Daybreak in Gaza: Stories of Palestinian Lives and Culture

by Mahmoud Muna (Editor), Matthew Teller (Editor)

This is Gaza – a place of humanity and creativity, rich in culture and industry. A place now utterly devastated, its entire population displaced by a seemingly endless onslaught, its heritage destroyed.

Daybreak in Gaza is a record of an extraordinary place and people, and of a culture preserved by the people themselves. Vignettes of artists, acrobats, doctors, students, shopkeepers and teachers offer stories of love, life, loss and survival. They display the wealth of Gaza's cultural landscape and the breadth of its history.

Daybreak in Gaza humanises the people dismissed as statistics. It stands as a mark of resistance to the destruction and as a testament to the people of Gaza.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Memoir, Short Stories, Middle East, Essays, Activism

338 pages, Kindle Edition

Published October 3, 2024

Reviews

[Lisanne van Dartel · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was definitely the most important and at the same time the most painful book I've read in my life so far. It consists of about 60 essays, interviews and poems from people that live in or have a special bond with Palestine and specifically Gaza, in which they show us the reality of Gaza. Although this book was published very recently, in October 2024, it does not only cover the ongoing genocide in Gaza but also the disasters that were inflicted on Palestinians before, including the Nakba, the 1967 war, the disengagement in 2005 and the 2014 war.

Seen as I can't even begin to explain in this review the ways in which this book has given me insight into the reality of Gaza, I'll just say: go read it yourself! This is an absolute must-read for every human being that cares about other human beings.

[Tom Scherer · Rating 5 out of 5]

As I write this review, a ceasefire is allegedly being finalized. Whether or not it will come to fruition is unknown. When this genocide will finally be recognized by the world for what it is, is unknown.

How many Palestinians died while I was reading this book? I don’t really have any words that can sum up the grief that this book explores. Nor the beauty of the culture that is currently being systematically erased.

Gaza is not some quiet, vague place that the rest of the western world can ignore. It is real and full of suffering innocents. My heart breaks for them.

Genocide wasn’t a word until the Holocaust, where the world declared ‘Never again.’ I didn’t realize that what they actually meant was ‘until tomorrow. Until we want to.’ We never learn. And genocide just happens again and again.

Read this book. If only to let the words of these brave men and women, as Noor Aldeen Hajjaj puts it, ‘travel the world, for [their] pen to have wings that no unstamped passport or visa rejection can hold back.’

[Marte]

Anything I could possibly write would be inadequate in the face of the suffering, injustice, and resilience within these pages. All I can do is urge people to read this, and let some of the many passages I highlighted speak for themselves:

“Books used to ignite our thoughts. Now books feed our children.” - Asmaa Mustafa

“I don't want my creativity to be linked to tragedy. My ambition is to create in innocence, freedom and beauty.” - Mahmoud Joudeh

“It's the fact that, no matter what they say or do in the world your civilisation has wrought, Palestinians remain alone and irrelevant.” - Youssef Rakha

“In Gaza all paths are blocked, and we're just one tweet or breaking news story away from death.” - Noor Aldeen Hajjaj

“The only values that an occupied person can espouse are those of resistance to occupation.” - Mahmoud Darwish

“We move from the unknown to the unknown, from pain to more pain, while the world watches, untroubled, offering only disapproving words.” - Saba Timraz

“For all this life that we left behind after our deaths, we deserve to survive.” - Beesan Nateel

[Abigail · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every story hits the heart directly. This book cannot be read quickly, otherwise your emotions would be overwhelmed completely. It encompasses every facet of life in Gaza and the feelings all humans possess. I experienced the joy, beauty, sadness, pain, memories, desires, fear, and love in every single one of those stories and it reconfirms Gazans just want to live, be free, and feel joy with their families and communities, just as every human being does. The suffering they have experienced is off the charts, yet hope remains. Israel has tried to obliterate Gaza and its people, but they never will as long as we hold them in our hearts and minds.

[Sara · Rating 5 out of 5]

“I often think, what if we had stayed in the house? We would have died once. Instead we left — and now we die a thousand times a day, from alienation, poverty and the loss of ambition and hope.”

“We used to mourn for a person, a pet, a beautiful memory, a park we sat in, a street we walked on. Then we would mourn for a family, a house, a neighborhood. Now we’re mourn for all of Gaza.”

“I didn’t realize that all my humdrum days before would seem like paradise. I close my eyes and go back to the way I used to be, before the war. I remember laughter, the meetings with friends, the boring commute to university, my dream of working at the things I do best… How I miss it. How nostalgic I am for days that will never return.”

[Jane Fudger · Rating 5 out of 5]

An extremely interesting book of essays exploring the lives and culture of the Palestinian people. Of the 68 contributors there is a small number of war diaries by writers/journalists and how it affects everyday life but the bulk of the collection is written by aid/charity workers, medical staff, theatre organisers, dancers, libarians, teachers, chefs,storekeepers and poets. Some of the contributors have since been killed
Overall the book portrays the wealth of the Gazan landscape and an interesting insight into the culture. I particularly enjoyed the theatre story plus the history of Tazreez [Embroidery] and the cuisine - t5here are a couple of recipes I may try.. Each essay shows how the Palestinians react and resist attempts to "cancel their culture".

[Tanja Špes]

V knjigi so zbrani eseji, besedila, poezija, zgodbe ljudi, ki so na kakršen koli način povezani z Gazo. Največ avtoric in avtorjev v Gazi živi ali je živelo, nekaj je avtorjev, ki so Gazo obiskovali ali tam delali. Nabor je zelo širok in skozi besedila sem kot bralka dobila uvid v kulturo Palestincev v Gazi (med drugim so opisane nekatere tradicije, hrana, zgodovina, manjšine itd.). Knjiga je pomembna, ker daje glas tistim, ki v Gazi živijo/so živeli in skozi njihove oči bralka doživlja dogodke tako pred kot po 7. oktobru 2023. Večina besedil je bila zbranih spomladi 2024. Kljub vsemu uničenju - življenj, kulturne dediščine, okolja, praktično vsega, se pisci ne vdajajo nemoči, temveč izražajo upanje. Težko branje, ampak nujno.

[Ciel Rombouts · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is such a timely and important book. It is a bundle of essays from different people who have various connections to Gaza and Palestine. From scholars, journalists, artists, human rights advocates, to ordinary people trying to survive a genocide, these essays fulfill their promise of providing vignettes of everyday experiences about living, dying, loving, losing and grieving. For me, it was interesting and heartbreaking at the same time reading about what Gaza was and what Gaza continues to be during the ongoing occupation. It also provides a lot of information about the rich culture and history of Palestine, making sure this history is recorded and can never be forgotten.
I highly, highly recommend picking this book up. From the river to the sea 🇵🇸🍉❤️

[Abigail · Rating 5 out of 5]

The pieces where the editor reveals the places talked about no longer exist are particularly moving. Everyone should read this. What is happening is horrific. To pretend it isn’t, or to say you don’t know enough to say at this point isn’t good enough.

[Tyson Peveto · Rating 5 out of 5]

Important writings from voices that need to be heard about a genocide that needs to be stopped.

[Diana Podar · Rating 5 out of 5]

Honestly, it’s probably the most important book I read so far. My heart broke a thousand times, but Gaza and Palestine’s story, beauty, resistance, and humanity will live on and endure. The phrase “must-read” gets thrown around a lot, but it has never been truer than for this book. Please read it!

[Georgia Kremalas · Rating 5 out of 5]

The most incredible book I have possibly ever read. I feel so deeply this is something everyone needs to read. Deeply insightful and emotional - each individual passage provides so much insight.

[Alex Taylor · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is simply devastating. Essential reading that will make you incredibly angry. It will also make you weep and will leave you feeling guilty that humanity has absolutely let the Palestinian people down.

[Sophia Cleary · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everyone who is able to read, must read this!

"If I must die, you must live to tell my story"-Reefat Alafeer.

[Jess Bollands · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not an easy read but such an important one, and obviously a huge privilege to read about these horrors rather than live through them.

[T.O. Munro · Rating 5 out of 5]

I bought this a while back after seeing reports of the author - proprietor of a Palestinian bookshop in Jerusalem being arrested. While news reports highlighted the injustice of the detention, the only c0ncrete support those at distance could offer was to buy the book, so I did.

It's taken me a while to read what is at times, informative, joyful and yet also a very hard read that illuminates not just the history and culture of Gaza, but the horror of the current war on its civilian population. The book doesn't just resist, but utterly refutes, the impetus to homogenise Gaza and its people. While it can hardly be right for those pursuing a colonial genocide to portray the population of Gaza as a uniformity of brown skinned terrorists, it would also be wrong for those beyond to see a sheep like flock of indistinguishable slaughter victims.

Scratch any human society and you will uncover layers of detail, nuance and difference and this book does much to turn Gaza from a two dimensional newsreel of dusty grey destruction into a rich three dimensional story of richly textured history and culture and individuality. The myriad of contributions juxtapose accounts of vibrant cities, intricate crafts and unique cuisine, with stories of death and survival - whole families brutally wiped out and dangerous forced marches where to stop is to be shot.

It is in the nature of genocides throughout history to seek to dehumanise the target, to render a whole people as flat and stereotyped so that populations can be dismissed as a collection of numbers rather than human beings. Daybreak in Gaza pushes back against that propaganda imperative with individual stories that bear witness to many tragedies. The apocryphal Stalin quote that "one death is a tragedy, a million is a statistic" captures the truth that human empathy needs individuals to connect to, rather than a mass.

While Daybreak in Gaza offers many such individual stories it does not pretend that Gaza is or was some perfect utopia. The shadow of authoritarian and restrictive government lours over some of the pages, while the prejudice experienced by the Dom people within Gaza exemplifies how being subjected to persecution and discrimination does not make you magically incapable of committing persecution and discrimination.

The Gaza that these stories depict is as diverse, as imperfect, as much a work in progress - in short as perfectly human - as any human society. All societies are on a journey, we need only look at how our own countries have changed in attitudes and character within a single lifetime to see how inaccurate it is to portray the character of any nation as homogeneous, immutable and unvarying. It is only the rightwing populists who believe there was ever a perfect moment of the past, one that they want to recreate in the present.

Living in Belfast I have learned something of the troubles of Northern Ireland's past, of how reducing a community to a status of second hand citizens with unequal access to justice, housing and employment, is an unsustainable way for a state to operate. It is no surprise that the Catholic communities here feel most affinity with the Palestinian cause, flying palestinian flags from their estate lampposts while the protestant community - partly perhaps on tribal grounds, or partly from an eagerness to embrace Israeli narratives of self-defence against terrorism - esposes the israeli cause and flag.

But when I read the experiences of the writers in Daybreak in Gaza I am reminded of other books I have read, films I have seen and places I have been. There is the story of Helga Weiss which I reviewed here who survived the Terezinstadt ghetto and Auschwitz. Weiss's tales of trying to keep culture and normality strangely alive in the midst of a dehumanising ghetto existence, ech0 some of the stories in Daybreak in Gaza. I have visited the Jewish quarter in Krakow where people were brutally evicted from their homes at gunpoint and sent to unimaginably crowded quarters in a fenced in ghetto across the river, which resonates with many of the tales of Palestinians in Gaza given ten minutes to leave their homes by the IDF, with those who dared to stay buried in rubble. I have read how, of Anne Frank's companions in hiding, only her father survived and her friend, the boy Peter, died on a forced march out of Auschwitz which Otto Frank evaded only by being too ill to leave the 'hospital' but not so ill he died before the camp was liberated. And in Daybreak in Gaza there is a tale of a woman walking past corpses with a nail she had trodden on buried bone deep in her foot, yet she knows that to stop to try and pull it out is to be shot.

I read history in different forms. Perusing the history of the Doolittle bombing raid on Japan in 1942, I discovered that the Japanese killed tens of thousands of Chinese people in revenge for a few of those people offering assistance to a score or so of crashed bomber crews. Humanity has always had the capacity for gross inhumanity, for urges of hate and fear that label others as somehow 'unworthy of living.' It is a trait that demagogues have harnessed throughout history, though it is dismaying to see how shamelessly that hate is now displayed in selfies and videos flaunted on the internet taken by soldiers from Ukraine to Gaza and beyond.

We may argue about degrees of awfulness, and there are those who will claim that to draw parallels between Gaza and the Holocaust is somehow antisemitic, despite the fact that many people drawing those parallels are themselves Jewish. However, there are surely some absolutes that apply to both, it cannot be a just war that labels some people as less than human, it cannot be a just war where children are dying, it cannot be a just war that tries to hide its truths either by shooting journalists or blowing up the evidence of its crimes.

As individuals it is easy to feel powerless while our alleged leaders collude with and are complicit in acts that are de facto war crimes. Our political leaders who, from an initial misplaced sense of pragmatism, have diplomatically (and apparently irretrievably) chained themselves to a regime that is rapidly sinking into a quicksand of undeniable immorality.

However, the least that we can do for the suffering, the very least we can do, is acknowledge the rich textured variety of their humanity and bear witness to the crimes committed against them. And reading this book is one part of that!

[Mai-Anh Peterson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This will stay with me forever.

[Nguyen Tran · Rating 5 out of 5]

It’s harder than I expected to articulate my feelings upon reading this book, partly because grief is often easier to feel than to talk about, and partly because the emotions it evokes encompass more than just grief. Joy, fear, hope, pride, and anger intertwine, challenging any reader's expectation to experience grief alone. This complexity subtly suggests that the stories from Gaza are not solely about those who survived or those who perished, nor are they merely numbers. This book, further than oppression and images of massacres, offers glimpses into the vibrant cultures and ways of life of Gazans who strive to thrive, even under Israeli occupation and oppression. It perfectly, and agonizingly, portrays how the Israeli genocide has, in the most inhumane way possible, transformed colorful, bright hopes and lives into a monotony of suffering, endless killing, and despair.

As I closed my eyes to reflect on the story or image I remembered the most, I realized I couldn't choose just one. Instead, a vivid series of images flashed through my mind: Salim's heritage store, destroyed in an instant after October 2023; a group of Palestinian women sitting in the sun, embroidering tatreez while their children played on the beach; children whose legs were trapped under rubble, eventually leading to amputation; a mother who had just brought twins into the world, only for one to be shot by a Zionist sniper before the twins could even grasp the cruelty of their surroundings; a girl who lost consciousness, unaware that she had lost all 17 family members to an explosion. I remember the hashtag #AllEyesOnRafah trending on social media; how many of us understood that people there felt death was preferable to living? When I opened my eyes again, tears streamed down my cheeks and soaked my shoulders.

I dog-eared a passage on page 172, which I read three times, trying to engrave it in my mind as a reminder of how a single slice of hope and the essence of life were erased from Palestinians in Gaza over the past year:
[“This is the IDF. You have ten minutes to leave your home.” Imagine this: ten minutes, and your entire history is wiped from the earth—your gifts, photos of your siblings, the children who were martyred and those who still live, the things you cherish, your chair, your books, the last poetry collection you read, a letter from your sibling living abroad, memories with your loved ones, the dress your grandmother Khadra wore when she had to flee, photos of your mother as a young woman holding you in her arms, the scent of your bed, your old clothes, your prayer mat.]

What horrifies me most about this book is that, as readers, we are left uncertain whether the authors and their families will survive after sharing their stories and feelings. Some narratives were written from abroad, some before October 7, but many were penned while bombs fell and guns were pointed at them, compelling them to evacuate to the south. Many wrote knowing there would be no home to return to, no hope to cling to.

No one is free until all Palestinians are free. I highly recommend this book to anyone who wishes for and fights for the liberation of Palestine.

[Raakel · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a deeply touching and intriguing book about the thriving, vibrant and diverse place Gaza was prior to the current war which is now only a dream: literature studies at the University of Gaza, theatre and music, strolling on the beach enjoying snacks, the President of the United States arriving at Gaza Airport and daytrips around Gaza’s tourist attractions.

A black Gazan musician: “I’ve sung in France and Egypt, but I’ve never been to Jerusalem or the West Bank. That’s my ultimate dream, to experience the music scene in the other half of this country and meet fellow artists.”

It details the hell Gazans are living in through diary entries of killed Palestinians who missed their own bed and homes and didnt’t want to be killed and has witnesses talk about a young child carrying his dead little brother in his back pack, children being left to sleep alone on cold streets after their entire family has been killed, Israeli soldiers trying on the underwear found in Palestinians bedroom drawers, dancing and taking duck face selfies, Israel not granting child cancer patients’ parents the permission to accompany them to Egypt for treatment, mass graves, mothers losing all their young children, orphaned and bereaved children being in need of a child psychiatrist, children’s bodies being stored in ice cream freezers, pregnant women having miscarriages, premature labor and stillbirths from the sheer shock and stress of the bombings and Gazan parents trying to comfort their children who have started wetting the bed again.

“Wedad - what did she do to be killed by Israeli bullets? She has left behind four children, one just a baby. My brother was killed with seven bullets - why? Those trees that were destroyed, those houses - why?”

It also tells the story of the resilience of Palestinians. Children flying colourful kites among warplanes, the owner of the oldest falafel shop in Gaza continuing to prepare falafel for the people after his shop and utensils were destroyed and an English teacher who had collected books since childhood and created a home library graciously accepting the faith of her books being used to light fires to cook for children.

”My 5-year-old nephew, darling Omar, made us laugh today. He regards this as a war against children. We overheard him telling his mother: “At least grown-ups can find coffee in the market. Children like me can’t find any snacks or lollipops. Now do you understand why this war is against us, not you?’

………………………………………………………………………………

”No one can think or hope for what might come after a ceasefire. The ceiling of their hope at this hour is for the bombing to stop. It is a minimal ask. A minimal recognition of Palestinian humanity. Despite Israel cutting power and internet, Palestinians have managed to livestream a picture of their own genocide to a world that allows it to continue.

But history will not lie. It will record that Israel perpetrated a holocaust in the twenty-first century.”

[Hani · Rating 5 out of 5]

These 60+ stories not only give a voice to the survivors (and sometimes to those who did not survive, as you learn when you finish a story) of the relentless bombing, devastation, trauma, famine... they also allow us to accompany Gazans in their incomprehensible daily struggle just to stay alive. And they bring Gaza itself into focus and humanise it. We learn about Gaza's long and rich history and culture, its cuisine and its people and their diversity, their hospitality and love of land. Gaza is so much more that "The Strip".

Some of these stories were sent by voice messages at midnight, braving dangers, when there was internet somewhere, some stories were written during past wars and some were written by non-Palestinians about Gaza and their experiences. They are at times tough to read, but always poignant, eloquent, heartfelt, and sometimes with (dark) humour.

How they manage, I cannot start to comprehend. But I owe it to them to read their stories, to give them life, to let them know we don't forget them.

A must-read.

One of my dreams is for my books and my writings to travel the world, for my pen to have wings that no unstamped passport or visa rejection can hold back. (Noor Aldeen Hajjaj, I Do Not Consent)

Those who hear the sound of the missile survive. We are alive until further notice. (Hiba Abu Nada, Your Vow is True)

We, too, are human beings with individual histories and stories that must be recounted by the living, not only buried with the dead. (Sara Roy, Shattering the Mirror)

My life has been defined by the Holocaust and the unimaginable losses it inflicted on my family... Yet, with those losses came lessons that were drummed into me by my parents, lessons burned into my soul, which I promised never to forget. The Holocaust is not a shield beyond which you cannot look, my mother and father taught me; rather, it is a mirror with which to reflect and examine your actions, a mirror you must always carry with you. (Sara Roy, Shattering the Mirror)

‘If you look at all these dresses (tatreez), the richness, the skills, the innovation, the creativity and the trade and the economy involved in creating them, this was a society that was stable, that had economic means and a role for women. Women had their dowry stitched in coins on their headdresses, which no one could take, at a time when European women could not open a bank account. (Katherine Pangonis, Written in Fabric)

[Hasliza Rajab · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book took my breath away.

I was taken to explore the alleys and streets around Gaza and it allowed me to get to know the Gazans in terms of its history, their arts, the diverse culture that they embraced and of course, the sea...the Gazan's pride! By learning all of these things through my reading, I was in awe. Such a beautiful people and friendly community that lived together despite their different religions and ideologies.

This book stands as a powerful, multifaceted anthology and a moral act. It’s both a historical document and a call to empathy that preserved voices in the face of cultural annihilation. Going through this book, the content is not just undeniably painful, but it is also a reservoir of resilience, beauty, and human continuity.

Through nearly 100 voices consists of poets, teachers, artists, doctors, acrobats, children and many more, this anthology brings Gaza to life in ways we rarely see. The stories of laughter, weaving, family, memory, resistance, and loss… not from the lens of war, but through the richness of culture and everyday existence. What breaks my heart is that we are only just learning about these lives, this beauty, this history after so much has already been destroyed.

Three key insights from my reading :

- Gaza is a cultural powerhouse where it lies a rich tapestry of art, music, embroidery, poetry, food, and oral history. Gaza’s identity isn’t defined solely by suffering, it’s also a place of deep cultural heritage and creativity passed through generations. For example their tatreez.

- Despite unimaginable hardship, they went with their routines like normal days. The ordinary becomes extraordinary in a place where normality is constantly under threat.

- Instead of eliminating Gaza to death tolls, this book brings me into the lives of individuals. Their dreams, fears, memories, hopes and jokes. The result is empathy and understanding instead of pity and simplification.

This isn't just a book, it’s a bridge to voices often silenced. It challenges the world to see Gaza not only through tragedy but also through dignity, beauty, and humanity.

[David Kenvyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a searing indictment of the Israeli genocide in Gaza. It is a series of witness statements about what is happening that will leave you breathless with anger. It could be used by South Af Arica at the International Court of Justice in support of the case that it is pursuing against Israel. These are testimonies that should not be overlooked. How do you deal with a statement like "I had not prepared for a genocide"? Who does such a thing? How do you deal with the story of a boy carrying a rucksack which contains the remains of his brother?

This is the definitive proof that the "Jewish State of Israel" is not only acting in breach of international law, but also of Mosaic Law, the very basis of that religion. They have seen the land and coveted it, the land that belongs to their neighbours. They have settled on that land, driving their neighbours, either into exile or into refugee camps. They did not buy that land. They stole it. To claim that they were given that land by God thousands of years ago does not make it any less of a theft today. Like Ahab and Jezebel, they murdered to take that land.

What else can you call unceasing bombing raids that target schools, hospitals, homes, churches and mosques, but a massacre of the innocents? As one writer says, children are not Hamas soldiers, old people are not Hamas militants, the sick in hospitals are not Hamas fighters. The Israeli Government says that everyone in Gaza is Hamas, and so they are all legitimate targets. Netanyahu is the best recruiting agent that Hamas has got.

This book is a clarion call to action, and we must take it. The destruction of Gaza and the genocide of its people must stop. If the editors of this book, and the contributors, help to achieve that they have done a wonderful thing. But is is for us, the readers, to make sure that it happens.

When Father Trevor Huddleston published "Naught for Your Comfort" we, the readers of that book, helped to destroy apartheid in South Africa. We have a similar task before us now.

[Shelley Anderson · Rating 5 out of 5]

"I would come home happy, or I would walk around Gaza, get some coffee and chat with friends in the streets. They're all gone now."
22-year old university student

What a wonderful, eye-opening book Daybreak in Gaza is. Over 50 Palestinians have contributed short recollections, diary excerpts, photographs and art work to this anthology, which spans history, poetry, memoir, and breaking news.

From an antiques dealer to a singer, a parkour teacher to a dentist, a writer to a housewife, these stories reveal more about Gaza, and what is at stake there, than any news documentary.

There are no polemics here. Only the recounting of daily life and love.

This collection brought home to me once again the primacy of words and of storytelling. By telling their own stories--about that first sip of coffee in the morning, or the crepe myrtle in the garden, or shopping in the market--these reclaimed their humanity.

But Palestinians have never lost their humanity. It's the rest of us who have lost ours.

This is a book for anyone who wants to learn more about the everyday lives, both before and after October 2023, of ordinary Gazans. It will make you weep at all that has been lost, and more determined to save what can be saved.

[Peter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Heartbreaking-victims of one genocide propagate another.

“Since October 2023, Israel has systematically attacked Gaza’s cultural properties. The idea of eradicating culture in Gaza is a part of a long-standing pattern of cultural destruction throughout historic Palestine, feeding the logic of settler colonialism to eliminate every aspect of a people and their identity from the land and leaving Palestine is a state of what scholar Daud Abdullah has called ‘cultural bareness’.

“Endings are so strange, as are living moments that suddenly become relegated to the past. We will never see them again, and the pictures that I took of the twins are now so precious, as one of them, Mustafa, was killed, while the other, Ibrahim, survived. I wonder how they could differentiate between them, when their father was dead and their mother lay wounded in intensive care? Which was Mustafa and which Ibrahim? It was as if they had merged upon one twin’s death.”

[Elissa Wood · Rating 5 out of 5]

Please read this book.
This book is a compilation of stories and lived experiences of Palestinians in Gaza; their stories are eye-opening and heartbreaking. Many passages refer to actions taken by the empire, colonialism, bombardments, and abject human suffering- I wish I had read this book in a more stable headspace, I recommend that people do. This book also features sections on Palestinian history, culture, and traditions. Without a doubt, this book humanizes a people that have been dehumanized and demonized for decades. This book does excellent work in mobilizing people towards the Palestinian cause. As well, a while after this book was published, author Mahmoud Muna was arrested and his bookstore was raided by Israeli authorities.* Muna continues to fight against censorship, even as the empire tries to erase Palestinian culture and life.

* Source: https://www.npr.org/2025/02/14/nx-s1-...

[Nina · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Gaza does not propel people to cool contemplation, rather she propels them to erupt and collide with the truth. (...) The only values that an occupied person can espouse are those of resistance to occupation. This is the only competition there. Familiarity with these noble and hard values has become a need in Gaza. Her people did not acquire this need from books, or from brief academic courses, of from trumpets blaring propaganda, or from patriotic songs. Only from experience did Gaza learn these values, and from actions not performed for the sake of one's image or self- promotion."

Mahmoud Derwish, Silence for Gaza

[Els · Rating 5 out of 5]

Vijf sterren zijn niet genoeg.
De verschillende bijdragen laten bij elkaar een onuitwisbare indruk achter en laten Gaza en haar inwoners door de jaren heen tot leven komen. Door de keuze van de stukken krijg je als lezer een heel divers beeld.

Het werkelijke leven in Gaza, zoals in deze bundel beschreven, is door Israël uitgewist, vernietigd, met de grond gelijk gemaakt.
Ik hoop dat Gaza door dit boek op papier enigszins kan voortleven en een groot lezers publiek bereikt. Want dat verdienen de Gazanen.
Veel beschreven gebeurtenissen zijn intens verdrietig en mensonterend, maar toch stijgt met iedere bijdrage het respect dat je krijgt voor Palestijnen.

[Brett Lambert · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a collection of essays and dispatches on all things Gaza. Yes this includes the perspectives of civilians fleeing the violence unleashed upon them by Israeli forces since October 7, but also includes lots about what life was like prior to it. Spans the gamut of cultural traditions, food, artists, history, and so on. Most of these essays are quite short so it can be digested in little bites easily.

The book does note whether some people ended up getting killed by air strikes, etc. as of July 2024 or so. I hate to think that more of these authors suffered a similar fate since then (haven’t checked, but wouldn’t surprise me if my premonition is true).

[Ruth Rhodé · Rating 5 out of 5]

A book with stories that crushes and warms your heart at the same time. Stories about rootedness in family, resilience through culture, despair during slaughter and hope based on generational experiences. It is al written down and being documented, so the world could never say they didn’t know. That they didn’t know both the destruction and the beauty of Gaza.

[Ramona Morris · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are no words to describe this book. This is the first book of 2025 that broke me clean down the middle. With each story my heart hurt more. Broke more. But I realized in my own selfishness I could never experience a smidgen of hardship that these people continue to face daily. My heart is with them.