Gaza City, Gaza – With a broken voice, Hussein Jaber recalls how his four-year-old daughter was killed by Israeli forces before his eyes.
The photographer, who works for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), was trying to flee Gaza City on December 5 to bring his family to safety when his daughter’s life took END.
“This area was empty,” Jaber said as he stood amid massive destruction, his left arm in a cast and held together by external screws. He was hit in the same attack that killed his daughter.
“There was no one on that road except the residents of the building who were exiting on foot, about to leave to the west as ordered by the army, including my family.
“I was waiting for them there,” he gestured to his right, “I was waiting for them. They were women, children and old people, and they could be seen clearly as day.
His family had taken refuge for four days in a building with friends. Jaber had stayed elsewhere working until he came to evacuate them.
“Salma was the first. She came to the intersection with her sister Sarah running behind her towards me, and suddenly there was intense gunfire,” he said, later describing on social media how an Israeli tank sprayed the area. of bullets.
“I saw Salma get hit in the neck before my eyes. … She writhed in pain but somehow kept running. I ran to her to hug her and carry her to the car while my wife and children, Omar and Sarah, continued running,” he said.
Jaber does not know exactly when he was shot in the arm.
He still can’t understand what happened, he said, pointing in the direction of a buzzing sound and saying there had been surveillance planes overhead the entire time. time.
“It was obvious to these planes that these were civilians fleeing the building and heading west in accordance with instructions from the Israeli army. We pose no threat,” he said.
“Salma was killed while Sarah, her nine-year-old sister, miraculously survived death when a bullet penetrated her jacket. He entered on one side and exited on the other. Millimeters separated her from death.
“My three-year-old son, Omar, always asks me where Salma is. He doesn’t understand how she could have been with him in the street and now she’s gone.
Jaber heads to the Buraq school, where his family had told him that Israeli tanks had moved in after the refugees staying there fled.
“The school was east of the building where my family was. “That’s why I asked them to go out to the west, to stay away from the direction where the tanks were,” he continued, approaching so he could point to the building, which had been hit by artillery shells every day they were there. .
Inside the building, Jaber stands in a dark, burned-out stairwell, telling Tel Aviv Tribune that this is where his family stayed, crowding into the center of the building to escape the continuous bombing that targeted the building on all sides.
Last week, the United States estimated that more than 25,000 women and children had been killed in Israel’s war on Gaza.
International criticism of Israel targeting residential areas has increased as the war continues. In December, South Africa accused Israel of genocide in Gaza in a case filed before the International Court of Justice.
More and more children are dying of starvation as famine gradually sets in. Two-month-old Mahmoud Fattouh died of starvation last week, near one of the world’s richest countries. He is one of 16 children who died of starvation in Gaza.
According to the United Nations, one in six children under the age of two already suffers from acute malnutrition.
Today, all Jaber’s family has of Salma are digital images of her on his cell phone.
The videos are a testimony of joy.
Salma can be seen dancing in front of her father’s camera, proudly reading a poem or smiling on a beach.
“Salma’s image will remain present in my heart and mind. Salma, my second daughter, intelligent, mischievous, affectionate, loved forever,” her father wrote.
Salma’s fifth birthday would have been on February 4.