Letters from Palestine (35 page)

The return: high school graduation

When I arrived back, my experience was
totally different. I was no longer the exchange student exploring
the American lifestyle. Rather, I was a stateless individual
seeking a high school education without having any clear sense of
my near future. I was fearful, anxious, and concerned that I would
not be able to unite with my family for an unknown period. The
situation in Palestine was not getting any better. There was
internal fighting between Palestinian political factions, Hamas and
U.S.-backed Fatah, due to American and Israeli refusal to accept
the election results.

On January 27, 2007, my seventeen-year-old
cousin in Gaza was shot dead in the back by Fatah militants who
were in front of his house simply because he asked them to move
away from the vicinity of his home. All night long, militants loyal
either to Hamas or to the Palestinian Authority had been firing
bullets into his home. His family was terrorized for days by the
intensity of the fighting. He thought that it was time to let those
fighters know of the horrors they had created.

I do not condone any side in their use of
violence and force. It is especially painful when violence is
between Palestinian factions. Both factions have committed crimes
in attempting to impose their will. However, it was established
that my cousin was shot by forces loyal to Palestinian President
Mahmoud Abbas. It was also confirmed that those forces were using
newly delivered American weapons, which were given to members of
Fatah to overthrow the democratically elected Hamas government.

Political asylum and I

This atrocity reinforced my decision to apply
for political asylum with Homeland Security to secure a stable
status. I utilized the death of my cousin as one component of my
case. After months of preparations and meetings with my lawyer, I
was finally assigned an interview date. It happened to be June 14,
2007, which was the same day that Hamas took over the Gaza Strip.
This was a significant enhancement to my case. During my
five-hour-long interview, the asylum officer understood that Gaza
was in bloodshed and that if I returned from the U.S., I would
likely be in danger.

I am considered stateless because the United
States does not recognize Palestine as a sovereign state, although
millions of Palestinians are living on part of what used to be
known as Palestine. In the interview, I was stunned by what the
officer said regarding my nationality: “We’re going to put down
stateless; that’s what we write for Palestinians.” Those were the
words of the asylum officer when he checked the nationality box in
my asylum application.

Deep within my heart I knew that I was not
stateless and that my home in Gaza, Palestine, exists. However, I
knew that today’s Palestinian Territories are no more than small
occupied, controlled, and isolated fragments and reservations.

_PHOTO

I am considered
stateless
because the
United States does not recognize Palestine as a sovereign state,
although millions of Palestinians are living on part of what used
to be known as Palestine.

Because I was a stateless minor, Washington
DC had to make the decision as to whether I was eligible to receive
asylum or not. Instead of waiting for two weeks, I had to wait over
one-and-a-half years. I finally received the approval in the
beginning of October 2008. Hopefully, I will receive the green card
in 2009.

I’m on the right path to gain citizenship. I
am currently enrolled in City College of San Francisco to receive
my AA degree in general arts. I plan to transfer to San Francisco
State University to get a bachelor’s degree in business
administration—management and marketing. I hope to continue my
graduate education and study the fields of economics and media.

I was thankfully able to utilize my asylum
status to ensure my education and to receive employment
opportunities. I feel conflicted, however, whenever I pay taxes.
It’s quite ironic that as a junior taxpayer, I’m paying for the
siege and occupation of Palestine. Only three years ago, I was
suffering directly from occupation and hardships paid for by
American taxpayers’ money. I am not demonizing taxpayers, but
rather bringing awareness to the fact that people like you and me
are paying for the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land.

I hope to return to Palestine when and if it
becomes safer and more stable. It is difficult to think that I am
not going to be able to see my family for many years to come. I
hope my story brings you awareness of the invisibility of suffering
in Palestine. I urge you to investigate and research the issue. I
believe that by doing so, you will become aware of the injustice,
which is not publicized in mainstream media. Meeting and talking
with Palestinians will help you get the grassroots version of the
story instead of political propaganda.

December 26, 2008

[Written the day before Israel launched its
attack on Gaza.—Ed.]

_PHOTO

My name is Hadeel Abukwaik, and I’m from a
city called al-Lod in Palestine. I was born in Gaza on August 16,
1984, where I spent my first weeks of life only to move shortly
afterward to the United Arab Emirates. I grew up in the UAE with
two younger sisters, Yasmin and Shahd, and two younger brothers,
Mahmoud and Mohammed. After high school graduation, I left my
family and went back to Gaza to study computer systems engineering
at Al-Azhar University. As an ambitious person and after spending
six difficult years there I won a Fulbright Scholarship to pursue
my studies in the U.S. I’m now earning my master’s degree in
software engineering at California State University–Sacramento. I
like walking, swimming, and both reading and writing. My dream is
to have a homeland rather than only hearing about it!

* * *

Not long ago, I received an email from a
student named Lashauna at a college in Sacramento, California, who
had read one of my articles about Gaza, asking me if I wanted to be
interviewed for a project dealing with Palestinian justice.
Lashauna was not Palestinian herself, but her best friend, Hadeel
AbuKwaik, a graduate student at the same university, was not only a
Palestinian but a Fulbright Scholar, and, as it developed, she also
knew Zohair Abu-Shaban, another Fulbright Scholar whose story
you’ll be reading next.

Small world.

As usual, a rapid series of email exchanges
ensued, and, as usual, a very warm and friendly relationship
developed between Lashauna and me. Naturally, I was curious about
Hadeel, too, who at the time was visiting friends on the East
Coast. But shortly after Hadeel returned, they both arranged to
drive down to visit Anna and me. Hadeel had never before been to
San Francisco, and was keen to see it, and since Anna knows the
city well and has often taken friends and tourists there, she
offered to do the honors for Hadeel and Lashauna.

The day they picked to come down turned out
to be warm and sunny, and we had a ball taking them around San
Francisco to see all the sights. Indeed, they had the full tourist
experience, complete with stops on the Golden Gate Bridge (the
photo of Hadeel that appears in this book was taken there) and a
ride on a cable car (we jumped on and off again before we had to
pay!).

Serendipitously, in walking through Union
Square, we came across a big crowd protesting and noticed
immediately that Palestinian flags were waving aloft. It was
demonstration against the attack in Gaza, and of course, many
Palestinians were present, so Hadeel felt right at home! Ziad was
there, too, so we were able to introduce Hadeel to him and other
Palestinians. And as we were leaving, I happened to notice Ahmed
Alkhateeb on the street corner, holding up a sign. We hadn’t met
yet (only communicated by email and over the phone), but I
recognized him from his photo (and from having seen him interviewed
on TV a number of times). I went up to him and said, “Ahmed!” He
looked at me blankly, until I identified myself. Then we had a big
laugh, and I was able to introduce him to Hadeel (to whom he has
been very helpful in various ways since).

The world was getting smaller.

Hadeel later wrote me that she absolutely
fell in love with the city, and if she were to remain in America,
would love to live there. It certainly would be wonderful to have
her as a neighbor across the Bay. In any case, once I had the
opportunity to get to know Hadeel, at least a little, that day, I
asked her if she’d be willing to write something for our book, and
she kindly complied. So here is Hadeel’s story.

* * *

All homelands are similar in that their
children live there. Only Palestine is unlike any other. Palestine
lives in its children.

I don’t know where to start with the story
of my twenty-four-year-old life. Do I start with my growing up in
the United Arab Emirates, where I was classified as a “foreigner,”
or with the last six years I spent in Gaza, where I was classified
as a “refugee”? Or should I start in the present, when I am in the
USA as an “international student”? Have you ever thought of being
without a homeland of your own?

Let me tell you about my family, which I
miss and which is made up of my father, mother, and five children,
I being the eldest. My good father, Kamal, is a fifty-two-year-old
chemical engineer who was born in Gaza and grew up there as a
refugee, coming originally from the town of Lod, which he only knew
through the stories of his father. My warm mother, Hedaya, is a
forty-three-year-old housewife born in Gaza and belonging to it. I
was born in Gaza on August 16, 1984. Shortly afterward, my parents
decided to move to the Emirates where my sisters and brothers were
born: Yasmin, Shahd, Mahmoud and Mohammad.

They moved in search of what locked-up
Palestine could not provide its children, hopeful for a better
life. But it seems fatigue is the Palestinian’s fate wherever he
goes. The label “foreigner” stuck to us everywhere, with its impact
on salary, treatment, respect, and even in school. My father works
day and night and only gets half of what native-born Emirates
citizens get. The laws of the ministries of health, education,
water, and electricity charge him double rates compared to locals.
Even buying a house was forbidden because he is a foreigner!

As for school, at the beginning of every
academic year, there was a committee counting the number of foreign
students, and pain tore through my heart as I lifted my hand to
announce that I am an unwanted intruder. Add to that the excellence
competitions in which I was not allowed to participate because I am
not one of them or the prizes I was not qualified for. Every time
the “homeland” was the title of the subject I was asked to write in
my various school classes, the words “I never saw it and may never
do so” would reverberate in my head, accompanied by a sigh “until
when?”

The summer of 2002 brought me the news of my
high school graduation with distinction, followed by the search for
a university that would embrace my dreams and that would be
affordable for my refugee father. What I never imagined was for me
to end up in Al-Azhar University in Gaza where I spent six years.
Was that the encounter with what they call “the homeland”?

My mother accompanied me to the town where
her mother and my four aunts live. How painful and beautiful at the
same time was the meeting with them after years of separation. She
stayed with me in Gaza for twenty days until I enrolled to study
computer systems engineering. Upon her departure, she made me
promise to realize my dreams and return with success.

I started my adventures in Gaza City,
roaming its simple quarters and looking into the eyes of its
inhabitants, as if I were looking at them for the homeland that had
long been denied to me. I would accompany my university friends who
would call me “refugee” jokingly (as I am from Lod, not Gaza) and
others called me “expatriate” (for growing up in the Emirates).

One year passed by, and my younger sister
Yasmin came to join me at the same university and to share
memories. Not long afterward, Israeli infringements on the right to
life started to be felt. We saw the Palestinian suffering saga:
shelling here and assassination there; child funerals and the
screams of their mothers; suspension of studies and staying home
for fear of Israeli bombardments; water and electricity cut off for
days; a dearth of bread and flour and other food products; fuel
shortages and no transportation; the sound of tank shells on the
borders of Gaza, my almost daily symphony before sleeping; and
lastly, the closure of the crossings with no travel to and from
Gaza. Was this the homeland I had dreamt of?

Only the voice of my father and mother
through the telephone would offer me in my moments of weakness and
tiredness a shot of calm and hope for a better tomorrow. I ignored
the situation of slow death in Gaza and concentrated on my goal of
excelling in my studies. I graduated with honors from the faculty
of engineering and the idea of traveling abroad for further studies
overwhelmed my thoughts. I heard of the Fulbright Scholarship in
the U.S. and decided to do my best to get one. Although the
situation in Gaza had reached its worst stage, and electricity
would be available for only four hours a day, I was getting ready
for the required tests mainly by the low light of the candles. But
with the grace of God, I obtained the grades I needed and succeeded
in the interviews to be shortlisted for a scholarship.

Suddenly, however, there was an explosion at
the Rafah crossing, which prevented Gaza inhabitants from
traveling, and those stuck started escaping, including my sister
Yasmin, who wanted me to accompany her. I was torn between joining
our parents and running away from death which inhabits Gaza and the
determination to achieve my dream and continue my ambitious path. I
decided to stay and face danger while awaiting news of the wished
for scholarship.