The sight of nature soaked by rainwater is refreshing to the utmost extent; for rain is a symbol of life, of agricultural crops, and of renewal. Sadly, on this Friday morning, the news of Gaza’s ongoing suffering overshadowed everything.
Last night, a conversation took place between me and Professor Darwish, who is from Gaza and currently living there. He kindly provided us with articles in English about the situation in Gaza. His words expressed the bitterness of the Arabs’ and Muslims’ abandonment of the people of Gaza, and how the bombing and killing continue without pause. He and his family are in the area that Trump and the Zionist enemy want to designate as a lawless zone—one in which there will be no reconstruction, no investment in human beings, and nothing that guarantees Gazans even a minimum level of dignified life.
His question was laden with blame and bewilderment: “Until when will we remain in this state?”
My response was painful: “Your situation will continue as it is as long as you do not unite your ranks internally and as long as you do not choose the option of resistance. The path of peace, as they claim, has not led to freedom, independence, or the establishment of a Palestinian state. When you unify your ranks and agree on a way out for your cause, you will have the opportunity to bring your full weight onto the international level, to place everyone before their responsibilities, and the Zionist occupation will find no escape to evade its accountability. What you lack is unity of ranks and a sound conception of resistance.”
Professor Darwish agreed with me and expressed his fears regarding Trump’s plan, which divided Gaza into a recognized inhabited zone under the control of the Zionists, and a condemned zone. He said: “We live in terror every time we hear gunfire and the advance of Israeli tanks through the destroyed streets. Children are the first to suffer, and they still do not understand what is happening.”
I asked him, “Who is administering your area?”
He replied, “We do not know.* We are trying to stay alive—that is our only goal now.”
Thus, I understood that the area not yet controlled by the enemy is also not under Hamas’s control, and that there is no clear Palestinian administration there. This, in brief, is the content of last night’s conversation.
* Professor Darwish’s description of the absence of governance and the lack of clarity regarding the authority controlling certain areas aligns with what has been documented in recent UN reports, particularly those of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) and UNRWA. These reports have confirmed the collapse of civil governance structures and essential services, as well as the existence of a wide administrative vacuum resulting from continuous bombardment and mass displacement. Moreover, the reference to areas being “uninhabitable or unfit for reconstruction” is consistent with warnings issued by the UN Secretary-General and reports of the Human Rights Council, which have described Gaza as moving toward a state of “unlivability” (an *Unlivable Territory*).
