The Al Bureij camp in the central Gaza Strip serves as a crossing point between the northern and southern parts of the Gaza Strip and hosts thousands of displaced people.EYAD BABA/AFP/Getty Images
In the early hours of Sunday, a massive explosion shook the heart of Al Bureij camp in central Gaza. A surface-to-surface missile struck my neighbour’s home, three metres from our own. In an instant, the house collapsed into rubble and fire. Our home shook violently and its walls cracked.
Inside the house was my relative Yousef, 28, his wife Heba, 25, and their one-year-old daughter Yumna. All died instantly. Their bodies were torn apart and scattered across the house, some parts falling into our home. The only survivor was their three-year-old son Amer. He was pulled from under the rubble by my children and neighbours. He is in the hospital in Deir al Balah and will have surgery on his foot on Wednesday.
What happened to Yousef’s family was not an isolated incident. Over the weekend four homes in Al Bureij camp were hit. Each home collapsed into rubble. Each family paid a terrible price: deaths, injuries, and survivors living under constant shock. The entire neighbourhood lives in fear. Children refuse to sleep alone. Adults spend nights awake, listening for drones and planes that never leave the sky.
So far the full-scale invasion of Gaza City as approved by Israel has not yet happened. But the attacks continue.
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Al Bureij, in the centre of Gaza Strip, is residential. There are no military sites, no visible Hamas fighters. Yet homes continue to be struck one after another.
But the Al Bureij refugee camp is strategically located. It is near the eastern border with Israel, about 10 kilometres southeast of Gaza City. Its location close to the main coastal road and Israeli military camps along the border makes it a sensitive and vulnerable area in a military escalation. The camp also serves as a crossing point between the northern and southern parts of the Gaza Strip and hosts thousands of displaced people. It is densely populated.
Some residents of Al Bureij said they are worried the targeting of the camp may be part of a broader plan to impose a new reality in the Gaza Strip.
“What’s happening around us is not just random bombing, it looks like part of a bigger plan to empty the central areas of Gaza, especially Al Bureij camp,” said Abdelhadi Muslim, 58, a resident of the refugee camp. “The repeated air strikes don’t just hit specific places, it feels like they want to pressure people to leave their homes, to create empty areas. Maybe this is part of a plan to change the population or prepare for political changes.”
The night of the missile strike on Yousef’s home, our family had stayed up later than usual. My son Hosam, 31, was sitting in the living room on the ground floor instead of his usual room upstairs. That small decision saved his life. If he had been upstairs he would have been among the dead. When we went upstairs we found the room gone – no walls, no ceiling. Hosam stood silently, pale and in shock, unable to believe he had survived. For us it felt like more than luck – it was a miracle.
After the strike none of us could sleep. We stayed together in one place surrounded by scattered debris. The smell of blood and smoke filled the house, heavy and suffocating. My son Abdullah went to the back garden to help search. While sifting through the rubble, he found a part of Yousef’s body. He froze in shock and broke down crying. It was unbearable – finding a part of your relative in your own backyard, where you had been safe just hours earlier, was unimaginable.
As time passed it became clear that searching in the dark was impossible. We had to stop and wait for morning. Still the shock remained.
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Our family stayed awake all night huddled together, trying to support each other. Outside, wild dogs barked. We worried they might attack us because of the smell of blood and flesh. Every sound, every movement heightened our tension. Each of us reacted differently: trembling, crying, or sitting in silence.
Even together, there was no real safety.
Gathering in one place was our only way to feel some strength amid the terror. That night showed us how fear and shock can take over a family’s life.
Mr. Muslim had his own observation on the Israeli military’s motives.
“It feels like they want to destroy more than buildings, they want to break people’s spirit and their ability to stay strong,” he said.