leFt A lady wearing a niqab,
a face veil, while shopping at
a market in Gazabottom leFt Three
generations of women at
home in Gazabelow Journalist Lara Abu
Ramadan (left) looks on at an
elderly womanalong with her writing, the young
woman’s intent is to show Gaza’s
human face to a world used to seeing
scenes of catastrophe and violence.
Lara, 24, seeks out stories and images
highlighting the perseverance and
moments of happiness found in Gaza.
“I want to show the beautiful side
of life – so people know that Gaza is
not only misery and destruction,” she
said. “Most places would descend into
chaos if subjected to similar violence
and siege but we have endured and
not completely turned on each other.”
Glimmers of hope are welcome amid
growing despair. Three major Israeli
military offensives in recent years have
caused displacement, traumatised
much of the population and left public
infrastructure barely functioning.
Most people in Gaza face food
insecurity and with the world’s highest
unemployment – close to 50% – the
collapsed economy offers little hope to
young people seeking a better future.
A delayed life
Life’s usual patterns and the daily
routines of maintaining a household
are tempered with the reality of chronic
shortages of medicine, electricity,
cooking gas and clean water.
“Women here are responsible for
working in the house and the lack of
electricity really effects their lives,”
Lara said. “Electricity comes only eight
hours a day and it’s never continuous.
If you have a family and kids with
school the next day and who need
their uniforms ready, then you must
wait for electricity to come. Everything
is delayed in our lives.”
The latest and most damaging
Israeli offensive against Hamas, a
51-day campaign of sustained aerial
bombardment in the summer of 2014,
reduced entire neighborhoods to
flattened piles of concrete and twisted
steel while one third of the civilian
population was internally displaced
during the conflict.
“Life here is tough for women. A
Palestinian mother often has to deal
with many hard things because of
the situation they live under,” Lara
said. “They have often had to lose a
son or a father, sometimes the whole
family. I think that gives girls a vision
of responsibility, independence and a
motivation to be strong.”The siege of 2014
During the bombing, Lara and her
husband established a live stream
video from their apartment showing
the city under attack in real time.
Along with being an innovative form
of reporting, it was also a means of
coping with danger.
“Working as a journalist gave me
another feeling at the time,” she
remembered. “I wasn’t just feeling
afraid, wanting to leave my house or
hide under my bed because of the
bombing, but I just wanted to stay in my
house and show what was unfolding on
the ground. It removed the real feeling
of what was going on – that we were in
a very dangerous situation.”
Physical signs of the bombing
remain obvious but the psychologicalThe daily routine
of maintaining a
household is often
affected by shortages
of electricity, cooking
gas and clean water
PHOTO © NATASA KLEANTHOUS