![One simple demand -- they want their father[s] free and out of Israeli jails.](http://bbsnews.net/bbsn_photos/topics/Israel_Palestine/One_simple_demand.sized.jpg)
Image Credit: Mohammed Omer, Rafah Today 2007-07-27.
Fatah Rejects Call for 'Dialogue' with Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh
BBSNews 2007-10-16 -- By Mohammed Omer. While Muslims all over the world Friday marked the beginning of the Eid holiday with gifts and feasts, Palestinians in the Gaza Strip instead felt the tightening grip of an Israeli embargo. Gazans at the same time mourned the dead from fighting which ended last June with Hamas taking control of Gaza, and the West Bank coming under the control of Fatah, under by Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas.
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One simple demand -- they want their father[s] free and out of Israeli jails.
Image Credit: Mohammed Omer, Rafah Today 2007-07-27. |
"We mark a very sad Eid. We remember our loved ones who were killed and we miss them," Majdi, a 46 year old from Rafah, said while holding his grandson. The infant's father was killed in the internal factional fighting in Gaza in last June.
Eid day came at the end of the Ramadan holy month. A break of the month-long fasting, this should be the happiest day for Palestinians. But in fact, the smiles you see when people greet each other belie their sadness. Talking to different people, you realize that the wounds are deep, much deeper than we all thought. The one who has lost his house, dwells in memories of his house; the one who has lost his child, is lost in memories of his child.
At one of Gaza's graveyards, 8 year-old Sameh is carrying flowers and watering the grass on the grave of his father. "It's a sad day. I have been waiting since early morning to visit my dad's grave. I wanted to be with him all day long," he said. His father was killed by Israeli warplanes in Gaza City, in one of their many air raids throughout the Strip. Even sadder is that under this ground, where the body of his dad should be lying, there are instead just some fragments of flesh. Yet, for a moment the child smiles, looking up and saying: "I will take care of my mom and two sisters, as my dad did, when I grow up."
This week, Fatah has rejected a new call for dialogue from the Hamas elected Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh. Haniyeh renewed his message to thousands of worshippers assembled for Eid prayers saying in his speech: "There are wounds in every house but we need to rise above the pain. Let's shake hands and let love and harmony prevail."
It doesn't seem that Haniyeh's words on love and harmony will find any willing ears from Fatah, or from the US-backed government in Ramallah. Yes, instead Gaza's borders remain virtually sealed to all but the most essential supplies, casting a dark shadow over the holiday.
Shortages
New clothes, a traditional purchase at this time of year, were hard to find in Gaza this week, and prices for old stock have soared to more than double in some places.
Palestinians traditionally eat fish on the first day of Eid. This year, though, fish is no longer affordable for most people, despite living beside the sea. "Per kilo of fish, it's 60 Shekels. How can I buy it for my kids when we have no income, when my husband is ill and no one works?" asked Samirah Abdelrauf. She depends instead on a welfare program from the Ministry of Social Affairs in Gaza, as well affected by the siege: orphans and widows are now also not getting the wages needed to keep them surviving.
Attacks
During Eid, a 21 year-old Hamas member, Hassan Naim, was killed, with five others injured. Family and friends held a funeral, as Palestinians seem to be doing every day in Gaza. The difference this time was that he was killed on the day of joy and happiness, when he should have been visiting his sisters, brothers, and relatives. He should have been spending time visiting friends and neighbors, sharing rare moments of joy in besieged Gaza. Yet, even these moments were cut off, taken away with the unleasing of another Israeli missile, in a string of military incursions on Gaza that continued through Ramadan and even on Eid.
Mohammed Omer is a young journalist/photographer in the Gaza Strip. He and his family have a very rough time in living day to day and they have lost much. In October of 2003, one of Mohammed's younger bothers, Issam, was injured and had to have a leg amputated. Later in the same month another younger brother, Hussam Al-Mouhagir, was killed in his home; shot to death by the Israeli Army that occupies and regularly devastates Palestine. These stories are written by Mohammed who knows no peace, only the continued devastation forced upon civilians who have little voice in the world. Mohammed has covered the Occupied Territories for several years. In 2006 Mohammed won the New American Media National Ethnic Media Award for best Youth Voice. On May 18th, 2007, Mohammed was shot at by unknown militants in Gaza yet he continues to report. Visit Mohammed's Web site, or write to him to get a more complete picture of what is really happening that main-stream news sources rarely brings to its audience. We are proud to feature articles from Mohammed Omer here at BBSNews, his reporting is some of the only original, on the ground reporting available from the Israeli Occupied Territories.