house and home

Mohammed Abu Shmas is an accountant. This is odd because when I hear of people's houses being destroyed I always imagine they are really poor.

The Israeli Defence Force (IDF) has been firing 300 shells a day into Northern Gaza in response to the rocket attacks on Israel. Mohammed's house was not a target or anything, he just lived in the wrong place.
When I asked him if I could take a picture of him and his house, he agreed and took me by the hand as we walked over. He told me about his week. He hasn't slept in the three days since the shell hit his house. He looked and talked and held himself like a broken man. He asked if I knew what it was like to know that your brother is dying and not to be able to do anythng about it. I said I couldn't and to be honest I don't want to.
He was visiting the house to see if there was anything of value he could pull from the rubble.
He was too terrified to stay there any length of time, he has no home for his wife and 5 kids. The kids can't attend school.
He asks where I'm from, I say Ireland. "So", he says, "You must know what it is like to live like this". "No", I said, "I have no idea what it is like to live like this".

This whole town, Beit Lahya, is dotted with small crators from tank shells. Talib got hit by shrapnel from a tank shell.













One of the men who showed us his shrapnel-ridden house said that no journalists had come to report on the incidents. These people were raging with the desire to be heard.






















In the car on the way home they said that somone had been injured in shelling in Beit Layha. There was a lady crying on the radio. I couldn't understand what she was saying.
I don't mean to say anyone is right or anyone else is wrong, I guess that as soon as you take sides you become part of the problem. But injustice is still injustice.