Behind Every Number, a Tragedy… 11 Displacements into the Unknown Amid Gaza’s Ruins
In Gaza, displaced families move endlessly from one place to another. Each relocation brings fresh pain and deepens their sense of loss and despair.
Such is the plight of the Abu Jarad family, caught in an unrelenting cycle of forced displacement and hardship. Since the war began nearly two years ago, they have been uprooted eleven times across the strip.
As he packed his family’s few belongings and tents once again in Gaza City to escape Israeli airstrikes, Naaman Abu Jarad told the Associated Press: “This is renewed torment. We are not being displaced, we are dying.”
The next day, they set up their tent on barren farmland near Khan Younis, uncertain about where their next meal or drop of water would come from.
Since fleeing their home in northern Gaza days after Israel launched its war in response to Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack, their life has mirrored that of countless Palestinian families—constantly on the run, forced to abandon each new shelter as it too came under bombardment.
“Death is chasing us”
During the ceasefire that began in January, they briefly returned to their damaged but still standing home. It was bittersweet: within two months, Israel broke the truce, and they had to flee once more.
With each move, Naaman and his wife Majda try to create a semblance of stability for their six daughters and two-year-old granddaughter. The youngest, Lana, is only eight; the eldest, Balssam, is married. Yet the sense of futility weighs heavily. “What lies ahead is dark. We may be expelled from Gaza. We may die… Death surrounds us. We run from place to place, away from it,” Naaman said.
Displacement without end
Since May, a tent in Gaza had been their refuge. They grew familiar with the neighborhood, found sources of water and occasional medical care. Their daughters met old friends who had also been displaced. Another family in a nearby building allowed Sarah to use the internet for her high school studies. The girls downloaded textbooks on their phones, studying—or simply distracting themselves.
Food was harder to secure. Israeli restrictions on aid had pushed Gaza City into famine. Naaman joined hundreds waiting for supply trucks, often under fire. “We saw people killed and wounded,” Majda recalled. Sometimes, despite the risk, he returned with food.
They even found a school for Lana, which excited her. But then Israel ordered an evacuation as part of its advance into Gaza. Soon after, an airstrike flattened a residential building one block away, sending shrapnel through their tent. Another destroyed a house across the street, killing the family sitting outside.
Last Thursday, the Abu Jarad family joined the growing wave of Palestinians fleeing south. In their new camp, they live on barren land, without schools or markets nearby, forced to walk two kilometers to access the internet.
Each day life in the tent grows heavier: fetching water, gathering firewood, finding food, cleaning, all while fearing a strike that could end their lives in an instant.
