Shell Shocked: On the Ground Under Israel’s Gaza Assault

305 Pages·2015·3.96 MB·English

by  Mohammed Omer

SHELL-
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“Omer’s accounts are not only about the immense SHOCKED
suffering of Gaza’s people but about their remarkable E
resilience and dignity … [His] book will remain with
ON THE GROUND
L
the reader long after it is read.” –Sara Roy
L UNDER ISRAEL’S
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GAZA ASSAULT
Operation Protective Edge, launched in early July 2014, was the third S
major Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip in six years. It was also the most
H
deadly. By the conclusion of hostilities some seven weeks later, 2,200 “Eyewitness dispatches of clarity
of Gaza’s inhabitants had been killed, and more than 10,000 injured. O and brilliance.” –John Pilger
C
In these pages, journalist Mohammed Omer, a resident of Gaza who
lived through the terror of those days with his wife and three-month-old K
son, provides a first-hand account of life on the ground during Israel’s
E
assault. The images he records in this extraordinary chronicle are a
literary equivalent of Goya’s “Disasters of War”: children’s corpses D
stuffed into vegetable refrigerators; a family rushing out of their
home after a phone call from the Israeli military informs them that IsrOn
the building will be obliterated by a missile in three minutes; donkeys ae th
machine-gunned under instructions to Israeli soldiers to shoot any- l’se
G G
thing that moves; graveyards targeted with shells so that mourners aro
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can no longer tell where their relatives are buried; fishing boats ablaze an
in the harbor. Ad
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Throughout this carnage, Omer maintains the cool detachment of the ue
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professional journalist, determined to create a precise record of what
is occurring in front of him. But between his lines the outrage boils,
and we are left to wonder how a society such as Israel, widely-praised OM
in the West as democratic and civilized, can visit such monstrosities MO
EH
on a trapped and helpless population. RA
M
M
Politics / Middle East E
D
ISBN: 978-1-60846-513-2 $17 MOHAMMED
OMER
haymarketbooks.org
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SHELL-SHOCKED
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PRAISE FOR SHELL-SHOCKED
“Mohammed Omer could easily have escaped the horror of Israel’s impending
assault on the trapped and helpless people of Gaza. Instead, he chose to stay,
to record, in searing and vivid detail, the savagery of Israel’s latest escapade
of ‘mowing the lawn’ and the steadfastness of the victims of a hideous tragedy.
Few can match his courage and integrity, but all of us who live in countries
providing the arms and diplomatic support that made Israel’s actions possible
should ponder his words and ask ourselves what has been done in our name
and what we should do about it.” —NOAM CHOMSKY
“Read Shell-Shocked. It’s author says, ‘I’m a journalist and I owe it to my
people and the Israeli people to get to the truth.’ Thank you, Mohammed,
the truth is like water, a basic necessity . . . without it we will not survive.”
—ROGER WATERS
“Written with painful immediacy, these are more than dispatches from a war
zone: they convey the human reality of people who manage to survive and
endure in conditions that have grown grimmer and more inhumane over
the years.” —RASHID KHALIDI
“With a terrible and necessary exactitude, Mohammed Omer’s war chronicle
lets the world know the devastating losses borne by the Gazan people
bombarded by Israeli forces in 2014.” —JUDITH BUTLER
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PRAISE FOR SHELL-SHOCKED
“The truth about Israel’s crimes in Gaza can never be forgotten, never
successfully lied about and covered-up, because Mohammed Omer was
there. This great reporter and his family were under fire day after day. When
I phoned him, I could hear the explosions outside his front door. Yet, day
after day he produced eyewitness dispatches of such clarity and brilliance
that, almost single-handed, he reclaimed the honour of real journalism.”
—JOHN PILGER
“From the very heart of Gaza, a witness to war: history will record Mohammed
Omer’s searing testimony about what was done to his homeland by Israel’s
‘Operation Protective Edge’ . . . This is journalism of the highest order.”
—JON SNOW, CHANNEL 4 NEWS
“If you only have time to read one book on Israel’s 2014 war on Gaza, let it
be this one. Mohammed Omer’s on-the-ground reporting is stunning and
unforgettable, giving access to a daily reality few can imagine let alone endure.
Omer describes the landscape of Palestinian life and death in this tiny strip
of land during this horrific period. Yet, his accounts are not only about the
immense suffering of Gaza’s people but about their remarkable resilience and
dignity, which cannot be destroyed. An act of conscience and documentation,
Omer’s book will remain with the reader long after it is read.” —SARA ROY
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ALSO BY MOHAMMED OMER
Oslo Accords 1993–2013: A Critical Assessment
(co-edited with Petter Bauck)
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SHELL-
SHOCKED
On the Ground Under
Israel’s Gaza Assault
MOHAMMED OMER
HAYMARKET BOOKS
CHICAGO, ILLINOIS
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© 2015 Mohammed Omer
Published by
Haymarket Books
P.O. Box 180165
Chicago, IL 60618
773-583-7884
www.haymarketbooks.org
[email protected]
ISBN 978-1-60846-513-2
Trade distribution:
In the US, Consortium Book Sales and Distribution, www.cbsd.com
In Canada, Publishers Group Canada, www.pgcbooks.ca
In the UK, Turnaround Publisher Services, www.turnaround-uk.com
All other countries, Publishers Group Worldwide, www.pgw.com
This book was published with the generous support of Lannan Foundation
and Wallace Action Fund.
Cataloging-in-Publication data is available from the Library of Congress.
A catalog record for this book is available from the British Library.
This book is set in the fonts Alte Haas Grotesk and Pobla.
Text design by Bathcat Ltd. Typeset by AarkMany Media, Chennai, India.
Cover design by Eric Ruder.
Printed in Canada by union labor..
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Introduction
Now, a year since the last war on Gaza, I find myself reflecting on my
first meeting with Jalal Jundia. It was during the summer of 2014 when
I saw him sitting atop the ruins of his family home, surrounded by dust
and rubble. Though he was attempting to remain calm I could see that
his face was etched with lines of stress. Like so many in Gaza, he had lost
everything during the Israeli assault, the most recent of a series of attacks
that arrive with predictable frequency every three to four years. Jalal
wondered aloud about his wife and six children. Where could they go now
their home had been destroyed? Where was it safe? They were trapped in
Gaza and unable to leave. All they could do was wait for the bombings to
end and pray for a day when drones no longer occupied the sky. Perhaps
then there would be enough peace for his family to rebuild and attempt a
return to some sort of normal life.
A year later, Jalal is still homeless. His house has not been rebuilt
and his family survives, but is barely alive. As for myself, I try to remain
optimistic, no small feat in this ruined shell of what was once a beautiful
and self-sufficient costal enclave. Our reality is predicated upon Israel’s
determination to drive us from our homes for good. After the 1947–48
purge, an ethnic cleansing of non-Jewish residents from territories Israel
coveted but had not been granted by the United Nations, Gaza became
a safe haven for tens of thousands fleeing the massacres at the hands of
the Irgun, Stern and Lehi gangs. Self-admitted terrorist organizations,
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8 MOHAMMED OMER
these were the forerunners of today’s Israeli military, police and Shin
Bet. Meanwhile our elders today, the men, women and children who fled
before the Zionist militias, still hold on to the keys of the homes they lost.
These keys represent hope and a determination. One day they hope to
return home.
In the wake of this latest attack, the vast majority of Gaza’s children
remain traumatized. We continue to live under siege, limited in what we
can buy, export or import. We can’t leave and it is very difficult for people
to visit us. We listen resignedly as human rights activists laud the fact that
we “Palestinians can withstand the aggression” simply because we have
survived it for so long. That may be true but it begs the question: why
should we be forced to continue to put up with this misery? The Second
World War lasted six years; the Third Reich’s assault and ethnic cleansing
of those it deemed undesirable lasted twelve. Our oppression has lasted
sixty-seven years, making the Israeli occupation of Palestine one of the
longest in history.
Every minute of every day we live in a distorted reality, a man-made
catastrophe crafted to protect and enshrine a peculiar manifestation of
overt racism that grants privilege and life solely on the basis of religion and
race, and then denies it exists. Its purpose is to make the lives of those of us
who belong to the non-favored race and religion unbearable. Its objective
is to force us to “volunteer” to abandon our country, businesses, family,
homes, ancestry and culture. The tool of this persecution is systemic and
infects all aspects of life. It ranges over preventing us from rebuilding our
homes to military aggression, targeted killings, imprisonment, starvation
diets enforced by siege and an array of punishments that dehumanize and
strip us of our rights. And then there are the obstacles to our movement—
walls and checkpoints for “security.”
And yet, despite all this, we’re still here. It’s true: In Gaza we find ways
to survive. Our women recycle the spent tank shells that have destroyed
our homes into flowerpots. Students return to bombed-out schools
determined to complete their education. Torn books are taped together,
pens are jerry-rigged back into service. At night we often study by
candlelight. The frequent cutting off of gas, water and electricity is another
daily reality of life in The Strip. And so we carry on, focusing on the basics
and muddling through with proud determination. We are human, with
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SHELL-SHOCKED 9
dreams and nightmares, equally strong and equally vulnerable. We pride
ourselves on our self-sufficiency and humbly thank God for the help of
others as we hope and pray for justice.
That justice has yet to arrive. Each time he sees me Jundia asks when
the West, with its pontificating about democracy and existentialism relating
to human rights, will take action in keeping with its ideals. Do they not
hear of Israel’s attacks on Gaza? His eyes search mine in hope. He knows
I’ve been outside of The Strip and speak regularly with influential people
in the West. Often, I am unable to meet his gaze. I’m aware that Western
powers care little of human suffering if it happens in Gaza. Here it often
feels as if we, the two million inhabitants of The Strip, don’t exist. I can’t
relate this disturbing truth to Jundia. Rather, I bolster his hope, assuring
him that I will continue to share his story with the world. I promise him
that his voice will not go unheard.
Like Jundia, I am a resident of Gaza and suffer through daily local
attacks, as well as the major assaults every few years. This has been my
experience of life, first as a child, then as a young man, and now as a father
and husband; I was born a few years prior to the first intifada. Today four
generations have lived under this occupation. The majority of us in Gaza
have known nothing else. Now the latest major attack is a year behind us.
For fifty-one days last summer we endured unspeakable devastation. With
each attack we emerged more tightly squeezed together, more resilient
and determined. We are united by this will to survive and to rebuild our
lives. There is a hope now that perhaps last summer’s was the final major
attack—that never again will the people of Gaza be forced to succumb to
such suffering. Hope, but not much faith.
This book illuminates various aspects of the war, drawing on many
of the articles I wrote reporting on Israel’s occupation. Social media made
the difference in this latest attack. Censorship, be it the policy of media
corporations or imposed by the individual journalists themselves, is
prevalent when it comes to dealing with the state of Israel. But what was
once passed off as news is now questioned. The sheer brutality of Israel’s
attacks was impossible to ignore because of social media. The networks
felt compelled to send their reporters. This was an improvement, although
the media in Europe and the United States has continued to slant the
story. Human voices like Jundia’s are rarely aired. Instead talking points
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