"I have never chosen to adopt the title of 'refugee,' yet it keeps haunting me. It is scribbled on my Palestinian national identification card and follows my name in human rights conferences."
In the Al-Taghreba shelter in Khan Younis, the displaced refused to let the rituals of Ramadan die. They made their own decorations, recycling cola cans into radiant lanterns that hung between the tents.
"In 2018 when the UN high commissioner for refugees and the International Organisation for Migration agreed to provide cooking fuel across the camps in the form of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), many of these problems subsided."
Francesca Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur on Palestine, has accused Israel of treating Palestinian lives as expendable, linking the hellish impact of a deadly winter storm in Gaza directly to the deliberate destruction of the enclave's infrastructure. Speaking to Al Jazeera Arabic on Tuesday as a deep weather depression pummelled the Gaza Strip, killing at least seven children, Albanese said the weather disaster had exposed the depth of Israel's disregard for civilian survival.
Approximately 92 percent of homes in the Gaza Strip have been destroyed since October 7, 2023. According to United Nations estimates, around 436,000 housing units have been damaged or destroyed as a result of Israeli airstrikes and military operations.
Since October's ceasefire, which meant Israel would allow some - but not nearly enough - aid trucks to enter our besieged Strip, people in Gaza have desperately been eating, whenever possible, what they had been deprived of previously. Yet, as a result, many have developed " refeeding syndrome," which is a serious medical condition. Refeeding syndrome occurs when food is suddenly reintroduced after a prolonged period of starvation - and Israel has subjected those of us in Gaza to such periods on multiple occasions.
But urgency should never become an excuse for illusion, spectacle, or political shortcuts. The contrast between rhetoric and reality could not be sharper. While United States President Donald Trump and a group of world leaders gathered in Davos, Switzerland, to sign the charter of the so-called Board of Peace and unveil glossy reconstruction plans, the killing in Gaza continued. Since the ceasefire came into effect on October 10, no fewer than 480 Palestinians have been killed.
This psychological limbo was highlighted this week by the case of Hamza Adwan, a 67-year-old detainee whose family was informed of his death on Sunday four months after he actually died in custody on September 9, 2025. Adwan, a father of nine who had already lost two sons before the war, was arrested at a checkpoint on November 12, 2024. According to his family, he was detained despite suffering from serious health issues, including heart disease, and requiring constant medical care.