Khan Younis, Gaza Strip, Palestine – Leaning on a picket cane, 72-year-old Fathi Abu al-Saeed navigates the rubble-strewn streets of Khan Younis’s al-Katiba neighbourhood — a each day ritual since he returned from displacement within the coastal area of al-Mawasi following the January 19 Gaza ceasefire. Fastidiously stepping over particles left by 15 months of relentless Israeli bombardment, he raises his cane, pointing at a demolished home.
“You see that pile of ineffective rubble?” he says. “That’s extra valuable than the USA and every part in it.”
His viewers — a bunch of kids, together with a few of his 50 youngsters and grandchildren — listens intently, undeterred by forecasts of heavy rain and powerful winds. Others be a part of them — youngsters from displaced households who’ve additionally returned, to not intact houses, however to the ruins of what as soon as was. With nowhere else to go, they rebuild their lives among the many wreckage.
Each morning, Abu al-Saeed exchanges phrases of resilience with neighbours. However on at the present time, US President Donald Trump’s current remarks about Gaza — his fantasy of clearing out its Palestinian inhabitants to construct a “Riviera within the Center East” — supply contemporary materials for his sarcasm and defiance.
“Trump talks as if he’s a king handing out land,” Abu al-Saeed scoffs. “Perhaps he ought to relocate his Israeli buddies someplace exterior of Palestine and go away Gaza alone.”
Trump’s feedback, which sparked widespread condemnation, outlined a plan to resettle Palestinians in Gaza elsewhere whereas the US would “take over” and “personal” the territory. Standing beside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — who faces an Worldwide Prison Courtroom (ICC) arrest warrant for conflict crimes in Gaza — Trump claimed Palestinians deserved higher than their supposed “unhealthy luck”.
‘A prize-winning delusion’
All through 15 months of Israeli bombing, greater than 60 p.c of Gaza’s infrastructure has been destroyed, together with hospitals, universities, and faculties. Washington, below the earlier US administration, was Israel’s largest backer, sending $17.9bn in navy help throughout the first yr of the conflict — the very best annual complete ever.
“That is the speak of a madman,” Abu al-Saeed says. “And as we Arabs say: ‘If the speaker is a madman, let the listener be sane.’ This man is aware of nothing about homeland, battle, defiance, satisfaction — or Palestine.”
Dismissing Trump’s feedback as absurd, Abu al-Saeed shakes his head. “That’s the perfect fantasy ever dreamt up by a world chief,” he says, shifting between disbelief and laughter. “Any sane one that is aware of Palestinians understands that leaving our homeland is like loss of life itself. Did Trump actually assume we’d pack up and go in any case this?”
For Abu al-Saeed, the thought of mass displacement is private. His father was pressured out of Jaffa — now a part of Israel — by Zionist militias in 1948 when Israel was shaped, and his mom’s household was expelled from the close by village of Sarafand. He grew up on tales of that first disaster — the Nakba — and now lives via one other.
“We already know what it means to lose every part,” he says, gesturing on the ruins. “However we additionally know what it means to carry on.”
The conflict displaced 90 p.c of Gaza’s 2.3 million folks. Many have returned, to not standing houses, however to wreckage — cleansing particles, salvaging what they’ll, or organising tents atop the ruins.
“Even below genocide, we didn’t go away,” Abu al-Saeed says, his voice regular. “It’s not about having nowhere else to go — it’s our homeland. Our land. Each brick right here is value extra to us than every part the US can supply.”
For per week, Trump has pressured Egypt and Jordan to soak up Gaza’s inhabitants, pitching his redevelopment plan as a job-creation mission. However even his allies in Cairo, Riyadh, Abu Dhabi, and past have rejected the thought outright.
“Trump should assume we’re residing in a lodge he can shut down,” Abu al-Saeed laughs. “However Gaza isn’t an actual property mission — it’s our land.”
He faucets his cane towards the rubble. “This earth is combined with our sweat and blood. Nobody right here will go away — irrespective of the threats or guarantees.”
‘Is he loopy or simply silly?’
Sitting on a pile of particles, surrounded by keen youngsters, Abu al-Saeed turns to his 10-year-old grandson, Mohammad, grinning.
“Trump says we should always go away Gaza and transfer to Egypt or Jordan. What do you assume?”
The boy bursts into laughter. “Is he loopy or simply silly? Why would we go away? Gaza is a part of Palestine!”
The opposite youngsters chime in, their voices rising: “Who leaves their house? We’ll keep, rebuild, and combat for it.”
Abu al-Saeed chuckles. “There’s your reply, Trump. Even our kids know higher than you.”
All through the conflict, Israel’s bombings, hunger ways, and assaults on hospitals have killed greater than 17,400 youngsters, orphaning hundreds extra.
“What sort of logic is that this?” Abu al-Saeed asks. “They starve us, bomb us, after which act stunned after we refuse to depart?”
Citing the unbreakable bond Palestinians really feel with their land, he provides, “You realize what is going to by no means occur once more? Us leaving.”
Trump, he believes, doesn’t perceive Palestinians or their battle. “Israel was constructed on the lie of ‘a land with out a folks,’” he says. “However we’re right here, and we’re staying.”
His eyes slender. “For Trump, like for Netanyahu, the one resolution is for Palestinians to vanish.”
Straightening his again regardless of his age, Abu al-Saeed says, “However we won’t.”
This piece was printed in collaboration with Egab.
