The New York columnist Mona Eltahwy interviewed me about six weeks after the tragedy. She wrote, “He seems to be the only person left in this small slice of the Middle East with its supersized servings of ‘us’ and ‘them’ who refuses to hate.” She was making a point that’s important to me. I don’t spend time feeling sorry for myself and I certainly don’t hate anyone, but I have wondered why this has happened to me. Why was I spared when my daughters were killed? Was I selected for a reason? Many people, both friends and strangers, have remarked on the dual tragedies that have been visited on my family during the last year—the sudden death of Nadia, the loss of my daughters and niece—and they ask if I feel like I’m being punished. I don’t. But I do wonder at times why I was not the one to die.
And I do sometimes feel like Ayoub in the Quran or Job in the Talmud and the Bible: the man whose faith in God was so severely tested—his crops were destroyed, his children were killed, he suffered from disease and loss of wealth, his friends abandoned him—but who still kept his faith. I’ve been tested and I have the feeling that I’m expected to come up with a solution. As a believer, I feel that I have been chosen to reveal the secrets of Gaza, the truth about the pain of the dislocation, the humiliation of the occupation, the suffocation that comes from a siege, so that once and for all Palestinians and Israelis can find our way to live side by side.
I believe in coexistence, not endless cycles of revenge and retribution. And possibly the hidden truth about Gaza can only sink in when it is conveyed by someone who does not hate. I’ve been tested by brutal circumstances the whole of my life, as have many people in Gaza. Until now I’ve seen each hardship as an opportunity to make myself stronger, to give myself energy and a weapon so as to be better armed for the next struggle. But maybe the tests have been designed to strengthen me as a messenger who can help bridge the divide in the Middle East.
I’m not a prophet; I’m a human being and a believer who is trying to accept that what happened to my family was God’s plan. The perpetrator was man, the violence man-made, but surely my mission is to try my hardest to ensure that the consequences lead to good, not to ever-increasing evil, violence and despair.
I believe everything happens for a reason, and that even my family’s terrible loss serves a purpose. The deaths of my daughters opened the Israelis’ eyes to the suffering on the other side. That’s the message I want to spread: allow yourself to see what it’s like to be in our shoes. The tragedy certainly led to the ceasefire and opened the hearts and minds of the Israeli public, the whole Palestinian diaspora and the international community to the misery the Gazans face day after day. I believe that there is a better future for us because of what this tragedy taught the world. There is hope; the past is only there to learn from.
Anael Harpaz, the woman who met my daughters Bessan, Dalal and Shatha at the peace camp in Santa Fe, came to visit Shatha and me in the hospital and ended up staying by Shatha’s side for the entire ten weeks she was in the hospital. At the end of March, just before we were to move back to Jabalia, she sent me an email whose subject line was: In Memory of Bessan. It read:
Hi Beloveds … at long last I have time now to mourn for Bessan. Before I was too busy and needed to be strong and present for Shatha and Ghaida, her cousin—the flood gates of tears have opened and with this a poem that always helps me to process and feel better afterwards.
Thank each and every one of you for your commitment to peace. May Bessan’s death be the foundation for deep change and may all people in this region know what we know in our hearts. Sending you all much love. If any of you have written something that you would like to share about this difficult time or about Bessan—please send it to me. Someone has volunteered to do a website in memory of the girls and we would like stories, poems or anything that you feel would be appropriate. Here’s my poem:
WHERE LOVE RESIDES …
in memory of Bessan
I long to touch you Bessan
One more time
To hug you
To tell you how sorry I am
that your mom died
But now you too are gone.
Your smiling face
Your gentle way
Your softness
Your non-judgmental words
Your pain for your people
Your way of life
Your dreams, aspirations
and your hope for peace
Just days before the war
I spoke with your dad
He gave me your phone number
It is still in my car
Every day
I glance at the number
seeing your name
Bessan
I wish I had spoken with you more
but I didn’t have the guts
I spoke with you three days before you died
I told you that I am praying for your safety
My prayers were not heard
through the shelling
the bombing
the Qassams
the smoke
I feel I have been betrayed by God
By my country
By the cruelty of humanity
By the warmongers
By those who think violence is the solution
And with all of this
I have been given a gift
To have spent six weeks
with Shatha, Izzeldin,
Atta and Ghaida
I heard no words of revenge
nor hatred
I heard no anger I heard the deep belief
that peace is possible
even with this enormous loss
I have been strengthened
from their strength
I am more determined
from their determination
I am more at peace
from their peacefulness
Bessan forgive me
for not being able to save you
from my own people
Forgive me for giving you hope
that peace is possible
and then taking that dream from you
You will always be my symbol
of hope, peace and mostly
gentleness
Your dad shared a dream with me
days after you died.
He came into a room full of men
and there you were
sitting amongst them
He asked you
“Why are you sitting here?
You know it is not acceptable in our society”
You answered
“All is fine now Dad
I am happy and well.
I can be here now among the men where I am
needed.”
May no other woman need to die
in order to be able to influence
the men as you have Bessan.
May we women
be heard and heeded
and may the men in this world
get the chance to know from deep within their
hearts that this is where the answer lies
In their hearts
where love resides.
Anael—March 2009
Her words struck a huge chord with me. I am presently laying the groundwork for a foundation in honour of Bessan, Mayar and Aya whose aim is to empower women and girls through health and education programs in order to promote change for women and girls throughout the Middle East.
As I’ve written earlier, women in this region have not been part of the discussion in civil society, but Palestinian women know about sacrifice and suffering. They know how to manage in the face of chaos. It’s not that the women aren’t able to participate; the issue is that they’ve been denied the right to take part in discussions vital to our future.
I want to see that opportunity come to women and girls everywhere. I want them to be part of the conversation. I’ve been delivering Palestinian babies and Israeli babies for most of my career. There’s no difference between a Pale
stinian newborn and an Israeli newborn. And I believe that the mothers who birth these babies can find the way forward for this region.
Many women and girls in Gaza cannot get an education because of their financial and cultural circumstances. I firmly believe that Palestinian women can carry the torch of change into the future. But first they need to be released from the bondage that culture, occupation, siege and suffering have imposed upon them. Empowerment means being independent and respected. And to create change in an entire society, women must be educated and empowered.
My daughters were special. They were modest and lovely girls, willing to help others, thinking of others. They could recite the passages in the Quran that support the education of women and girls. And they were full of dreams and ambitions when they were killed. But not all of the women in our society are as emancipated as my daughters or have fathers or families with the resources and attitudes to support them. That needs to change.
The initial funds for the foundation will come from the blood of my daughters. Although compensation for their deaths was discussed at the outset, to date there’s been no payment. In fact, there’s been no apology. The Israeli government has taken responsibility for wrongly targeting my home and killing my daughters, but it has never apologized; no official has said, “I’m sorry.” If they are true to their word, they will pay the compensation, apologize for the mistake they made and take responsiblity. Then the blood of my daughters will provide the seed money to launch this new experiment in changing the status and role of women.
I want an organization that will enable girls and women to speak with a stronger voice and play a more influential role in the improvement of conditions affecting the quality of life throughout the Middle East. I believe we need to accept that the women among us can contribute a great deal to the changes we need to make. Most people become exceptionally nervous when cultural change is suggested, when the status of women is challenged. But it’s time to start the discussion.
Every girl in Palestine (and elsewhere for that matter) must be able to go to school. The foundation will provide scholarships for high school and university education and will study existing programs and services and find out what’s working to advance women and girls and what isn’t. It will develop new curriculum to fill the gaps and assist in improving current programs. At the same time, the foundation will use its funds to commission research into the advancement of women and girls and create an advocacy program to make sure the community gets behind the changes we propose.
The ultimate objective of the foundation—which will be called the Abuelaish Foundation—is the creation of a credible voice throughout the Middle East on societal issues that affect the lives of women. When the values of women and girls are better represented through leadership at all levels of society, overall values will change and life will improve in the Gaza Strip, in Palestine as a whole, in Israel and throughout the Middle East. That’s the legacy I want to honour the memory of my daughters.
Part of the aftermath of this tragedy is that I’ve had the opportunity to travel even more widely to countries in Europe, North America and Asia to speak on coexistence and the real truths of Gaza. Each visit presents me with a chance to straighten out the facts, to right the wrongs and to gain supporters for coexistence and human rights in the Middle East—and everywhere. And at the same time, I talk about the lives of women and the work my foundation plans to do. My stand on coexistence has set me apart, but now that I am challenging the status of women in the Middle East, I have two platforms to speak from.
I was invited to Brussels in April 2009 to meet members of the European Parliament. While I was there, I was awarded honorary Belgian citizenship and given the opportunity to meet with the president of the EU parliament, Hans-Gert Pöttering of Germany. I also found out that Jean-Marc Delizée, secretary of state for the Belgian parliament, had nominated me for the Nobel Peace Prize for 2010. I spoke to the media that day in order to dedicate the nomination to people everywhere who suffer from prejudice and injustice, and to the leaders of both the Israeli and Palestinian peoples, urging them to work together to prevent further destruction and pain. Enough blood, enough animosity. Military means have proven a failure, and a new method must be found to deal with the conflict. We must focus now on the lessons of tolerance and compromise, on hope, good deeds and saving lives.
I was, of course, overwhelmed. When I’d had time to absorb that news, I reflected on the worldwide response to my family’s tragedy and on the heartfelt goodwill that has come from political leaders as well as opinion makers. Apart from the fact that I can never get my girls back, it seems as if there is nothing that is truly impossible in this world.
Soon after the trip to Brussels, I was informed that I was to receive the 2009 Niarchos Prize for Survivorship. The prize is given by Survivor Corps, an organization that works to break cycles of victimization and violence, individual by individual, country by country. I was deeply honoured to receive an award that mirrors so closely the reality of the lives of Palestinians. Nomika Zion, from Sderot, also received the award, and spoke out against people who glorify war: “I am frightened that we are losing the human ability to see the other side, to feel, to be horrified and to show empathy. It’s our obligation to make our leaders talk, to compel them to tell us for a change, a different story. Maybe, one day, our voice will be heard.”
I listened intently to her acceptance speech, and when I made my own, I felt I was speaking for my whole family, for all Palestinians. I said: “I would love for a moment if my parents could come up from their grave, my wife also, and my daughters, and the Palestinian people in general and the Gazans in particular, to share with me this happy moment, and know that they are not alone; that someone else in this world is thinking of them. I assure you that this tragedy has strengthened me, and I am more determined than ever before to continue my efforts for the sake of humanity, but I also want you to know that willing is not enough. We must act. It is well known that all it takes for evil to survive is for good people like you to do nothing. It is time to do and to act. We have to look forward. The dignity of Palestinians equals the dignity of Israelis and it is time to live in partnership and collaboration—there is no way backwards.”
On the day of the shelling that ended my daughters’ lives, we had decided as a family that we would take up the posting in Toronto that had been offered to me by Dr. Peter Singer and Dr. Abdullah Daar, and that I would come to work at the University of Toronto’s Dalla Lana School of Public Health.
As we made arrangements to leave Gaza in the summer of 2009, both Israel and Hamas were seeking a truce, and Egypt was once again willing to broker it. Hamas declared that the firing of rockets into Israel from Gaza would stop. And Israel said that shipments into Gaza would start again in stages. But the rockets didn’t fully stop and the shipments remained well under expected amounts.
Still on those summer evenings my friends and relatives gathered every night out on the street to escape the stifling heat of their houses. We sat outside my house on white plastic garden chairs arranged in two rows facing each other and exchanged the news of the day. I also carried on meeting with the dozens of people who needed my help. Because I was one of the few with access to Israel and to the goods the Gazan people need, every weekend when I came home from the hospital in Tel Aviv, I’d bring filled prescriptions, shoes for a child, eyeglass lenses for one, a passport for another. I’d also arrange medical appointments with specialists in Israel and ambulance transfers for those who needed them. Even the famous families, the heads of the tribes in Gaza—the Hmaid family, the Akel, the Abu Zaida—had fallen into the habit of coming to my house to discuss their health issues with me. This is my world, this is what I’ll miss, and this is why our departure from Gaza will not be permanent.
There was much to do before we left in late July. Shatha studied for her final examinations day and night, holed up in the living room with the door closed, hoping to place among the top ten stude
nts in the graduating class. Dalal was tethered to her drafting desk preparing final drawings for her architecture class. My task was to prepare travel documents for the children, find us a place to live in Toronto, get the tickets, and somehow pack for a five-year voyage with a family of six.
Our departure was exciting, slightly chaotic and nerve-racking. Our extended family, friends and neighbours had begun the goodbyes the day before, gathering around us with tears, hugs and best wishes. The younger children had never left the Gaza Strip except to come to the hospital in Tel Aviv when Shatha was a patient there, or flown in an airplane. The only planes they knew were the Israeli F-16s that flew over our home. I was concerned that the first Israeli they would see would be a soldier at the Erez Crossing, which is not in keeping with the lessons I’d taught them about who Israelis are. I took all our suitcases to the Erez Crossing early to start the inspection process, then went home and got the children. Once through the crossing, which took until five p.m., we were treated like celebrities. In the airport, television cameras were there to record the event, and Channel 10 TV anchorman Shlomi Eldar, who had played such a critical role in our lives, came to interview me and to say goodbye. (The piece was called “The Co-Exister Has Left.”) He brought me a jar of sand so I wouldn’t forget where I came from. Our farewell was mixed with tears of sadness and joy, of anticipation and regret. And it still took about three hours at the airport to clear the inspection for our flight, which left at midnight.
As the plane took off down the runway, the children exchanged glances with me. We all knew this would be an adventure, and we were all thinking of Aya’s remark, “I want to fly, Daddy.”
Toronto has turned out to be everything I’d hoped for: a place and a time for my children to heal. Dalal and Shatha are enrolled at the University of Toronto. Mohammed, Raffah and Abdullah are in a junior school nearby. The neighbours welcomed us to the street and soon enough we found our way. In our first days in the new house, an incident warmed my heart. Most of the backyards around the neighbourhood are fenced. The family next door has children about the same ages as my younger ones, and the first thing they did after we moved in was to take down a section of the fence so the kids could run back and forth without barriers. That simple act gave me a lot to think about.