The following are WhatsApp messages Andaleeb was able to send to out beginning on 8 October 2023:

Sunday, October 8th

... Thanks we are all ok

… Wallahi I’m ok and all, I’m not calm to post now, there is so much noise, people, events…I’m at the house of my daughter in law’s family

Monday, October 9th (at 21:30)

…The girls and I, my grandchildren, their mother and her parents, her cousin and his wife and children are trapped in the basement of their house that’s near the Islamic University and all of the bombing is right next to us. The situation is indescribable, the horror is beyond imagination, the house has been badly damaged, and there is much destruction around us and above us. My son Muhammed, the journalist is in the courtyard of al-Shifa hospital where he took cover with the other media people who had to evacuate their offices after being warned.

… by the way we’ve been in this situation since noon

… but I’m beat, my nerves are shattered so I said I’ll write to you all

… No [sleep] is impossible the airstrikes don’t give us a chance. We go to the bathroom two by two out of fear

…. We have with us two of my grandchildren and another girl and boy, the children of my daughter in law’s uncle – that is altogether four children

(10 minutes pass without bombing)

… [Can you leave?]

… No its difficult to get out…the roads are ruined...cars can’t move on them...and we’re in total darkness and there’s no light in the streets

… many people tried to get out and got caught in the streets

… they’re doing something [patterned bombing] called a fire belt in different areas, they divide neighbourhoods into cells cut off from each other

… dear god let them have finished

…we’re waiting for the morning

[Andaleeb shares an Instagram post from Al Araby TV taken earlier in the day. It is of the street and the semi-destroyed building she is in.]

… We’re inside that building that is damaged

Tuesday, October 10th (morning)

… We fled the building because they want to bomb the two buildings that are across the street

… we walked a long way between the destruction so that Mohammed would know how to reach us with a car and take us to al Dera Hotel

Tuesday, October 11th (evening)

… Praise God we are fine and the children are well and they are happy to be reunited with their father

… and we were able to wash off the dust and dirt

… that’s to say our situation is much better thank God

Wednesday, October 11th

… Good morning. Yesterday at midnight we had to flee the hotel because they wanted to bomb the area. We went to a house with other people to relatives of my daughter-in-law. A little while later we wanted to go back to the hotel - Hahhahaha - I have an incredible loss of feeling!

… You know, Israel is priceless and we Palestinians are worth nothing. Our blood is so cheap

… We went back to the hotel and after half an hour they bombed a building exactly across from us with phosphorous bombs. We were choking and fled again from the hotel and here we are at the house of my daughter-in-law’s uncle.

… I’m okay…all are okay… I hope it will be calm tonight

Thursday, October 12th

… Yes, Habibti, I’m ok

… Can you understand [anything about our] future from the news?

Friday, October 13th

Thanks to God we arrived safely to Rafah, I’m with my family the Adwan’s

Monday, October 16th

… Good morning we are fine

… We don’t have enough drinking water, no one here has drinking water

… Two of the kids got sick, they’ve got fever and diarrhoea

… God deliver us

Tuesday, October 17th

… Since dawn there’s bombing all around us

… there are so many, many, dead and injured

… there are so many dead and injured

Sunday, October 22nd

I'm trying to stay strong and to keep the hope that this shit will be stopped

Thanks for support and hope

Yes, we all survive despite the shelling everywhere around us

Monday, October 23rd

Honestly, last night was horrible, but we survive Alhamdulillah

Thursday, October 26th

Good morning

Please keep bothering me

Your messages make me feel connected to the world

Sunday, October 29th

Good morning dear

I really miss you too

Kids are Ok, food is available, but drinking water is rarely available and its price is triple

Monday, October 30th

Hi dear

I’m ok

I sent the mobile to charge

It was out of my hand

It was a bad night

 It [the bombing] was near us

Tuesday, October 31st (morning)

The night was alright

But right right now

The shelling is nearby

There’s no electricity at all and the generators on the street are completely silent because there’s no gas or diesel

We installed solar panels enough to charge mobiles and batteries for some LED lights around us at night

Long lines for bread from the morning because it takes so long and a bag of bread is double the price

And the internet goes and comes and it’s really weak

And the water isn’t safe for drinking and we buy it for double the price and we use plastic stuff so we don’t have to wash dishes

And gather any water used to flush the toilet

And sleep is constantly disrupted

…

M and A and their two kids are with me

And M’s colleague and his wife and three kids and my sister’s daughter with two kids, and her brother is in the same building, in the apartment across from us, he has 6 children

Yes, we’re a whole crowd

And my paternal cousin, the father of my niece whose mother, my sister, passed away, and his current wife are on the first floor

Wednesday, November 1st

Good morning

The network was cut last night until an hour ago

They destroyed Jabaliya camp yesterday and today

I no longer know how to worry or to be reassured

This numbness isn’t normal

Nothing really matters to me

Tuesday, November 7th

Good morning

Since the war began exactly thirty full days ago, I have evaded writing about its horrors that we have been suffering instantaneously and continuously in Gaza. I have even evaded talking to foreign and local journalists who have contacted me, some of whom are old friends or friends of friends. I evaded using various pretexts and justifications including the racket made by the many children around me and my laying in ambush of their small wars, trying to prevent them before they break out or to extinguish them as they start. And I am the grandmother who is trying to be firm and fair between her grandchildren and the many other children here; where we found refuge from Gaza City which we fled twice with my daughter-in-law’s family and relatives; first fleeing to two different hotels, then once again fleeing to my relatives here in Rafah [Refugee] Camp in the southern Gaza Strip. My attempts often failed, since the children became totally and incredibly out of control, and were filled with violence and savagery using their hands, feet, and teeth to attack each other. Some of them no longer cried or screamed during the fights, neither while hitting nor being hit. Sometimes we would notice that a fight was breaking out from the sound of slaps or something crashing next to them. Salma, [my granddaughter] who is exactly two and a half years old, would be walking and punching the others, old and young, right and left without warning. I was drained by these battles, by trying to prevent them or end them or calm my thoughts when they were over. And I was convincing myself that I was busy with this great mission that distracted me from press interviews that would neither nourish me nor relieve my hunger. Since what is prohibited and permissible are obvious, and whomever cannot see in their [moral] sieve that the Palestinians have a just cause are blind, and will never see or understand anything, neither from press interviews nor from anything else… Moreover, the TV stations broadcast live the bombing of neighbourhoods and their crowded homes and buildings falling on the heads of their residents; the bombing of hospitals with their wounded, and schools and churches with their thousands of displaced people. So, what will my words add to this deaf and blind world... Nothing...

In addition to the task of preventing wars between children, I have another task that is no less important which is the job of managing food provisions. This includes the procedure of cooking and then distributing rations among men, women and children, and receiving the bread and conserving it through drying, while hiding it away from the old white cat that comes through the window each night in search of food. These tasks are followed by supervising the disposal of the garbage that accumulates every day so that the cat won’t find it and scatter it all over the house while we sleep... I beg you -- don’t underestimate these tasks of mine, as they are much more important than chattering to the press, and much easier than using the intermittent and unstable internet, and more comfortable for me than speaking in English, of which there is nothing left in my head... And to be even more honest, I’m also incapable of speaking in Arabic with any fluency, or rather it takes me time to remember a lot of meanings, words, names and expressions... This state makes me appear as if I’ve just woken up from sleep or from a coma...

So, let us agree that I carry out valuable field missions on the scene in the places of displacement where we have taken refuge. In fact, my 44-year-old nephew awarded me the title of, Minister of Nutrition and Provision - one I’m very happy with. My joy over it is only marred by the sounds of bombing near and far, and the noise of generators running on gas, kerosene, and gasoline used to raise water to roofs that are heavy with [water] tanks, firewood, old shoes, worn carpets, empty plastic bottles, and miscellaneous scrap; in addition to the washing line strung with hand washed clothes that are still sodden with water because the tired hands of the women were unable to sufficiently wring them out. Especially since most of them are very young women who have never had to do washing by hand during the short span of their lives between one war and the next over these past 15 years... Yes, throughout these years we suffered from regular power outages, but the majority of women were able to keep washing their laundry in washing machines by scheduling the task according to when electricity was available, even in the previous wars the electricity was never cut off in such a total, continuous and comprehensive power outage as in this current war..

But let’s return to my daily preoccupations that distracted me from talking and writing about this war. Such as checking on my work colleagues on a daily basis and responding to female friends who constantly reached out to check up on us. This was one of the tasks I did, whether it was possible to call by cell-phone or to write a WhatsApp group message depending on whatever was made available by the [communications] network. Also following the news of the daily fights between the overcrowded displaced people, tens of them living on top of each other in small houses that are crammed next to each other along the camp’s narrow lanes, this was also one of my preoccupations... Oh God, how much people are stressed, scared and nervous... We need years of treatment to be released from what we are in -- if we are not released from life before that... We need years of reconstruction and rebuilding to compensate for what’s been destroyed, and we need more years in order to document and record the horrors we are experiencing, horrors that we don’t know when they’ll end. And we don’t know if we will be here to witness their end or whether we will witness our end??

This is night after night in Rafah. I am writing and am filled with great fear. May God protect us 

It was our hardest night in Rafah

Wednesday, November 8th

Yesterday I heard our house [in Gaza City] is destroyed as is the whole neighbourhood

I’m very worried about our personal things

There are thieves in Gaza

Robbing destroyed buildings

I’m not worried about things that can be replaced

I’m worried about our photo books

Memories

Anyway, I’m lucky to be alive

Andaleeb Adwan is a long-time women's and democratic rights activist in Gaza. She is the founder and director of the Community Development and Media Center in Gaza City that works with youth and women to promote democratic space and self-expression through socially aware citizen media. See her post from the 2021 Israeli war on Gaza here and a 2012 interview here.

*A version of this dispatch was published in Italian here by Pagine Esteri.