THE CLOCK HAD not yet struck midnight on October 9, when Said Al-Taweel fell into a deep sleep in his office in al-Ghefari Tower, Gaza City’s tallest building. Alaa Abu Mohsen, Al-Taweel’s colleague, heard him snoring.
It was the early days of Israel’s war on Gaza, and Al-Taweel wasn’t getting much sleep. Neither, for that matter, was Abu Mohsen.
Al-Taweel, the 37-year-old editor-in-chief of Khamsa News Agency, had been more or less living in his high-rise office, working constantly, late into the night, to cover the Israeli onslaught.
More than an hour after Al-Taweel drifted off to sleep, sometime after 1 a.m., word began to spread that Haji Tower, another high-rise near the al-Ghefari building, was going to be attacked by the Israelis. Haji Tower is home to local and international media offices, including Agence France-Presse. The rush of people leaving the 12-story tower came after an Israeli military officer spoke by phone to at least four people to order the evacuation of Haji Tower, according to the accounts of two direct recipients of warnings as well as video of a call. ….more
