AFFIDAVIT

My father, mother and two sisters died during the war on Gaza

Prepared by: Rafeeg Musalim

Gaza Community Mental Health Programme

In her affidavit, Fathya stated “I was the last person in my home. I didn’t want to go out to be sure that my father, my brothers and my sisters received the first aid. I want to go with my mother to the hospital to be beside her and my family members who were injured. I felt that was ridiculous as I could imagine that they were alive despite my undoubted perception that they all died”.

‘I wish I had followed them and died with them. Now I don’t have anyone in this world and even my desire increased when they didn’t bring their corpse to have the last look at them before burying them the next day. I had waited a lot, but they didn’t bring them because we were totally astounded as the corpses were in a miserable state that can’t be seen because they were cut into pieces without any marks to be known. They were torn off into pieces and scattered outside the house that we still find their limbs here and there”.

“Now and after two months and a half, I still feel very scared and afraid when I awake from sleeping to go to the bathroom. I don’t go to the bathroom alone and I don’t know the meaning of sleeping during the night. I always remember this event and I will never forget the picture of blood, limbs and the burned and distorted faces of my family members.” 

This is Fatheia E. A. Mousa’s statement. She’s 18 years old and living in Al Sabra neighborhood in the centre of Gaza city. This affidavit was given to GCMHP under her oath. She said that around 8:30 in the evening of Wednesday, 14/1/2009, “I was sitting in my room with my sister-in-law, Heba Mousa (24) years and my sister Hanen who is 17 years old. While we were speaking, I stood up from my bed and headed toward the door. Then, we heard a very violent explosion which shaken the whole place. I felt that rubble and glass were falling over me, so I harried up to the nearby room. My brother’s children were in this room and they are: Eiz Al Deen (4 years), Zeen (4 months) whose mother where trying to make him sleep, but because of the strong explosion, she ran away and her child was going to fall from her hands. She opened the door and hurried up towards the street without seeing anything around her because of the big cloud of smoke which filled the entire place.

My sister Sabreen (19) years old was sitting in the nearby room with her fiancée. They stood up quickly thinking that the whole house was destroyed over them. They stopped to ask me what happen, but I screamed and told them to get out quickly to smother the fire which broke out in our home. We thought that what fallen over our heads was firing bombs.  Meanwhile, I went to the place where my family sit and walked over the rubble till I reached their place. I was in a complete astonishment because of what I had seen. I saw my brother Mohammad saying “God is The Great” despite the smoke was getting out from his face and body due to severe burns and he was severely bleeding. When he saw me he asked me to help him, I hold the bottle of water and started spraying his face… while he was extended on the earth and his hand and feet’s bones appeared from his body and scattered everywhere...

Meanwhile, my sister’s fiancé came and started spraying water on my brother Mahmoud. I got out to see what happened to the others. I found a girl from our neighbors dragging my mother outside our home and she asked me to help her in carrying my mother with her. When I came closer to carry my mother, she looked at me and smiled then she closed her eyes forever. Then she was carried by a civilian car to the hospital. After that I saw my brother Waheed (29 years old) who is thrown on the earth and the rubbles over him and smoke getting out from his body because of the severe burns. I sat beside him and felt that his soul is returning back to its creator and then he died, so I touched hid face. I looked to the other side where I saw my father Eiz Al Dein 52 years old who was thrown on the earth and his face, body and neck was bleeding severely and smoke rising from all his body parts. When I tried to stand from my place in front of my brother Waheed to go to my father, I couldn’t move and I stayed as pinned to the ground.

This tragic scene didn’t stop to this level, but my brother Mohammad 24 years was not better than the others. His body was entirely mutilated and cut into pieces. When I go to him and gave my hand to carry and help him, I felt that my hand is filled of his intestines and the flesh of his body, so I retreated backward with a total amazement. I was not able to do anything then I remembered my sister Nour 16 years, so I looked to the place where she used to sit in and I didn’t see her, so I realized that she is among the corpses which is thrown on the earth. I searched for her and I found she was burning on the fire and her long hair and her smashed head, so I was shocked more than before, but I did nothing. It is worthy to mention that neighbors were entering our house and getting out quickly because of the unbearable scene as blood was scattered everywhere and corpses were thrown and spreaded all over the place. Some of them were shocked and stand powerless and other tried to help, but he couldn’t.

I didn’t let anyone to be close to my brother Mahmoud as I was afraid about him until the ambulance came and carried him to the hospital. I saw my brother Ahmed 27 years thrown on our house door and his body is severely burnt , his right hand and the feet were amputated and his face was charred as well as the plastic chair which he was sitting on was sticked with his body.

My uncle Mahmoud came and took us from our home to another adjacent home and after they carried the corpses of the martyrs and the injured, they brought me to my grandmother house Abu Samir Al Jarrah. I and my two sisters Haneen 16 years and Sabreen 19 years stayed in my grandmother house all the night, but it was impossible to sleep and we didn’t know anything around us. We were in a hysteric state and we tried to go out to the street to go to our house during the night, but my uncle ran after us and retuned us back to my grandmother house. He closed the door by the keys because I hadn’t understood what’s going on yet. I didn’t understand that I can sleep outside my home in that moment as I was looking around me on the walls and imagine my father and mother and I speak to them saying: look what happen to us? And how we live now?

I was injured in my leg a slight injury in the accident day which I didn’t felt at that time, but it began hurting me during the night. In the next day it hurts me a lot that my leg started to distend in the third day and then the pain increased more and more. When I go to the hospital, the doctor asked me about the reason of this injury, so I told him that I am from Moussa family. The doctor treated me and get out some shipping from it then he bandaged the injury.

Regarding my brother Mahmoud who was hit in his right hand and leg and chippings over his body, he was transferred to Al-Shifa hospital to receive the required treatment. He stayed on the hospital for three days then he was transferred to Al Maadi, a military hospital in Egypt where he is still receiving treatment there.