(AP) — It took Ramez al-Masri three years to rebuild his home after it was destroyed in a 2014 Israeli offensive. When war returned to the area last week, it took just a few seconds for the house to be flattened again in an Israeli airstrike.
The despondent al-Masri once again finds himself among the thousands of Gazans left homeless by another war between Israel and the territory’s Islamic militant Hamas rulers. He and the 16 others who lived in the two-story structure are scattered at relatives’ homes, uncertain how long they will remain displaced as they wait with hope for international aid to help them rebuild the home.
“My children are scattered — two there, three here, one there. Things are really very difficult,” he said. “We live in death every day as long as there is an occupation,” he said, referring to Israel’s rule over Palestinians, including its blockade of Gaza.
The United Nations estimates that about 1,000 homes were destroyed in the 11-day war that ended last Friday. Lynn Hastings, the U.N. humanitarian coordinator for the region, said hundreds of additional housing units were damaged so badly they are likely uninhabitable.
The destruction is less extensive than in the 50-day war of 2014, in which entire neighborhoods were reduced to rubble and 141,000 homes were either wiped out or damaged.
But following that war, international donors quickly pledged $2.7 billion in reconstruction assistance for the battered enclave. It remains unclear this time around whether the international community, fatigued from the global COVID-19 crisis and years of unsuccessful Mideast diplomacy, will be ready to open its wallet again.
It was 3 a.m. on Wednesday when the phone call from Israel came to a neighbor ordering everyone in the area to evacuate. “Leave your homes, we are going to bomb,” al-Masri says they were told.
The neighborhood is home to members of al-Masri’s extended family. At the time of the warning, he said no one knew which house might be targeted. But he could not believe that the airstrike hit the two-floor home where he lived with his eight children, his brother’s family and their mother.
“If we knew someone was wanted, we would not have stayed here from the outset,” he said. Al-Masri, who owns a small grocery store, said neither he nor his brother have anything to do with militant groups.
The airstrike turned his home into a crater. On Sunday, the massive hole was filled with murky water spewing from broken water and sewage lines.
Seven adjacent homes belonging to relatives were badly damaged. Their walls were blown up, exposing the colorful interior decorations of the living and bedrooms. The blast was so powerful that concrete support beams were weakened and the houses are likely beyond repair.
