Hello from Rafah

Yasmine Moor writing from Gaza, Occupied Palestine, The Electronic Intifada, 4 July 2007

"Here in Gaza, we're all listening to the radio and watching the news every hour (our only way of knowing what's happening in the outside world), waiting to see what Abu Mazen (Mahmoud Abbas), Israel and the US are planning for us, and where our fate will take us.

This has become more than a prison for the people of Gaza. It's hard not to feel like animals in a zoo, where we are caged and have enough food for two weeks at a time to keep us alive, but not well or free while someone decides what to do with us. At least in a zoo, if an animal gets sick, its taken out of the zoo and taken to a hospital. Here in Gaza, God forbid you get sick or injured -- hospitals are packed and one can't easily go to Egypt or the West Bank for medical attention. So one is at the mercy of those few people that run this gated zoo, Mr. Abbas, Israel, and the Quartet......

"Where are you Abu Mazen? Come see my son, he's dead -- where are you? Where are you, you forget about us? And let Israel slaughter us? Come Abu Mazen, come fight off the tanks and missiles. Come, but we won't move, we stand still and won't move and won't leave our homes like Israel has planned for us. We're standing still and praise be to God, praise be to God, we're standing still."

And so we wait to see what is decided for us."