“What is the greatest level of frustration a person can reach? To what extent does it make him think about death?” Two questions summarize what went through the mind of the young Palestinian man, Abdullah Qalja, when doctors exhausted the solutions to treat his left foot, and amputated it due to an injury he suffered as a result of an Israeli raid that targeted his neighbors’ house in the northern Gaza Strip.
On October 27, 2023, Israeli occupation aircraft bombed a house adjacent to the Qalja family, resulting in the martyrdom of his father and brother, and the wounding of Abdullah, his second brother, and a number of other family members.
Doctors performed 4 emergency operations to treat Abdullah’s foot, all of which were unsuccessful. The moment came when “I wished I would die before I lost my leg,” this is how the young man describes to Tel Aviv Tribune Net the extreme stage of frustration he reached when he was informed that the fifth operation would be its amputation.
Abdullah was displaced with his mother and the rest of his family, and they recently ended up in a tent near Deir al-Balah beach in the central Gaza Strip.
Abdullah added to Tel Aviv Tribune Net, “The pursuit of livelihood is an act of worship, but the path is painful and arduous with one foot, after a friend gave me a crutch to lean on, before I decided to convert the broken crutch into an artificial foot.”
He continued, “I have created a new life for myself. It is true that it is a primitive idea, but for me it is useful to the extent that it helps me with the hardships of war and the poverty of medical supplies in a war that left nothing as it was in Gaza.”
Developing a method for desalinating seawater to overcome the scarcity of fresh water in the Gaza Strip pic.twitter.com/KyYYe9C2UC
– Tel Aviv Tribune Egypt (@AJA_Egypt) June 1, 2024
Seawater desalination
As for the Palestinian Ahmed Afaneh, he says that he used to make a bumpy road every day looking for the nearest point to fill drinking water, especially since he lives in a tent on the sea sand extending in the middle of the Strip, which makes the task exhausting.
He added to Tel Aviv Tribune Net, “Filling drinking water, while you live in a tent on the seashore far from residential areas, is not an easy task. My children sometimes participate in it instead of sitting down to study and teach.”
He added, “Because the occupation and war do not break the steadfastness of the Palestinian, I devised a way to desalinate the seawater that extends in front of his sight in order to obtain about two liters of drinkable water daily.”
Ahmed brings water from the sea, puts it in a tube full of stones, and at the end of it is a filter to precipitate the salinity. The young man displaced from Jabalia camp admits that this method does not replace the need to obtain water from the remaining desalination plants in Gaza, but it is effective to the extent that he does not have to travel long and arduous distances every day.
Since the start of the war on Gaza on October 7, 2023, the Israeli occupation army has deliberately targeted water wells, tanks, and various desalination plants, until the sight of citizens queuing to obtain a few liters of water has become familiar on screens.
#a witness | The story of the innovation of a solar-powered seawater desalination device in Gaza
Engineer Enas Al-Ghoul was able to find alternative solutions to solve the problem of drinking water shortages, by manufacturing a device that works to desalinate seawater using solar energy.
It was applied to some neighborhoods in Khan Yunis and given to the residents there… pic.twitter.com/c8X5ciCKt1
– Palestinian Information Center (@PalinfoAr) August 5, 2024
Resistance with the idea
Just as the war placed the conditions and fates of the Palestinians in the unknown, it pushed them to resist with ideas and challenge the difficult circumstances and lack of basic services in various ways.
In light of the lack of electricity and its complete blackout in Gaza on October 21, 2023, tailors devised a way to operate a private sewing machine using a bicycle, in light of the Palestinians’ need for this profession to repair their remaining clothes.
This is the same method used by other Palestinians to recycle thermal blanket fabrics to produce winter clothes.
As the most difficult winter season approaches for the residents of Gaza, more than two million citizens complain about the scarcity of clothing and its availability at exorbitant prices, which makes the idea of recycling thermal blankets innovative for the displaced in the Strip.
Due to the scarcity of gas and the difficulty of providing it in light of the closure of the Gaza crossings, Palestinians worked to devise alternative solutions, by lighting fires with frying oil and some plastic, using a hair dryer to make the fire burn more regularly.
During the war on Gaza, Israel destroyed the economic sector, including facilities, factories, farms, and fish markets, which caused very large financial and economic losses.
82% of companies in Gaza, which constitute a major driver of the economy, have stopped, and the Israeli war has left the Strip’s economy in ruins, according to a report by the United Nations Trade and Development Organization (UNCTAD).
The unemployment rate in the Gaza Strip has reached 80% since the outbreak of war on October 7, 2023, according to a report published by the International Labor Organization last June.
With American support, since October 7, 2023, Israel has been waging a war on Gaza that has left more than 143,000 Palestinian martyrs and wounded, most of them children and women, and more than 10,000 missing, amid massive destruction and famine that killed dozens of children and the elderly, in one of the worst humanitarian disasters. In the world.
For the second year in a row, the occupation army continues its genocidal war in various areas of the Gaza Strip, targeting humans and stones, causing huge financial losses, estimated by the government media office at about 33 billion dollars.
