Refugee Voices
Phone Interview with Ali Ass'ad Amin Damaj ("Abu
Ass'ad"), Member of the Residents' Emergency Committee, Jenin
Refugee Camp, 20 and 21 April
The interview was
conducted on two separate days, because of a shortage of batteries
for cellular phones on the first day). Excerpts
Can you describe your current location in the
camp?
We are a group of 50 people at the home of Afif
Hussein Sarhan ("Abu Hussein"). His house is located in the Damaj
quarter, a neighborhood in the eastern part of the Jenin refugee
camp, 200 meters above the government hospital. Abu Hussein's
household is usually composed of 13 family members, Abu Hussein,
his wife Khitam, their 10 children aged 6 - 22, and his mother. My
own house is only 6 meters away, we are neighbors. I am a refugee
originating from the Khalissa neighborhood in Haifa, and Abu
Hussein's family comes from the village of al-Mansi, also in the
district of Haifa.
Yes, of course we knew that it would happen. There had been previous Israeli attacks against camps, and the Israeli army had closed in on the town and camp of Jenin already on 29 March, the day they invaded Ramallah. So we took care that we would have some money in the house, and we bought supplies that would last 4-5 days. We did not expect the Israeli attack to last more than one week.
Did the Israeli army enter your
neighborhood?
Yes, immediately on the next day (3 April), they took position in
the Al- Ansar Mosque in our neighborhood, which is only some 40
meters from my home. It is a three-floor building with a
kindergarten in it, and from the top it is possible to see most of
the camp. They also took position in some houses of Jenin town,
which are located on the border of the camp, overlooking our
neighborhood. The soldiers stayed there for 14 days, until 16
April.
Why and when did you all gather in Abu Hussein's
house?
Already on the second day. My house was not seriously damaged, the
windows of several rooms been broken from the shooting. However, I
saw the Israeli army bringing huge bulldozers and starting to
destroy houses in the area to the west of us. These were huge
bulldozers, twice the size of their tanks. So I told my wife,
'Let's get out of here,' and it was our neighbor, Abu Hussein, who
invited my whole family to his house. He said that we would be
safer together. Later on also the family of Abu Hussein's brother
and other relatives arrived. We ended up counting 50 people in his
house, men, women and children. Abu Hussein's house includes a
bakery on the ground floor, this is where we all slept for two
weeks. It is an Arab bakery, with a 3 x 3 meter fire-place with the
stove, a storage area for the bread maybe 2 x 4 meters wide, a 3 x
4 meters wide place for sale, and a narrow corridor with a toilet.
We put three children on each mattress on the floor, the women
found one area to sleep, the men another. Like this we spent more
than two weeks closed in the bakery. During the day, we sat
together, talked and listened to the radio. The children tried to
keep busy among themselves, but of course, every time there was
heavy shooting and shelling they became terrified, and the adults
tried to calm them down.
Can you describe what you actually saw happening
outside?
We could not see much from the windows, we
were on the ground floor and could not go outside. We saw the huge
Israeli bulldozers destroying houses in our quarter, west and north
of us. By the 5th day (7 April), they had destroyed some 10 houses
west of us and some 20 houses north of us, and they had partially
damaged some 40 homes. This was still before the massive Israeli
attack on the camp after 13 of their soldiers were killed on 9
April. The Hawashin neighborhood, where the 13 were killed, and
where the army completed bulldozed all homes is some 250 meters
away from us. We could not see much, but we could hear the shooting
with what we call 300mm, 500mm, and 800mm caliber guns, and the
helicopters. Then we saw tanks and heavy bulldozers passing by our
house, in the direction of the Hawashin quarter, and we knew where
bulldozers are there is destruction.
Did you see people getting killed or injured in your
neighborhood?
I saw one person killed. His name is Abdelnasser Mahmoud Ighrayyeb
Abu Hattab. He was a young man, a neighbor and father of three
children. On the fifth day, when the shooting was really heavy, we
convinced his wife and children to leave. We helped them to escape
through a window. Abdelnasser, however, was very stubborn, he
insisted to stay. Two days later, he was killed by Israeli bullets
in his home. His body stayed in the house for six days, until we
could bury him. On Monday, 15 April, the curfew in the camp was
lifted for two hours, and we quickly called his brother who lives
in the town. His brother came in a private car, we put the body
inside, and his brother took him first quickly to the hospital to
register, and then he was buried in the martyrs' graveyard of
Jenin. I saw two people getting injured, Abdelnasser's father, who
was shot in the leg, and an old woman, 'Arab Balalu, who was shot
in her arm. Both could not get medical treatment until the curfew
was lifted on 19 April.
Did Israeli soldier enter your homes? Did you witness
pillage and looting?
Yes, they entered every home in this neighborhood and ransacked
them. They used explosives to open the doors of the homes of those
who had left the camp before the attack. They entered my house and
destroyed the furniture inside. The entered Abu Hussein's house,
where we were all staying, twice; the first time they came last
Monday evening and they came back Tuesday morning. On Tuesday, 16
April at 9:45 AM, they came and ordered us all to step aside. They
ordered Hussein, the owner's 23 year-old son to come with them to
the apartment upstairs, and when they found some cupboards locked,
they demanded the keys. Abu Hussein's wife gave them to her son,
and he had to open the cupboards and throw everything out on the
floor. Like this they went from room to room, some soldiers stayed
behind to search among the things. When they had left, we found
that NIS 9,000, 17 packets of cigarettes, five golden bracelets and
a golden necklace were stolen. pest control near
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Have you been able to walk around in the camp since the
curfew was lifted? Where did you go? What have you
seen?
Yes. Yesterday I toured the whole camp together with Jamal Shati, a
member the Palestinian Legislative Council from Jenin, and US
Undersecretary Richard Burns. We saw all of it, but what is most
devastating for me is to see the dead lined up. Everybody is here
now, the Red Cross, the Palestinian Red Crescent, many
international aid teams and local residents, in order to search
under the rubble. Just today (21 April), we found another two
bodies, men from the Palestinian National Security Forces. We have
found some 40 dead so far, not counting the 86 bodies that the
Israelis confirmed having taken away before. Until now there is no
adequate equipment to lift the rubble. Israel promised to send
equipment but has not done so, and the arrival of equipment from
abroad is delayed because of Israeli clearance procedures. So we
continue to work with the equipment available at the Jenin
municipality.
Do you still have missing relatives or friends whose
where-about is unknown?
Thanks to god, nobody from my
family or my neighborhood is missing. All of the 15 youngsters who
were arrested have called, they are in detention in the Ofer
military camp or at Meggido Prison. But others in the camp are
still looking for relatives and friends. We are undertaking a
census now, in cooperation with international agencies. Only when
this census is completed and when we know who is arrested, will we
know how many of us are missing and most likely dead.