Texts from a war zone Winnipegger follows friend’s harrowing journey of ‘despair, courage’ in Gaza
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This article was published 19/09/2024 (730 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
“No Gaza now. They bombed all of the homes on my street. The school and the hospital. When we go back home — no street, no house.”
That’s part of a text Winnipegger Joanna Hiebert Bergen received March 4 from her friend, Abdal (not his real name), about the conditions facing him and his family in Gaza with the conflict between Hamas and Israel raging.
Hiebert Bergen, 64, is part of the Mennonite Church Manitoba Palestine-Israel Network and a member of Fort Garry Mennonite Fellowship. She has been friends with Abdal since 2012 when she was working for a Christian organization in that region.
RUTH BONNEVILLE / FREE PRESS Winnipegger Joanna Hiebert Bergen displays text messages from ‘Abdal,’ who lives on the streets of Gaza with his family.
“I got to know Abdal while visiting Gaza numerous times,” said Hiebert Bergen, adding they remained in contact sporadically after she returned to Canada in 2015 — she received texts from him when he married Samia, when his two sons, Eid, five, and Mustafa, three, were born, and about other major life events.
After the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel, the texts began to arrive more frequently. “I have followed this family for over 11 months now,” she said. “I have wept with them and advocated for them along with many others in this city of ours, Winnipeg, and beyond.”
Most of the texts are short, with Abdal just checking in. “’We are alive. How are you?’” he writes.
But sometimes the messages are more devastating, such as one sent Nov. 10: “Today, my wife’s sister was killed. She was 12 years old. Her name was Noor. She played all the time with my sons. Yesterday she gave me tea. She said, ‘I am happy when I play with your sons.’ Another sister is in the hospital. She is not fine. Doctor says ‘Pray for her’. I am not fine.”
Along the way, there have been days where Hiebert Bergen didn’t hear from Abdal and she feared for his life.
As she would discover, his silence coincided with times the family had been forced to relocate or flee from the bombing. This included when their compound, where they lived with Abdal’s extended family, was destroyed by a bomb. Everyone survived that attack — they had been warned in advance to leave. Abdal and his family next found shelter in a school, but it was soon hit by shelling.
“My father, brother and sister die,” Abdal texted, noting they were all in a classroom when it was hit by an Israeli tank shell. “My heart died with them.”
Hiebert Bergen says she carries a “low-level anxiety about them all the time,” noting Abdal and his family are now living on the streets in Gaza. “I wonder: Are his little boys OK? Did they eat today or drink clean water? What will I do if the phone remains endlessly silent?”
“My father, brother and sister die. My heart died with them.”–Abdal
While always wanting to hear from him, she worries that it might be putting his life in danger since he has to find a place to charge his phone each day. “It’s dangerous wherever people congregate like that,” she said.
And yet, Abdal has a need to tell his story, Hiebert Bergen said. She also wants to make sure the plight of people suffering in Gaza isn’t forgotten.
“As a Christian, I believe God calls us to take the side of those most marginalized, those often without permission to speak or tell their stories,” she said, adding she sees people like Abdal in Gaza and those in the West Bank as “the silenced,” people without power who have no voice or space to tell their stories.
The story of the Good Samaritan in the Gospel of Luke provides inspiration for staying in touch and telling Abdal’s story, Hiebert Bergen said. “This parable feeds my faith commitment to show love to my neighbour as I would hope to receive love from others,” she said.
MAHMOUD ISSA / QUDS NET NEWS VIA ZUMA PRESS WIRE Palestinians inspect their destroyed homes earlier this month after bombing in the Sheikh Radwan neighbourhood in western Gaza.
One thing that stands out for Hiebert Bergen is how Abdal, a Muslim, asks her, a Christian, to pray for him and his family. “We talk a lot about prayer,” she said.
Hiebert Bergen knows she isn’t the only person in Winnipeg receiving texts from Gaza. “My story is just one story. There are hundreds of thousands of stories like mine with much deeper roots to pain and loss,” she said. “It can’t be measured.”
She wishes more people in Winnipeg could hear stories of “despair, courage and hope,” like Abdal’s.
“I hope the city could become a place where Palestinian stories could be openly shared with all the emotion and honest conversation they deserve, where we can feel the depth of their humanity.”
faith@freepress.mb.ca
Texts from Abdal
Nov. 11
“Joanna, do you have any news to stop war? I don’t know where to go. I am so worried. No one tells me where to go. Who can help me? I can’t sleep. I have not slept for days. I need to see my family safe. I don’t have food. But what I really need is to be safe. My dream is buy a home but if my family is fine, that is good enough. When I die, I will rest.”
Feb. 12
“Did you see what is happening in Rafah? Big bombing, we don’t sleep. We worry so much. Tonight was very difficult. Very strong bombardment. I saw my son hiding from the force of the bombing. He hides his face in the ground and trembles. I try to hide him so no one can see him, so he doesn’t die. Really, my heart dies. I am so tired.”
March 6
“Here we wait. Or die. Back home we wait – or die. Here really it is so bad. The situation is so bad. I am tired of this situation. How can these problems end? War and conditions are unbearable. 150 days we suffer. Now it is unbearable. Good night.”
May 8
“Today I sat with my son because of his fear. He said that he is afraid of the bombing and that he sees my family under the sand. In his dreams his legs are cut off and he walks without them because he saw what happened to my cousin without a hand and my brother without an eye.
He made me cry today. What should I do? Tell me.”
May 24
“The first and best dream is to be safe with my family. Then traveling to Egypt for medical treatment for my brother. I want to build a future for my children. I want to have some money in an account so when my children grow up it will help them.”
Aug. 17
“The bombing is very close. Some shrapnel reached us. The sounds are terrifying, the children are screaming. They are all the time bombing.”
Aug. 19
“We left because of the bombing, heavy bombing. We were running under bullets. The children did not sleep, from fear they wet themselves. We are in the street. My family found a place next to my relatives who sleep on the ground without anything. I arrange them a blanket, a mattress and a temporary cover for them to sleep in until the situation ends because we do not have a tent. We hope and pray for stop to war.”
Aug. 20
“We fled our tent in the middle of the shelling, we left with only the clothes on our backs. Yesterday a relative and I tried to go back to our tent to get food, clothes and a few supplies for my family. An Israeli drone helicopter flew out and shot at us. We quickly ran away, but we could see that they had earlier shot up our tents and burned some of our neighbours’ tents. I do not know when it will be safe to go back to the tent. The Israelis never tell us when they leave an area. Here so bad, we need help for stop war. Only Americans and Europeans can end this war.”
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