As the war between Israel and Hamas enters its fourth month, Palestinian Americans in metro Atlanta are mourning the more than 22,000 Palestinians who have been killed in the ongoing conflict, according to the Gaza health ministry.
The war began Oct. 7 when Hamas militants from Gaza launched a terrorist attack in Israel killing nearly 1,200 and taking more than 230 hostages, more than half of whom remain in captivity.
The world is divided over Israel’s response to the terror attack which has seen much of Gaza being reduced to rubble, displacing an untold number of Palestinians.
Last week, Israel’s defense minister outlined plans for the next stage of the war in Gaza, including a sustained fight in the south where Hamas leaders and Israeli hostages are thought to be, but also where masses of civilians fled at Israel’s direction.
Israel has said that the United States will lead a coalition to rebuild Gaza, which will be controlled by “local non-hostile actors.”
During December, Rough Draft spoke with three Palestinian-Americans living in metro Atlanta about what had been happening both before and since the war began. At their request, we have used only used the first names of two of our interviewees.
Ghada Elnajjar
Oct. 7 is a blur to Ghada Elnajjar, the daughter of Palestinian refugees, but she remembers thinking the attack might bring more attention to the plight of the people in the existing Palestinian territory.
She does remember Oct. 8 “clearly,” she said. That day, she drove from her north metro home to the Woodruff Arts Center in Midtown to see Little Amal, the 12-foot puppet who represents a Syrian child refugee. Little Amal, whose gender-neutral name means hope in Hebrew and Arabic, was in Atlanta as part of a U.S. tour to raise awareness about the tens of thousands of children forced to flee their homes because of war, violence, and persecution.
“It was an emotional day for me because she symbolizes not just the Syrian refugees, but all refugees, and I’m a daughter of refugees,” Elnajjar said.
Children were playing the tabla, a goblet-shaped drum popular in the Middle East, for Little Amal at the event. “And it was just so beautiful and so emotional,” she said.
Elnajjar has many relatives still living in Gaza. Her family lived in what was Palestine until May 1948 when the Jewish state of Israel was established by the United Nations following World War II and the Nazi holocaust that renewed the call for a Jewish state.
“My family became refugees in Gaza, they are 1948 refugees. My dad was born in 1950 in a refugee tent. My mom was born in 1957 in a refugee camp built by the United Nations,” she said.
Her parents were able to leave Gaza and Elnajjar was born in Libya and grew up in the United Arab Emirates. She emigrated to the United States in 1986 with her parents and brothers.
She has an uncle, aunts, and many cousins and extended family still living in Gaza. She keeps in touch with family members through WhatsApp and Facebook when her family in Gaza can access an Internet connection.
The Facebook pages and WhatsApp were once ways the family kept in touch to share pictures and information about happy occasions like marriages and graduations. Now the messages from Gaza are just to let people know they are OK are to report on the latest death toll or death announcements.
Elnajjar said many members of her extended family have been killed in airstrikes. The stories she heard of others who evacuated but then had to deal with food and water shortages are horrifying, she said.
“At first I was obsessive about checking those pages and it became unhealthy,” Elnajjar said. “This is not the life that they deserve. They deserve so much better.”
What is happening now in Israel is not a war, she said.
“I would call it a genocide,” Elnajjar said. “A war is when two equal parties are fighting each other. You don’t have equal parties fighting each other. You have an oppressor and oppressed people.”
She wants people to know that Palestinians are humans who love, sing, write poetry, and want to live a life of peace.
“Some of my family were lucky to find a relative to house them. Some of them don’t have relatives to house them. They’re staying at United Nations schools,” she said.
“They held a wedding at one of the schools and people were dancing … in the midst of the war and the killing and the savagery and the death. They found time to celebrate life. That’s what Palestinians are. That’s who my people are.”
Nura
Nura, who is a Palestinian American from North Atlanta, said she has family in the West Bank. Her mother was in Jerusalem on business on Oct. 7, but was eventually able to leave the country. Her father, who lives in Florida, still has family in the West Bank.
Last summer, Nura and her family went to the West Bank for a visit. It was her husband’s first time in Palestine and Nura said he got a firsthand look at what day-to-day life was like for Palestinians. Although the West Bank is controlled by the Palestinian Authority, the rights and movements of its citizens are “very restricted,” Nura said.
“Visas are required, there are dozens of checkpoints, and there is always fear that you might be detained or that you might be removed from your home,” Nura said.
Nura said even an American passport didn’t always guarantee smooth passage. She said a visa was required to visit Jerusalem and there were often long waits at checkpoints.
“We were held up for three hours with our kids,” Nura said. “They asked questions about my family, why we were visiting – it was an interrogation.”
She said the family missed their flight back to America due to the long wait at checkpoints. “Even being American citizens, the Israelis don’t want us to come back even to visit.”
But Nura said she and her family have been visiting the West Bank every other summer for years, despite always feeling on edge during their trips.
Like Gaza, Nura said the West Bank is incredibly congested with Palestinians who have been moved to make way for Israeli settlements. She said since Oct. 7, there have been countless stories of unexpected raids by the Israeli military. Her cousin sent videos of soldiers in the streets of his West Bank town, heavily armed and in tanks.
“You can see the soldiers searching homes, looking for people, and making arrests,” Nura said. “Everyone is afraid.”
Nura said while the West Bank has been spared the bombardment, it has been emotional watching the coverage of Gaza.
“I can’t believe people are just watching genocide happen,” she said. “It’s a lot to deal with.”
Nura said there is fear among Palestinians that Israel will widen its war to the West Bank. She also believes that if a solution is not found in the coming weeks, the Middle East will be drawn into a wider conflict.
“We live together in peace or it’s going to be an even bigger war,” she said.
Baha
Born in Jerusalem and raised in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Baha moved to the United States when he was 17. For many years he lived in South Georgia, but now calls metro Atlanta home.
“I grew up in an occupied territory,” Baha said. “Travel was limited. Even now, as a Palestinian American, I am not able to visit my birth city. There are hundreds of checkpoints and the feeling of occupation is always there.”
Baha said things got “a little better” in the 1990s after the Oslo Accords, but the expansion of Israeli settlements has pushed Palestinians into overcrowded cities.
“There’s no ranch homes or individual homes for Palestinians,” he said. “It’s all multi-story buildings. Space is more and more limited, so everyone goes vertical.”
Baha said he’s been in touch with family in the West Bank regularly since Oct. 7. He has heard numerous accounts of Israeli settlers showing hostility to Palestinians in the West Bank, especially to olive farmers in the north.
“October and November are harvest time for olives. These Palestinians make a living from their crops and they’ve felt intimidated to go out and pick their olives.”
Baha also described friends who work in other West Bank towns who haven’t been able to drive to work since Oct. 7.
“I have a friend who’s in construction who hasn’t worked since Oct. 7,” Baha said. “Israel has closed the roads between Israeli settlements. There are no checkpoints, it’s just closed.”
He’s also heard accounts of teachers not receiving regular payments and burials interrupted because of closed roads and fear of traveling.
Baha said he believes there is a lack of understanding about who controls Palestinian territory. “The Palestinian Authority in the West Bank is not Hamas,” Baha said. “There is a small minority supporting Hamas.”
However, Baha said he is concerned that the bombing and killing of civilians in Gaza will radicalize a new generation.
“Israel has burnt a lot of bridges in the Arab world,” Baha said. “I think we’ll see more violence before we see less. There will be radicalization among younger people who were not on the side of Hamas and who will want to retaliate. When Israel cuts water, food, aid, medical supplies, and 70% of the deaths are women and children, the road to peace becomes much harder.”
