A shattered wall inscribed “Omar and Osama are under the rubble.” Photo: Hassan Herzallah

It was midday during the height of the war. I was helping distribute hot meals in a displacement camp in Al-Mawasi, Khan Younis. Starved children stood in long lines, and families hoped for a moment of relief.

Suddenly, a woman struggled to reach the front and collapsed. I quickly filled her pot with food, and she looked at me silently before whispering, “Don’t you recognize me? I am Umm Ghazal. You helped my children with their lessons months ago.”

The vibrant woman I once knew was gone. Her features were pale, exhaustion etched her face, and her hands trembled as she held the pot. She and her three children hadn’t eaten in days. I remembered visiting her in the camp months earlier; she had stood firm, despite displacement. Now it seemed as if hunger and hardship had drained whatever strength she had left.

On the first day of the war, I’d thought it would last only a few days, like before. By evening, the electricity in my neighborhood was cut, and soon the taps ran dry. A few days later, my father and I began to search for drinkable water. Each morning, we carried empty containers through damaged streets, sometimes waiting for hours at a well or a tanker. On the way back, the containers felt heavier with every step. Warplanes circled above our house, and my university closed without warning. What had once been simple — electricity, water, studying, seeing friends — became nearly impossible. My life narrowed to one task: getting through the day.

One night, three rockets shook our area, followed by the wailing sirens of ambulances. The attack was on my grandmother’s street. We called repeatedly to make sure she was safe. Thankfully, she was unharmed; the target had been a friend’s house.

I went to check on them, but the scene was devastating. Most of the people inside had been killed. I searched for my childhood friends, Omar and Osama Al-Riyati, but found nothing. The bombardment had reduced their home to rubble. On one of the remaining walls, we wrote: “Omar and Osama are under the rubble.” 

Life is waiting in line

For two years, Gaza has been a city of queues. Gone are the days when you could quickly buy what you needed, or order delivery. Life is waiting in line for the basics. In March 2024, during Ramadan, food was so scarce that some people in the north had to eat leaves or animal feed. Even small shipments meant someone standing for hours in long crowded lines just to secure a meal for their family.

One morning during Ramadan, I woke up before Fajr, determined to get two chickens for my family. I stood in line from 4 a.m. until 1 p.m., fasting, while the sun rose and more people joined the queue. Around me, I could hear distant gunfire and explosions, and people kept saying, “We just need a ceasefire, even for a short time, so we can stop these endless lines.”

My cousin Mustafa, only 15, had spent the night and most of the next day waiting in line for cooking gas but he didn’t give up. Seeing him later, his eyes red from exhaustion, I realized how the war had paused our lives. The simplest things, like food and gas, had become impossible luxuries.

In two years, everything in my life had changed. I was once a translation student dreaming of the future, but the war turned me into someone struggling daily to feed his family — planting and harvesting crops, helping farmers, and fishing despite the dangers of the Israeli boats, all to get some food for my loved ones. When famine hit Gaza in early May, every day became a fight for survival. The siege and constant closures made basic goods scarce. Prices soared and aid distribution points became deadly rather than helpful.

Each night, as hunger and fear surrounded us, my father would say, “Be patient—when the war ends, you’ll return to your dreams, and all of this will just be a memory.” His words were what kept us holding on.

‘Hudna! Hudna!’

When the war finally paused and the ceasefire began, I woke up to the sound of families cheering and children shouting, “Hudna! Hudna!” — “Ceasefire! Ceasefire!” For the first time in months, the sky was quiet, but the pain was still alive.

Most people in Gaza are still living in makeshift tents; some can’t return home because the Israeli occupation remains nearby, while others, like us, no longer have a home to return to at all. Even with the ceasefire, life hasn’t restarted. Schools remain closed, jobs lost, and dreams postponed, as if time itself stopped in Gaza.

Sometimes, I still pass by the ruins where Omar and Osama once lived. They were my closest friends, always there in the quiet moments before the war, sharing laughs and dreams. The walls are gone, but their names remain — written in dust and memory.