Patrick O.
Strickland The Electronic Intifada Gaza City 23 December 2014
Palestinian
journalist Muhammad Daher did not live to see the birth of his son and will
never see his one-year-old daughter grow up.
A
financial editor for Al-Resaleh newspaper, the 27-year-old father and husband
died after being injured during Israel’s brutal assault on the Shujaiya
district of Gaza City this past summer.
His wife,
Shaima, recalled that their three-story house collapsed on top of them when
Israeli occupation forces attacked the area with heavy tank shelling on 20
July. “I was stuck under the house, under a pillar,” she told The Electronic
Intifada. “I was pregnant at the time, and I really don’t know how I survived.”
Muhammad
was transferred to the nearby al-Shifa hospital, where he succumbed to his
wounds ten days later — on 31 July. Shaima was trapped next to her injured
husband for six hours before being rescued by Palestinian medics. Three more of
their relatives died under the rubble of the home, she recounts.
Muhammad’s
sister, Bisan, just eight years old, was also stuck under the rubble and was
badly injured by shrapnel.
The United
Nations monitoring group OCHA estimates that 2,257 Palestinians were killed
during Israel’s 51-day summer onslaught, including at least 1,563 civilians.
Some 100,000 people are still displaced; they are now living in schools,
temporary shelters or with host families across the coastal enclave, which has
been under tight Israeli siege since 2007.
“Friends
all loved him”
Shaima
recalled that Shujaiya “was almost completely empty at the time” when Israeli
forces attacked. “Thirteen of us were living in the house, and three stories
came down on top of us,” she said.
She
describes her late husband as a loving father and husband, dedicated journalist
and “a loved man, who helped everyone he could. Neighbors and friends all loved
him very much.”
In addition
to his five years of work at Al-Resaleh, Daher printed a regular newsletter on
the local economy.
He was one
of at least sixteen journalists killed by Israel during the assault – dubbed
Operation Protective Edge – and dozens more were injured or targeted. According
to the watchdog group Reporters Without Borders, the Israeli-occupied West Bank
and Gaza Strip is second most deadly place in the world for journalists.
According
to statistics provided to The Electronic Intifada by the Gaza Centre for Media
Freedom, at least fifteen Palestinian journalists were killed during the summer
war.
Simone
Camilli, an Italian photojournalist employed by the Associated Press, was also
killed, bringing the total to sixteen. On 13 August, Camilli died with Palestinian
fixer Ali Abu Afash when an unexploded ordnance left behind by Israeli forces
exploded in the Beit Lahiya area of the northern Gaza Strip.
Though
such killings took place in several areas across the strip, at least four of
the slain press workers (including Daher) were killed in Shujaiya. For
journalists, it was one of the most dangerous areas in Gaza.
Khaled
Hamad, a 25-year-old videographer, was killed by Israeli shelling in Shujaiya
on the same day as Daher.
Cousins
Rami Rayan and Samih Rayan, respectively employed by the Palestinian Network
and Al-Aqsa TV, were killed by Israeli shelling in Shujaiya on 31 July.
Massacre
Yet the
slaughter in Shujaiya was not limited to journalists.
Israel
attacked Palestinians across Gaza from land, air and sea, while Palestinian
armed groups responded with rocket fire into the south of present-day Israel
and against Israeli military positions.
Near the
boundary line between Gaza and present-day Israel, Shujaiya was particularly
devastated by Israeli attacks, resulting in accusations of a deliberate
massacre of civilians. Months after a ceasefire was reached on 26 August, large
swathes of the district, like much of Gaza, remain entirely destroyed.
A recent
donor conference raised $5.4 billion for Gaza’s reconstruction, but, as The
Electronic Intifada has previously reported, nearly half of that will be used
to fill gaps in the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority’s budget.
The amount
of construction materials allowed into Gaza in November only “constituted 13
percent of the October 2013 level, which represents less than 30 percent of the
materials imported before the blockade” began in 2007, according to Shelter
Palestine, a humanitarian aid body.
Walking
through Shujaiya, homes, schools, mosques and a hospital are still razed beyond
recognition. Most buildings still standing are pockmarked with bullet holes and
bear the signs of tank shell damage.
Amid the
mangled steel and concrete remains of Palestinian homes there are toys, prayer
mats and other personal belongings still visible. Signs detailing the contact
information of homeowners have been placed atop the massive mounds of rubble.
“I named
him after his father,” Shaima said of her newborn son. “He’s only two months
old now, but I hope he will grow up to look like his dad.”
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