My name is Yusuf: a seed traces his journey from Gaza to camp by Yusuf Bashir

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My name is Yusuf: a seed traces his journey from Gaza to camp

by Yusuf Bashir

23 March 2006

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“Yusuf was tired of arguing about the past. He urged our Dialogue Group to concentrate on the future when we got trapped in arguments of history. He had big ideas about peace, and took advantage of every opportunity to share them. Before any of us knew his story, we knew of his dream for peace”. -Adam Sege (Mass.)

Deir el-Balah, Gaza Strip - Until September 2005, I lived with my family--my dad, his mother, my mom, and my four siblings--in a house in the Gaza Strip next to the Israeli settlement of Kfar Darom, by its military base. (I have since moved to Ramallah to be able to participate in Seeds of Peace activities and to attend a better school. My family is still in Gaza).

The 1990s were by and large calm, or at least seemed to be. It was the time of the Oslo Accords. I used to care about sports, especially football, and little about the news and politics. Things changed in 2000.

When the second Intifada broke out, the Israeli army told us to leave our house. The family discussed whether to leave or to stay. My mother was very frightened and she wanted to leave. All of the neighbours had left and their houses had been destroyed. My father never wanted to leave our home. He told us that whoever wanted to leave could, but that he was going to stay.

If we were to leave our home, it would simply be destroyed and we would never see it again--these were the words of my father. We all decided to say at our house.

But living there was getting more difficult every day. The Israeli soldiers had moved in. The roof of our house was covered in camouflage nets and barbed wire and there was a machine-gun post and a camera. We lost the normality of our lives.

The army occupied the top floors of the house. No one was allowed to come into the house, except for the soldiers and journalists--who had to have permission to enter. My house wasn't my house.

I started to care about the news-indeed I had to and wanted to share in the discussions about the situation. I also wanted to know when I would be free to play football again in the garden.

We were also not allowed on the second and the third floors of our house because the army told us that they were "Area C”, where the Israeli military government runs everything and the Palestinians have no authority. The living room, where all seven of us had to stay at night, was "Area A”. We called it the jail. The bathroom, kitchen and bedrooms were "Area B"--where Palestinians administer themselves but Israel has security control. (Luckily they were not "Area C"!) My sister labelled the doors of the house. We had to get permission to go into the kitchen and a soldier would come with us if we had to go to the bathroom.

This continued for five years. Everything around was tanks, soldiers, shooting, rockets, destruction ...

But it was our love of our home that always gave us the power to keep on going. It was our belief that we all are humans, who are always able to live together, which never let us feel that we hate them. My father used to say that we are all the sons of Abraham. So we have the right to live in peace and they also share the same right.

My life took a change for the worse when I was shot on February 18, 2004. The bullet stopped near my spine. The day of the shooting, we were visited by United Nations workers, who had permission to visit us. At the end of the visit, I was standing outside my house, waving them goodbye, when I was shot.

I crumpled to the ground. I was very sure it was my end and that I was dying. I even said the Shahadat, the words a Muslim says when he dies. But I did not die. In the hospital, I hoped that I would die because I was not able to move my legs.

And it was painful. My parents, sisters and brothers were in a terrible situation. But thanks to the help of God and a German friend of my father's, who got in touch with the German Embassy in Tel-Aviv and made sure I got good treatment in a hospital in Israel--thanks to this, I can walk.

I am still on medication though because sometimes my legs won't move right. It is too dangerous to remove the bullet and any operation will cause even more damage to my spine. So I have to live with the bullet for the rest of my life. The Israeli doctors also told me that I am not allowed to practice sports.

It was a very tough time. I did not know how I was going to live. But at the hospital, for the first time, I met Israeli civilians, not Israeli settlers and not soldiers. They were just humans, just like we all are. I was helped by them and they were kind to me. I realized that we really are the sons of Abraham. One soldier shot me, but many people saved my life. I felt like a human for the first time at the hospital. I realized that I could do something for this world.

The Israeli soldier who shot me changed my life. My dad says someone needs to forgive, if not the soldier then you.

So I was wondering why we are fighting, why I was shot without reason. And it was not only me, many young people from the two sides have suffered. We are all going to die, for sure. But the land will not die. Can the people live together?

Then I had the chance to join Seeds of Peace in 2005 and attend Camp, where I met with young Israelis. And there I felt, once again, that it is unfortunate that we are fighting. When I was back home in Gaza, before the Withdrawal, I gave one of the soldiers who was at our home a green Seeds of Peace T-shirt.

My family, like many Palestinian families, and Israeli families as well, share the same belief. So the future belongs to us and we all have to work to change the situation in this very beautiful area.

My dear friend, I know that you want to live safely with us. Israel will not die and Palestine will come for sure but we need to realize our dreams without losing each other.

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* Yusuf Bashir is a Palestinian youth who grew up in Deir el-Balah in the Gaza Strip. He attended Seeds of Peace camp in 2005.

Source: The Olive Branch - Youth Magazine of Seeds of Peace, March 2006.

Visit The Olive Branch Online: www.seedsofpeace.org

Distributed by the Common Ground News Service.

Copyright permission has been obtained for publication.


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