Dalia Abu Ramadan
Truthout / September 10, 2025
My bag is packed, but I have nowhere to flee. I live in fear as I watch residential towers fall around me.
Every day we witness a new chain of brutal crimes committed by the Israeli occupation. Why does no one dare to stop it? How can a world stripped of humanity watch us burn alive? How are we expected to answer sudden phone calls ordering us to evacuate, threatening: “We will destroy everything around you”? Has everything we own become Israeli property to be demolished at will?
Have rulers become so consumed with protecting their wealth and interests that pleasing Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu matters more than listening to their consciences? From Gaza, we watch as people across the world raise their voices in condemnation of these atrocities, but their governments remain silent, eager to secure whatever gains they can reap from their cowardice.
In just two days, the occupation destroyed 50 residential buildings and towers. Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz has warned that if Hamas does not give up all weapons, “Gaza will be destroyed and you will be annihilated.” The tragedy is that many of these buildings were already partially destroyed, yet families struggled to repair them in order to survive. But it has become clear that the occupation’s goal was not merely to damage — it was to strip us of every shelter by levelling them completely to the ground.
As the destruction spread, the fear became personal and immediate. On the morning of September 5, 2025, the bombing escalated to an intense degree. My friend Sally, who lives near Al-Daraj neighbourhood in Gaza City, called me and said, “We gathered all we could carry to head south, even though the situation there is catastrophic too. But it’s clear the occupation has begun to wipe out my area completely. If we stay, we will certainly lose our lives.”
Her words made the devastation feel closer, more urgent — it was no longer just numbers on a page.
I hung up the phone only to hear the news of another threat — this time targeting the Mushtaha Tower in Al-Rimal, the same neighbourhood where I live, but near the Ansar area. That tower had already been targeted multiple times, yet it still sheltered no fewer than 100 families.
Imagine receiving a sudden phone call: “Evacuate immediately, we will bomb the tower!” Soon after, the ground shook violently. I realized that Israel was using a different kind of missile — one designed to level buildings completely. In that moment, I understood: This occupier selects one weapon to burn and shred human bodies, and another to erase entire structures.
An hour later, my mother’s friend, who lives just a street away, called to warn that the building next to hers would soon be bombed and that they had to evacuate immediately. These repeated phone calls forced us to quickly pack our belongings in case of an evacuation order — especially since we live in a high-rise apartment building as well. Although the building where we live is half destroyed and the apartment opposite ours has already been obliterated, my father repaired the apartment we currently live in, despite the danger of living next to a bombed-out unit with no wall left. He has always repeated, “Better than a tent.”
Dalia Abu Ramadan is a Palestinian storyteller and aspiring graduate of the Islamic University of Gaza
