Ramadan came to devastated Gaza. While the rest of the world is launching with a festive mood over a month of fasting and prayer, we do it with sorrow and sorrow.
The echoes of war still sound strong. There is no certainty that this ceasefire will last. People are worried about what’s going on. They fear that war will come back.
The memory and trauma of what we have assisted and experienced in the past year are hung in our minds.
Last year was not the first time that we have observed Ramadan during a war. In 2014, I was only nine years old, but I remember very well how our Ramadan nights were filled with air strikes and destruction and how we had to rush out of our house in darkness, fleeing the bombings in our neighborhood.
But Ramadan last year was different. It was unimaginably worse. Hunger was everywhere. We fast all day, only to break our fast with a box of houmous or beans shared between six people. Without electricity, we would chew the food preserved insipid in darkness. We barely see the faces of the other through the table.
We were far from most of our extended family. My grandmother, the aunts and the cousins with whom I spent Ramadan were all dispersed in different places, some displaced in tents and others trapped in the North. The month of conviviality has become a month of separation and isolation.
Ramadan was stripped of his joyful mind. We want to hear the Adhan (call to prayer) in Maghrib before breaking our fast or fajr before starting it. But these sounds have never come. Each mosque has been destroyed. There were people who wanted to do the Adhan, but they were afraid – afraid that the sound of their voices bring air strikes, that it would make targets.
Instead of breaking our fasting sound of the muezzin on the speakers of the neighboring mosque, we broke it with the terrifying echoes of the missiles and shots.
Before the war, I went with my family to the mosque after Iftar to pray and see our loved ones. Then we took up the streets of Gaza, taking advantage of the lively atmosphere of Ramadan before going home for making Qatayef freshly making.
But last year, there was nowhere where we could pray Tarawih in the middle of the genocide.
Even the great Omari mosque – one of the most beautiful and historical mosques in Gaza, where my father and my brothers spent the last 10 nights of Ramadan, listening to the recited Koran in the most beautiful voices – had disappeared, bombed in ruins, broken beyond recognition. The place that formerly resonated with prayers and peace was transformed into dust and rubble.
This year Ramadan begins during a ceasefire. There are no air strikes that shake the earth while we break our fast. No explosion repercussions in the silence of the fajr. No fear of decorating our houses, hanging colorful lights that could make us a target.
In the midst of pain and devastation, life – which has been on break for so long – has tried to return to the streets of Gaza.
The stores and markets that have not been destroyed reopened, and street vendors have returned.
Even the great Nuseirat supermarket, Hyper Mall, has once again opened. Before Ramadan, my father took me, me and my sister there. We could barely contain our excitement while we entered the shiny shopping center. For a while, it was as if we have come back in time. The shelves were again stored, filled with everything we had, different types of chocolates, cookies and fries. There were decorations of Ramadan, lanterns of all shapes and sizes, boxes of dates, colorful dried fruits and Qamar al-Din.
But this abundance is misleading. A large part of what fills the shelves on commercial trucks, which constitute a large part of the trucks authorized in Gaza to the detriment of humanitarian aid. At the same time, these products have become unaffordable for most people who have lost their livelihoods and their homes.
So what are most families break quickly this year? It will be a little more than canned beans: a simple meal of rice, molokhia or vegetables that they can afford.
For the first iftar, my family will have Musakhan, a Palestinian dish that is made of chicken, Saj bread and a lot of onion. We know that we are among the luckiest. The vast majority of the inhabitants of Gaza cannot afford the fresh chicken which has reappeared in the double market of the pre-war price.
But a rich and traditional Iftar is not the only thing that will be missing at the Ramadan tables in Gaza.
More than 48,000 people were killed during the war. Whole families have been suffered from the civil register and will not observe Ramadan this year. In so many Iftar tables, there will be an empty seat: a father whose voice calling his children at the table will never be heard again, a son whose impatience to break his fast will never be seen again or a mother whose qualified hands will never prepare delicious food again.
I too have lost people I love. The husband of my aunt who invited us to Iftar each year was brutally killed. My friends Shaima, Lina and Roaa that I met at the mosque after Tarawih prayer were all martyred.
The festive spirit has disappeared, but the heart of Ramadan is there. This month is a chance to move away from the distractions and concerns of ordinary life and to reconnect with our faith. It is a period of forgiveness. It’s time to seek proximity to God and spiritual resilience.
Our mosques may have been destroyed, but our faith was not broken. We will always do Tarawih in half -destroyed houses and tents, whispering all our wishes to Dua’a and looking for comfort by reciting the Koran, knowing that Allah will reward us for all the sufferings we have endured.
The opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Tel Aviv Tribune.