The next day I spend it trying to understand how someone can move under these circumstances, where is what in this bombed city, how are things done. Even the easiest thing: buying bread was getting complicated: no exchange, no shops, no bread. The next days I moved around with local press people from Ramattan television center and ambulances. The heroes of this war were really these people: local journalists, medics and activists. The only humans moving around the city, specially after nightfall. The nurses in the ambulances and the doctors were working 20 hours a day, sleeping in shifts in the hospitals.

The cameramen and reporters hadn’t seen their families for weeks. The activists went with the ambulances wherever there was danger to be used as a human shield so the medics could pick up wounded or dead people from isolated areas. I focused more on these people’s work as I preferred to see the hope and human force against horror than only death and despair. I discovered things about me as well. I found out that in this question that is always asked to photographers and cameramen: do you take the picture or do you help the person that is suffering in front of you? I thought I was in the first category but I am in the second one.

Greek doctor and deputy of the Greek opposition Ilia Karanikas wtreats a young boy with wounded hand at Al Najjar hospital in Rafah, Gaza, on Monday, January 12, 2009. Today around 35 people arrived to the hospital after a bomb fell near the market. A group of eight foreign doctors from France and Greece that crossed the Rafah border today went directly to work helping their Palestinian colleagues. The Al Najjar hospital in Rafah has a capacity of 60 beds and 60 doctors. The emergency room has 20 beds. To date, approximately 350 wounded people have been treated here since the conflict began, and 32 have died.

Relatives ask through the window as the small hospital accepts only the wounded people during the rush hours after a bombing in Al Najjar hospital in Rafah on Monday, 12th of Jan. 2009. Today around 35 people arrived after a bomb fell near the market at 8 o’clock at night. A group of eight foreign doctors from France and Greece that passed the Rafah border today went directly to work helping their Palestinian colleagues.

Five minutes after the sound of a bomb falling, the ambulances are on the road to check for injured people, in Gaza, on Thursday, January 15, 2009. Hospitals have struggled to keep up with the demands of the injured during the conflict between Gaza and Israel, and several medics have been killed or injured, in addition to the Gazans.

Al Tuam, Gaza Strip, Jan 21 2009.Inhabitants slowly come back to heavily damaged or totally destroyed homes, as fierce fighting between the Israeli army and Hamas took place in this elevated area just north of Gaza city.

The city of Gaza during the bombing was a ghost town. No one wanders in the streets,all the doors are sealed, the windows wide open, only distant blasts and explosions rip the darkness, on Saturday, 17th of January 2009

Father of Al Kanya family picks up his second son’s picture, laying on the floor of his house destroyed by the Israeli soldiers in Atatra, Gaza Strip on Sunday, January 18, 2009. The heaviest machine gun fire and most casualties in the three weeks of Gaza/Israel conflict were in western Beit Lahiya Atatra district, as Israeli forces sought to secure control of the northwest corner of Gaza Strip. This area includes the ruins of three former Jewish settlements abandoned in August 2008, and the Atatra district of Beit Lahiya. Atatra was isolated from the rest of the Gaza, and became a occupied by the Israeli army. During the beginning of the war, Israelis gathered all the men of the settlement and interrogated them about the location of Hamas’s center of operations. Women and children were sent to Jabaliya to find shelter. When the men and women returned to their homes after the declared cease-fire, they found their homes vandalized and destroyed.

Desperate relatives wait outside Al Najjar hospital in Rafah, on Tuesday, January 13, 2009. Hospitals have struggled to keep up with the demands of the injured during the conflict between Gaza and Israel, and several medics have been killed or injured, in addition to the Gazans.

Journalist reports at the roof of Ramadan television tower on Wednsday, 14th of January 2009.
The heroes of this three weeks war were normal, every day people: local journalists, doctors medics, and activists.

Alian Al Madalany, 19 (on the right) returns to the school where he was detained for two days by the Israeli army in Atatra on Sunday, January 18, 2009. The heaviest machine gun fire and most casualties in the three weeks of Gaza/Israel conflict were in western Beit Lahiya Atatra district, as Israeli forces sought to secure control of the northwest corner of Gaza Strip. This area includes the ruins of three former Jewish settlements abandoned in August 2008, and the Atatra district of Beit Lahiya. Atatra was isolated from the rest of the Gaza, and became a occupied by the Israeli army. During the beginning of the war, Israelis gathered all the men of the settlement and interrogated them about the location of Hamas’s center of operations. Women and children were sent to Jabaliya to find shelter. When the men and women returned to their homes after the declared cease-fire, they found their homes vandalized and destroyed.

Young boy injured on the head entering the Sioufa hospital in Gaza, on Thursday, January 15, 2009. A group of ten foreign doctors from France, Norway and Greece that passed the Rafah border the last week of the war and worked in Rafa and Gaza hospitals during the bombing. Hospitals have struggled to keep up with the demands of the injured during the conflict between Gaza and Israel, and several medics have been killed or injured, in addition to the Gazans.

Man leaving the Shifa hospital having lost his leg, in Gaza, on Thursday, January 15, 2009. Hospitals have struggled to keep up with the demands of the injured during the conflict between Gaza and Israel, and several medics have been killed or injured, in addition to the Gazans.

Norwegian doctor giving an interview for Spanish filmmaker Alfredo Arka in Shifa hospital in Gaza, on January 19, 2009. A group of ten foreign doctors from France, Norway and Greece that passed the Rafah border the last week of the war and worked in Rafa and Gaza hospitals during the bombing. Hospitals have struggled to keep up with the demands of the injured during the conflict between Gaza and Israel, and several medics have been killed or injured, in addition to the Gazans.

People leaving their houses destroyed the previous night during the Al Quds hospital bombing. January the 16th, Gaza.

Child wrapped in a blanket from his destroyed house in Atatra on Sunday, January 18, 2009. The heaviest machine gun fire and most casualties in the three weeks of Gaza/Israel conflict were in western Beit Lahiya Atatra district, as Israeli forces sought to secure control of the northwest corner of Gaza Strip. This area includes the ruins of three former Jewish settlements abandoned in August 2008, and the Atatra district of Beit Lahiya. Atatra was isolated from the rest of the Gaza, and became a occupied by the Israeli army. During the beginning of the war, Israelis gathered all the men of the settlement and interrogated them about the location of Hamas’s center of operations. Women and children were sent to Jabaliya to find shelter. When the men and women returned to their homes after the declared cease-fire, they found their homes vandalized and destroyed.

Omar Al Kanya and his father look around their destroyed house and find a lot of Israeli ammunition in Atatra, Gaza Strip on Sunday, January 18, 2009. The heaviest machine gun fire and most casualties in the three weeks of Gaza/Israel conflict were in western Beit Lahiya Atatra district, as Israeli forces sought to secure control of the northwest corner of Gaza Strip. This area includes the ruins of three former Jewish settlements abandoned in August 2008, and the Atatra district of Beit Lahiya. Atatra was isolated from the rest of the Gaza, and became a occupied by the Israeli army. During the beginning of the war, Israelis gathered all the men of the settlement and interrogated them about the location of Hamas’s center of operations. Women and children were sent to Jabaliya to find shelter. When the men and women returned to their homes after the declared cease-fire, they found their homes vandalized and destroyed.

Omar Al Kanya’s house view in Atatra neibourhood, Gaza Strip on Sunday, January 18, 2009. The heaviest machine gun fire and most casualties in the three weeks of Gaza/Israel conflict were in western Beit Lahiya Atatra district, as Israeli forces sought to secure control of the northwest corner of Gaza Strip. This area includes the ruins of three former Jewish settlements abandoned in August 2008, and the Atatra district of Beit Lahiya. Atatra was isolated from the rest of the Gaza, and became a occupied by the Israeli army. During the beginning of the war, Israelis gathered all the men of the settlement and interrogated them about the location of Hamas’s center of operations. Women and children were sent to Jabaliya to find shelter. When the men and women returned to their homes after the declared cease-fire, they found their homes vandalized and destroyed.

Jabalya, Gaza Strip, Jan 18 2009.Stunned inhabitants of Jabalya return to where their homes used to stand, only to find a huge rubble field, levelled by Israeli bombs, explosives and bulldozers. Not a wall is standing over a very large area on the eastern side of the village facing the israeli border.

Al Tuam, Gaza Strip,on Monday, 19th of Jan 19 2009.Inhabitants slowly come back to heavily damaged or totally destroyed homes, as fierce fighting between the Israeli army and Hamas took place in this elevated area just north of Gaza city.