When I started my nursing studies at Al Azhar University, I knew I wanted to work at al-Shifa Hospital. It was my dream.
It was the largest and most prestigious hospital in the Gaza Strip. Some of the best doctors and nurses in Palestine worked there. Various foreign medical missions would also come to provide training and care.
Many people from the north to the south of the Gaza Strip sought medical help in al-Shifa. The name of the hospital means “healing” in Arabic and indeed, it was a place of healing for Palestinians in Gaza.
In 2020, I graduated from nursing school and tried to find a job in the private sector. After several short-term jobs, I joined Al-Shifa as a volunteer nurse.
I really enjoyed my work in the emergency room. I went to work with passion and positive energy every day. I met patients with a big smile, hoping to relieve some of their pain. I always loved hearing patients’ prayers of gratitude.
In the emergency room, there were 80 nurses in total – women and men – and we were all friends. In fact, some of my closest friends were colleagues at the hospital. Alaa was one of them. We worked shifts together and went out for coffee outside of work. She was a beautiful girl, very kind and loved by everyone.
It was these friendships and the camaraderie among the staff that helped me get through when the war started.
From the first day, the hospital was overwhelmed with wounded. After my first shift ended that day, I stood in the nurses’ room crying for an hour because of everything we had been through and all the injured people I had seen suffering.
In a few days, more than a thousand wounded and martyrs were hospitalized. The more people we mobilized, the harder we worked to try to save lives.
I didn’t expect this horror to last more than a month. But it is.
Soon the Israeli army called my family and told us that we had to leave our home in Gaza City. I was faced with a difficult choice: to be with my family during this horrible time or to be with the patients who needed me the most. I decided to stay.
I said goodbye to my family who fled south to Rafah and stayed at al-Shifa Hospital, which became my second home. Alaa also stayed behind. We supported and comforted each other.
In early November, the Israeli army asked us to evacuate the hospital and besieged it. Our medical supplies began to dwindle. We were quickly running out of fuel for our electrical generators that ran vital equipment.
Perhaps the most heartbreaking moment was when we ran out of fuel and oxygen and could no longer keep the premature babies in our care in the incubators. We had to transfer them to an operating room where we tried to keep them warm. They were having trouble breathing and we had no oxygen to help them. We lost eight innocent babies. I remember sitting for a long time and crying that day for those innocent souls.
Then, on November 15, Israeli soldiers stormed the compound. The attack was a shock. As a medical facility, it was supposed to be protected by international law, but that clearly didn’t stop the Israeli military.
Just before the raid, our administration told us that it had received a call that the Israelis were about to storm the medical complex. We quickly closed the door to the emergency department and gathered inside around the nursing office in the middle, not knowing what to do. The next day we saw Israeli soldiers surrounding the building. We couldn’t leave and we lacked medical supplies. We struggled to care for the patients we had with us.
We no longer had any food or water. I remember feeling dizzy and almost passing out. I hadn’t eaten anything for three days. We lost some patients due to the siege and the Israeli raid.
On November 18, Dr. Mohammad Abu Salmiya, director of al-Shifa, came to tell us that the Israelis had ordered the evacuation of the entire medical complex. If I had the choice, I would have stayed, but the Israeli army wouldn’t let me.
Hundreds of us doctors and nurses were forced to leave, along with many patients. Only around 20 staff members remained on site with bedridden patients who could not be moved. Dr. Abu Salmiya also remained behind and was arrested several days later. He disappeared for the next seven months.
I and dozens of colleagues are heading south on Israeli orders. Alaa and a few others defied these orders and headed north to their families. We walked for many kilometers and passed Israeli checkpoints, where we had to wait for hours, until we could find a donkey cart that could transport us part of the way.
When we finally arrived in Rafah, I was more than happy to see my family again. There was a lot of crying and relief. But the happiness of being with my family was quickly overshadowed by shocking news.
Alaa was able to return to her family in Beit Lahiya, who had been moved to a school shelter. But as she and her brother went to their abandoned house to collect some belongings, an Israeli missile hit the building and they were martyred.
The news of his death was a huge shock. A year later, I still live with the pain of losing my close friend – one of the kindest people I have ever known, who loved helping others and who was always there to comfort me in difficult times.
In March, Israeli soldiers returned to al-Shifa. For two weeks, they ransacked the hospital, leaving death and devastation in their wake. There is not a single building left in the medical complex that has not been damaged or burned. From a place of healing, al-Shifa was transformed into a cemetery.
I don’t know how I will feel when I see the hospital again. How will I feel knowing that the place of my greatest professional achievements and the most cherished moments shared with my colleagues has also become a place of death, enforced disappearances and displacement?
Today, more than a year after losing my job, I live in a tent and treat the sick in a makeshift clinic. My future, our future is uncertain. But in the new year, I have a dream: to see al-Shifa as he was – tall and beautiful.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Tel Aviv Tribune.