GAZA, (PIC)
“We promise we will rebuild them.” These words were written by a Palestinian on the walls of a house demolished by Israeli airstrikes in northern Gaza, sending a message of resilience and defiance against the occupation, which has been trying to empty the region of its inhabitants for the past 28 days.
The drawings and writings on the walls have become a means of expressing perseverance, resistance, and defiance against the occupation in northern Gaza, which is facing one of the fiercest campaigns of Israeli ethnic cleansing since October 5.
On the wall of one home, a Palestinian artist painted a picture of a Palestinian woman holding her child around a pool of blood, with destroyed houses in the background, along with the words in English: “Stop the war.”
“We remain and will not leave,” said Amer Khalil to the Palestinian Information Center: “The occupation is trying to kill us and displace us, and we are telling it through all means, including these words and drawings, that we are staying and will not leave. We are the rightful owners of the land, and we will rebuild our homes.”
On the walls of another house, someone wrote, “My home, even if you destroy it, I will not leave,” to express the Palestinians’ determination to stay despite the genocide and brutal massacres being carried out by the Israeli occupation forces for the past 28 days, aiming to displace the residents and turn northern Gaza into a buffer zone.
On one of the mosques, someone wrote, “Gaza will remain ours, even if the whole world fails us.”
Eviction orders
During the past month, the occupation forces issued five eviction orders, the latest on Friday morning, targeting citizens in northern Gaza. They committed dozens of massacres in homes and shelters, killing more than 1,200 Palestinians and injuring over 2,000 others.
Activists and local media circulated a video showing how the walls of destroyed homes in northern Gaza have turned into murals of resilience; murals standing against the siege and the Israeli military operation.
The phrases and drawings on the walls varied between rejecting forced displacement and calls to stop the war on Gaza. Among the most prominent phrases were: “Stop the war,” “Freedom for Palestine,” “Tomorrow we will rebuild it,” “Even the birds in Gaza have wings and do not migrate,” “My son is still under the rubble,” “Sufficient for us is Allah, and He is the best disposer of affairs,” “I will not leave,” and “We remain like thyme and olives.”
Since October 5, the Israeli army has begun unprecedented bombing operations on the Jabalia camp, town, and large areas in northern Gaza, before invading it the next day, warning of its intention to implement the Generals’ Plan to empty the region.
Since October 7, 2023, Israel, with absolute American support, has been waging war on Gaza, resulting in over 144,000 Palestinian martyrs and injured, most of whom are children and women, and more than 10,000 missing, amid massive destruction and famine that has killed dozens of children and the elderly, in one of the worst humanitarian disasters in the world.
