“I’m very upset because for the first time I’m talking about what I feel,” says Haneen Ajjour. “I was preventing myself from thinking about the situation we’re in.”
“You lose everything sweet – memories, loved ones”
Haneen is the Norwegian Refugee Council’s finance officer in Gaza. In this emotional interview, she describes the devastating reality of everyday life for Gaza’s residents.
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The problem is that you feel imprisoned. You are imprisoned and you see children everywhere, playing barefooted because there are no shoes available on the market. If you can find anything, it is usually only one size and very low quality. So they all have to wear the same shoes that are too big. We have been sewing shoes that we could wear.
We have to adapt. In this hot weather, we make long-sleeved clothes into short sleeves. There are clothes made of nylon, which make you feel hot and not smell good.
Children spend the larger part of their days on the streets, always bored, always fighting. Parents are exhausted.
NRC has supported more than 350,000 people in Gaza since the escalation of the conflict on 7 October 2023.
Haneen is the Norwegian Refugee Council’s finance officer in Gaza. In this emotional interview, she describes the devastating reality of everyday life for Gaza’s residents.
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The problem is that you feel imprisoned. You are imprisoned and you see children everywhere, playing barefooted because there are no shoes available on the market. If you can find anything, it is usually only one size and very low quality. So they all have to wear the same shoes that are too big. We have been sewing shoes that we could wear.
We have to adapt. In this hot weather, we make long-sleeved clothes into short sleeves. There are clothes made of nylon, which make you feel hot and not smell good.
Children spend the larger part of their days on the streets, always bored, always fighting. Parents are exhausted.
People who always got along now quarrel all the time
We used to have goals in life. We would go out, go to work and talk to others about our lives. We enjoyed reading our books. Now we don’t even have internet, and there are no newspapers to get the news.
I used to enjoy horse riding and my children took Dabka [a traditional dance] classes. Now my children don’t do anything all day – no school for them. People who always got along now quarrel all the time. Everybody is wondering “where are we heading?”, everybody is in shock and fears for their life.
What it means to be hungry
Having lost our homes, going back to normal now means going back to worse. We wonder if we will have a house again, if we will have food.
We had enough food and clothes before, those were not things we would worry about. Then suddenly, we were told to leave our homes. I am discovering what it means to be hungry, and how it feels in real life. It is harder than death itself, it is the hardest thing you could ever experience.
Food is just one face of this crisis. Suddenly, you find yourself dressed in your finest clothes but unable to secure your next meal. Your cash is stuck in the bank and you have nothing left to spend.
We realised we had to go out if we didn’t want to starve to death
We used to be too scared to go out, but then we realised we had to get out if we didn’t want to starve to death. But you are effectively sacrificing yourself in order to get hold of low-quality food. Children are malnourished and have lost so much weight.
When we were in Rafah, people were being starved, so tinned food and bad quality food became an acceptable choice. Bad cheese that cats wouldn’t eat became too expensive to get.
Cut off from family
I’m very upset because for the first time I’m talking about what I feel. I was preventing myself from thinking about the situation we’re in. Just thinking or letting yourself feel like this is something that makes people cry or could kill a person.
Since the beginning of the war, I have only seen my sisters once. There is no transportation at all and no gas for cars, so I am cut off from the whole world. I have only seen my mother once, and she is old. She needs a lot of care.
I just want to help everyone but I wish I had not been born into this life so I didn’t have to go through these experiences. The injustice and brutality of what you see with your eyes make you cry bitterly, and there is no-one to feel for you.
Losing everything
You lose all your dreams. You lose everything sweet – memories, loved ones. Places and situations have all disappeared. Our lives have become: “Where can we find food? Where can we drink water without getting sick?”
When I am walking in the street, I feel like stopping every person or child to ask them: “Do you want money? Let me help you. Let me play with this child.” Because I see in their eyes stories that make me cry. I see a hungry child and they tell me “I would like a banana”, then they stand and watch the fruit vendor as he sells the banana for a huge amount of money.
How can this child understand that this has become our normal life? Chicken and meat have become a dream. On the eve of Eid, I saw a donkey slaughtered in the street. The bones were so infested with flies you couldn’t even see them.
He is a child with so much energy and intelligence that go to waste
I always tell myself that I only want the people to be happy and joyful again. The people of northern Gaza, I want to see them back home and be with them.
I see people who love life no matter what it is and try to be happy, playing by the beach. I see a three-year-old child bringing water from a very long distance so that he can drink and spend a moment playing. It makes me happy and sad at the same time.
Because after that moment, he will come back feeling hot and tired, and will have to help his father carry water and bring firewood to cook with it. He will feel tired of feeling that he is a child without importance or purpose. He won’t understand that his father is also tired and unable to give love and attention because he himself has lost everything.
He is a child with so much energy and intelligence that go to waste. He has creativity but it’s in vain. All the people I see are like this – the mother, the neighbour, everyone. Everyone is fighting.
Truth is what you experience
I am tired. I appear to be calm, tolerant and patient because my energy is exhausted. All I want to do is go back to sleeping comfortably, eating healthy food, going to the gym and practising horse riding with my children.
I try to avoid these images so I don’t get upset, I keep myself busy with people and with work, or by preparing food that I can’t stand the smell of. I don’t want to see what is on the internet because it will only reveal a fraction of the torment we are in.
It hurts if one day someone from abroad comes and tells you: “I understand what you feel”. I will appreciate the sentiment, but inside I will cry because what he has heard and seen is nothing like the truth. Truth is not told in feelings, truth is what you experience with us. And no-one will understand what Gaza is going through unless they are there.
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