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By: Motasem A Dalloul
It was midday and temperature was over 32oC when Rabah abu-Shanab, 58, was lying under the rubble of what once was his house in Al-Shuja’ia, the neighbourhood which was devastated the most during last summer’s Israeli offensive on the Gaza Strip.
One year passed on the Israeli offensive, but nothing has changed in Abu-Shanab’s life. He and his extended family of 18 members are still homeless, have not received makeshift shelters, have no electricity or drinking and running water.
“Until today, nothing happened to me and my family,” Abu-Shanab said, “even the rubble of my house was not removed… I asked the electricity company to install only one street light in the whole area, they promised, but did not fulfil their promise.”
Abu-Shanab, who has been unemployed for 13 years, said that he had received only one six-month payment to pay for an apartment. He paid the money to buy some household appliances and other essential staff to equip what he called a “makeshift house,” but I call it a very primitive tent.
Abu-Shanab is not alone
Like Abu-Shanab’s, Isam Habib, 23, has been working more than 12 hours a day just to afford the rent for a small apartment he, his family and his father’s family are currently living.
“My father was abroad when the war started,” Habib said. “When he came back he was chocked with the scene of his house was completely destroyed and immediately had a heart attack that left him dead.”
Habib continued: “All the family moved to my uncle’s house. We lived for about two months, but my uncle could not bear 16 new family members living in his house which is originally designed to reside a six-member family. Therefore, we moved to a small rented apartment and since then, I have been struggling to afford the rent for this apartment.”
Habib and Abu-Shanab are two out of around 100,000 Gaza residents who are still homeless. According to conformed statistics, 19,075 homes were destroyed or made uninhabitable by Israeli bombing during the war.
Several local and international organisations, including the British Oxfam said that none of these houses has been rebuilt. Therefore, around 100,000 Gazans are still displaced.
According to Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) which has an operation office in Gaza, “83,977 housing units are still waiting for repair assistance and people continue to live in homes that bare gaping holes from the bombardment.”
The NRC said that couples of Gaza residents, who were made homeless, have built makeshift houses, but it insisted that the tight Israeli restrictions put on the movement of building material entering the Gaza Strip would make the reconstruction take at least “half a century.”
No money for reconstruction
Less than two months after the end of the Israeli offensive that caused the death of around 2,260 Gazans and wounded 11,000 others, international donors held a donor conference in Egypt and pledged a sum of $5.4 billion to rebuild Gaza.
Norwegian Foreign Minister Borge Brende, whose country called for the conference, announced that the pledges exceeded the $4 billion the Palestinian Authority (PA) had asked for.
In June 10, Adnan abu-Hasna, spokesman of the UN Relief and Work Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), told MEMO that the donors have not fulfilled their reconstruction pledges.
He said that only $216 million of the pledged funds has been paid to date. “It seems that the issue was not taken seriously by the donors,” he said. “A sum of $216 million out of $5.4 billion means no fulfilment.”
He added: “People in Gaza feel desperate as no single house has been rebuilt. More than 1,500 displaced refugees are still sheltering at UNRWA schools in different areas across the Gaza Strip.”
Abu Hasna also blamed the siege as the “main reason” for the delay of rebuilding the Strip. “If the siege continues, Gaza would continue suffering,” he said.
People feel ‘hopeless’
While showing me around his “makeshift” house, Abu-Shanab said that he feels “hopeless” about the pledges of the donors and the promises of the Palestinian officials regarding reconstructing his house.
“We have been here [in his tent] for a year now,” he said, “and I have hearing with promises and pledges, but saw nothing until today.” Abu-Shanab hoped that the donors and the officials to fulfil their pledges and promises.
“I have been living here with rats, mice and insects,” he said, “I want to end this life and live again in an appropriate house.”
While standing on the rubble of his house, Habib also hoped that his house is reconstructed very soon in order to live in an appropriate house which is enough for his family and his father’s family.
At the end of last week, UNRWA Operations Director for Gaza Robert Turner said that his organisation has only received financing for 200 homes. But he also said that the situation in Gaza would witness tangible measures regarding the reconstruction of the destroyed homes.
This story first appeared on MEMO
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