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July 27th, 2021 
Awake Goy 
According to neuroscientists, our memories tend to stick around when there is a strong emotion attached to it. Sometimes emotions are so powerful that it overload our nervous system. Fear is one of these emotions that can invade one’s mind, and we end up completely paralyzed by our own emotion. Though the threat is gone, fear remains locked in the mind. And the mind becomes locked behind its own bars.
After witnessing 264 savage hours of the carpet-bombing of Gaza, it seems impossible to break free from this brain-structured prison. Sound is a powerful stimulus that evokes the reliving of dire events. Neither the sound of fireworks, nor the sound of wedding drums is pleasant. A slamming door can bring the war back. Sight is triggering, when debris, leaning electricity poles, black soot on houses, and bent metal is ubiquitous. The war was kind enough to leave us with muddy footprints to be reminded of its visit daily. It also remodeled my memories of Al-Wahda street, which is the main street to my high school. Now, it is no longer recognizable. It mourns for its departed residents to the point of vanishing into dust. I had never paid attention to the streets before, for streets will be ever present. It turned out that the buildings lining the streets are what make them familiar.
The war changed my perspective of the night as the time of serenity, instead the night sky became a threat. And, serenity became a red siren yet to destroy the silence. On May 16th, Israel bombed Al-Wahda street, a residential block, killing 42 Palestinians and 11 children in a single night. When this intensive bombings took place just few minutes away, my family and I gathered in the living room, and exchanged looks without uttering a word. It seemed like we were saying goodbye with our eyes.
“This time hits different” a phrase frequently shared among Gazans regarding the experience of the last attack. It was indeed different in the intensity and massive scale of destruction in so little time. Airstrikes seemed to be everywhere, they could be heard and felt intensively along the coast. In my imagination, my heart is held by strings always on the brink of being cut. With every airstrike, the strings get weaker. As the sound of rockets penetrating the sky rose, I heard the sound of fibers detaching; strings unable to bear the weight of the blasts, and my heart crashes into fragments.
Fear paralyzed us – as explained by neuroscientists – but it is also the fact that nothing can be done, we are helpless and hopeless to protect one another. With no shelters or any safe place to run into, being still as a statue seemed to be a normal response. We were waiting for our life verdict in an unfair trial.
As the day dawned, and before I surrendered to my body’s persistent calls for rest, I mourned for those who fell victim to such injustice and cruelty. I cried for their dreams, their lost life, and for the loss of their loved ones.
“My sister’s dream was to open a pet store, my brother wanted to be a chemist and my mother wanted to live a good life just like normal people,” said Mohamed el-Qoualk, the only survivor of his family from the Al-Wahda street atrocity. The first phrase one hears when asking about personal aspirations of Palestinians in Gaza is for a life of dignity. The occupation, siege, and repeated escalations are ongoing attacks on human dignity.
I cried of fear the next night, for whose turn it would be, whose dreams will be shattered. And I cried as I heard the chorus of dawn, for being deprived of enjoying the mere peace of living.
The alarm rang abruptly, an alarm that can’t be found anywhere but in Gaza, it is special enough to wake all residents. When the alarm is delayed for a while, I open my eyes with the delightful thought that it was all a nightmare. I scroll over the 100+ news notifications and all news sites searching for a precise sentence “agreed on ceasefire”. Then the monstrous alarm roars, dashing my hopes.
Eid is different
My mother insisted on making maamoul, an Eid tradition where neighbors and family gather to participate in the celebration of making this desert. The house smelled like Eid, but the laughs and talk were replaced with the wicked laughs of bombs. The spirit of Eid burned out like a candle with only the scent of fire. my mother kept clenching a fine thread of hope that we will celebrate Eid to the last string.
Eid is a time to rejoice. It has always been a sacred time that encapsulates the feeling of love and unity. Celebration, peace, and unity, words interrelated with Eid, became agitating and surreal. Survival and death became the words of great use.
Children in Gaza, just like every child of the global Muslim community, were eagerly waiting to enjoy their holiday. They would all dress in their Eid clothes: shiny and colorful. They would play, snack and receive Eidiyas— coins, cash, and gifts. Toy stores would be packed with children hugging their colorfully wrapped new toy.
On the night of Eid Al-Fitr, in one half-hour, Israel pounded 450 bombs and missiles. Amid the chaos and the non-stop bombardments, comes the sound of Takbeer, a small prayer performed as a ritual of Eid. Again a reminder of normalcy within times of madness, it stood out louder than the sound of bombs, at least it seemed to in my mind. Takbeer was also just performed during the holiday of Eid Al-Adha. But, it didn’t bring to mind the peacefulness and beautiful rituals it once brought, instead it stirred up a painful memory.
One of the main cultural events of Eid are family and acquaintance visits, which turned out to be different this Eid. Too many families in Gaza have been significantly affected by the last assault, and don’t have a house to put Eid decorations on, or have houses that are too damaged to host their relatives in. Or, most tragically, some families lost their Eid and all meanings of pleasure with the loss of parents, siblings or children. Overall, family visits were limited, and instead included collective visits to the cemetery.
Stories about the hideous attack took over all conversations, making it the core of every sitting. Phrases about destruction, and loss were too common. The normalcy of which generates an immense grief at the unfairness of living under constant threat of attacks.
‘our relative used to live in this neighborhood but he fled to the UN schools.’
‘Our house is just around the corner from the leveled landmark building’
`Our neighbors were targeted, we were terrified and went down stairs. Thankfully only the windows shattered.’
The streets will be fixed, buildings will be rebuilt, and the wounds of the wounded will be healed. All physical damage will be repaired with time. But, time will be incapable of mending the obliterated dreams, re-stitching the strayed memories, or easing the burden of living with loss.
It has been shown that the types of stimuli we are exposed to repeatedly become the kinds of stimuli that we become masters at dealing with. But what we are really masters at is the ability to bury emotions and get along. Until another war erupts, which bursts all buried emotions and makes it impossible to recover.
Our brain learns to adapt to fear and works according to the previous experience of fear. However, scientific facts do not apply to our case, when we are subjected to repeated attacks that are vicious enough to be unadaptable. With each war, fear grows more intense and it seems almost impossible that we can respond based on previous experiences.
Children become more insular, and more distanced from fulfilling their future. Suffering such trauma affects the building of their personality and their flourishing spirit.
The last aggression eradicated every ray of joy, every glimpse of hope, and all means of ordinary life with every brick dissipated to the streets. Instead, in their place it planted deeply-rooted torment.
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