One day in December 2023, Aysha al-Najjar was listening to the news while her daughter Luna, 15, was bathing.
Her husband, Muhammad, an accountant with the ministry of finance before the genocide, had gone to locate some water, and her son, Ismail, 14, was playing football with relatives.
Suddenly, in the blink of an eye, everything around Aysha lit up, then everything rose up and came crashing down.
Aysha, 37, and her family had moved from the Tal al-Hawa area of Gaza City to the al-Qarara area in Khan Younis in October 2023. They left behind a three-storey house with a front yard that used to be abundant in flowers and trees and a backyard for their two children to play in.
Israel’s indiscriminate bombing campaign was particularly intense in the early weeks and months, and did not spare anyone, people or animals. Aysha and her family felt the horror, especially at night.
They ate canned food and spent large parts of their days finding firewood for cooking and locating water.
And the bombardment followed them south. ….more