GAZA: People living in the Gaza Strip, which has been cut off from electricity, water and food supplies since the devastating attack carried out by Hamas on Israeli border towns last week, are running out of places to hide from the retaliatory Israeli airstrikes that have been pounding Gaza for days.
For Tahani Jaber walking everywhere is now the only option as driving a car has become unthinkably dangerous. She has left her children with their mother north of Gaza City while she tries to procure medicine for her infant, who is suffering from a high fever for the second day in a row. "I feel like I'm getting closer to death every moment, but the lives of children are more important," Jaber says.
Hamas fighters attacked Israel on Saturday, causing the worst bloodshed in the state's history, Israel says. The Israeli army has since bombed hundreds of targets in Gaza which it says are linked to the Palestinian extremist organisation which rules the densely populated area on the Mediterranean coast.
According to the Health Ministry in Gaza, at least 1,354 people have been killed, and more than 6,000 others injured in the coastal strip.The Israeli military accuses Hamas of using people as "shields" and of hiding or storing weapons among the civilian population.
Entire streets have been reduced to rubble by the Israeli airstrikes, Mohammed Baroud from the Al-Nasr neighbourhood in Gaza City says. Anyone currently going outside could be bombed and die at any moment, Baroud told dpa. "We can't move or buy important things for our children."
After every attack, he says, another one comes. "What is happening is crazy." Eyewitnesses say neighbourhoods such as Al-Rimal, Al-Mukhabarat and Al-Tuffah have all been devastated.
Two million Palestinians live in the sealed-off coastal enclave, and many have been forced to leave their homes. Jaber Al-Sufi is one of them. He and his family spend the night in a shelter in the centre of Gaza, he says. However, he fears that the situation could get even worse as the attacks on the Gaza Strip continue to increase. - DPA
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