A Recipe for Survival
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One of the things that surprised me about doing this show and the generosity of people in impossible situations who let us into their lives is learning that there is laughter, laughter on death row.

Laughter on the front lines. Laughter holding a friend's hand in hospice. Laughter. I've always felt that this laughter, this joy, it feels like an assertion. Declaring that whatever you take from me, you can even take my life, but you can't take this. This you can't have.

What is this? This humanity, this defiance, this spirit, this hope? This is mine. Well, today, from KQED's Snap Judgment Studios, we proudly present a story about this.

We're calling it A Recipe for Survival. My name is Tim Washington. May you too always have this when you're listening to Snap Judgment. Snap Judgment

Today's story takes us to the front lines of a war. In fact, the deadliest war for journalists in modern history. Since October 7th, 2023, nearly 150 journalists have been killed in the most recent Gaza-Israel conflict. Still, journalists on the ground continue to work in extreme and sometimes fatal circumstances. And sensitive listeners, please note...

This is a real story that takes place in a war zone and as such it contains scenes of violence, death and destruction. Before that, before the most recent iteration of hostilities began, there were two newlywed journalists in Gaza. They had a new apartment with a rooftop garden close to the sea and they had just welcomed a brand new baby girl into the family.

Then these lovebirds, Shrook and Rushdie, decide to take a vacation. Snap judgment. October 6, 2023. Shrook Aila, her husband Rushdie Siraj, and their baby girl, Dania, are in Mecca. The trip was a birthday present for Rushdie, their first vacation as a family. Because I really wanted to go, and I really, really wanted to go with him. They booked a room on the 34th floor of a fancy hotel.

Floor-to-ceiling windows. A view of the Great Mosque and the Black Kaaba in the center. Later that day, Shrut asked Rushdie if he could bring her a coffee. So we can drink together a cup of coffee. A simple request. For Rushdie and Shrut, coffee is a love language. We both are coffee addictors, and the coffee that he fixes...

So he told her, Shroop protested a little because room service, it's going to be pricey.

This would be the last cup of coffee that they would enjoy together in peace. October 7th.

Shrouk, Rushdie and Dania were fast asleep high up in that hotel room in Mecca. Rushdie wake me up at the morning, I think 7 a.m. And he said, we're going back to Gaza. I was like, what is going on? To Gaza? What is happening? Your family is okay? My family is okay? And he said, yes, but there will be a massive war in Gaza. Shrouk got out her phone and started scrolling.

News reports said Hamas had launched a surprise attack on Israel, killing about 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages. Rushdie said we better just run to Gaza before they close the border. Both Rushdie and Shrouk had lived through numerous conflicts and wars. We know that when it comes to wars and you are out of Gaza, you die every single minute.

They knew what was coming. Egypt would close its border crossing to Gaza, and then it would be nearly impossible for them to get home. As they're booking plane tickets, Rushdie gets a call from a co-worker.

He says that when Israel started bombing Gaza, he and three other journalists had gone out to film fighting that had broken out at a border crossing. One of them had been shot and killed. Two others were now missing. So it was really a shock, like Rushdie collapsed. They are like a family. They are like brothers for us. Rushdie and Shrook are journalists.

More than a decade ago, Rushdie founded Ayn Media, a well-known production company in Gaza. So Rushdie was unaware of what is happening around him. And I tried as much as I can just to focus. I was having Dania at that time, and I went to change her diabetes. And he brought me coffee from the airport. I didn't drink it, and he didn't drink his coffee as well, because we are not in the mood.

The flight was after midnight. From Cairo, they jump in a van toward Gaza. It's early morning, still dark, and it feels like they're the only ones going in that direction. But Shrouk and Rushdie are determined to go home. If something happened to your family, if one of them got injured or killed, you will never forgive yourself. So when it comes to war, you stay with the family. They arrive at Rushdie's family's house.

Almost at once, Rushdie picks up a camera and heads out into the street to cover the attacks. He goes alone. They've already lost three colleagues, and he doesn't want to lose more. He films paramedics bringing the dead and wounded men, women, and children to hospitals. He documents airstrikes. He gets drone footage of bombed-out neighborhoods. And during breaks, Rushdie films himself on his phone and posts the videos to Instagram.

The situation here is very bad. It's miserable. We talk about disaster. There is no water anymore. There is no electricity at all. Even the network and internet was down. I had that feeling that I'm after that he's going outside to do the coverage. But I was unable to say no for him because this is his work. And also this is his duty, you know.

So it feels like I'm betraying my country when it comes to say no for my husband. And of course, Shroop wants to go out too, to film and document. But they have Dania, and she's still breastfeeding. So every day before he leaves, Shroop makes Rishi tell her exactly where he's going to be. And she calls him, constantly. Just to check on you, how are you doing, how are you feeling? This is what we agreed on.

One day, Rushdie's out working for longer than expected. Shroop calls once, twice, too many times. And I was like ringing and calling and he's not responding. I was like, what happened to him? Like he's not responding. But then he returned with all the dust on his clothes. And then I found out that they bombed a place that was close to him and he ran away.

Day 16. Shrouk wakes up to Dania crying.

She just wanted to keep doing the breastfeeding all the time. And I got annoyed because it hurts when it takes so long of doing the breastfeeding. And I'm tired. So I was talking with her this way. And then Rushdie wakes up. And Rushdie said, OK, I will take her outside. And you sleep, you relax. After a few hours, Rushdie checks back in with Shrew.

He needs to get ready to go out and film paramedics for the day. And I was like, Rushdie, I'm having bad feelings because every day they are attacking ambulances. And I'm having negative energy about this. I was telling him this way, and he was like, if I did not, who will do it?

Before he leaves, Rushdie asks his whole family to sit down and eat breakfast together. And he insisted on this, and this actually kept him late. So they all sit down, all nine of them. Shrouk reaches her hand across the table to grab a piece of bread. Once I just hold it, we hear a very nearby explosion that made the table moving. You know, all of us got terrified because it's very close. And then...

She doesn't hear the rocket at all.

Everything went into dust. Like I was only seeing dust, only the grey. And then I started to smell the smell of the weapon, the smoke of the weapon. I have Dania on my, like carrying her. I tried to put my, you know, to feel her and I felt like she's fine. And I never thought that they are attacking us because I hear nothing.

The first thing that I heard, the voice of his mom, when she said, "Where's Rushdie?" And I started to... I was feeling that there is something heavy on my legs. And then I tried to see what is that heavy thing on my leg. It was Rushdie. I grabbed him from his leg and he collapsed, like he's not resisting.

So we carried him and moved because they are still pumping the area. The house is collapsing. They pumped us. They hit us directly with two rockets. And I was not even able to understand how we made it alive. Rushdie's mom, dad, sister, and brother are okay. Dania's okay. And so is Shrew. But Shrew can see that Rushdie's severely injured.

His skull is broken. We called the ambulance several times, and the ambulance said, I'm sorry, we cannot come because the area is very dangerous. They are not stopping attacking the area, so we cannot take the risk and come. So we decided to carry him. The house is crumbling around them, and they move Rushdie to the street. His breath is labored, wheezing. The emergency workers can't make it.

But Shroop knows the hospital is just a few blocks away. Maybe they can carry Rushdie there themselves. So they place him into a blanket. They each grab the edges of the cloth and hoist him up and over the rubble. We carried him, you know, using the blanket. So I tried my best to be focused, like, you know, because otherwise I will not forgive myself if I didn't, if I didn't did so well.

It takes them 15 minutes to get to the hospital. But it's too late. Rushdie is dead.

The same day, Shrut goes back to the house. The house that's just been bombed. She manages to dig through the debris and find a bag. It's actually her daughter's diaper bag. In it are some clothes. Diapers, of course. Some gold. Cash. Her laptop. Their passports. She and Rushdie had wanted to go abroad. To study for PhDs in Europe. Maybe. To grow the media company. Maybe.

In an instant, Shrouk's life has shrunk down to a size she doesn't recognize. She's a widow. Her daughter is fatherless. In the days after Rushdie's killed, she looks down at her phone and thinks. Why he's not, you know, calling me? Like, he always called me all the time. Like, how are you doing? How are you feeling? And till now, I can say that I cannot just look at his photos. I don't feel like I'm...

Day 30. Shroukz moved in with her sisters. But then her sister's neighborhood is hit by a rocket. So they all have to flee together, an hour south, to Rafah.

Without her husband, without a home, where will Shroop go? How will she protect her husband's legacy? Stay tuned. They say that money can't buy you happiness. And that might be true, but I know from my own life, being broke is stressful. And Acorns is a financial wellness app that helps you take control of your money with simple tools that make it easy to start saving and investing for your future. You don't need to be an expert.

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Upfront payment of $45 for three month, five gigabyte plan required. Equivalent to $15 a month. New customer offer for three months only, then full price plan options available. Taxes and fees extra. See Mint Mobile for details. Welcome back to Snap Judgment. Our story today follows real people in wartime and as such contains violence. When we left, Sharouk's husband had been killed in an airstrike and she and her daughter fled toward the south.

And it's here. For the first time in weeks, Shrook has internet. She's flooded with messages from sources, clients, contacts. They write how sorry they are about Rushdie. His death has been all over the news. And their messages mourn the apparent end of Ayn Media. In a span of around two weeks, two of their journalists have been killed. They've lost their founder. Surely, the company can't go on.

They are just assuming ending Ann Maria by the murder of Rujdi. Shrou's upset. She writes their clients back. We're still here. Because if we did not, who is going to document and record this history? And, you know, it's a duty. Even if we are not doing anything for clients, for business, we have to document it for ourselves because it is a history.

Since the invasion, Israel has restricted and controlled outside journalists' access to Gaza. And 55 reporters wrote an open letter asking to be allowed inside. So the work that Ayn Media is doing in Gaza has never been more important. The only thing that I can do is to work and to get busy because I don't have the privilege to grieve. The company only has one camera.

It's too dangerous to get their gear from the office in the north, which is under constant attack by the Israeli army. So they rent gear and start filming. Shroop teaches herself to operate a camera. Sometimes she goes out with another producer. The stories that we're trying to cover is the displacement camp, basically, and how every tent has a story inside.

They interview displaced families. Families that sleep on the beach in tents. Tents that flood when the tide comes in. They document aid workers giving out food and clothing. They try to stay away from red zones and areas where there have been airstrikes. You know, we all believe that it's not only the marked areas that is just dangerous. It's everywhere.

February 9th, day 125. This is when I first reached out to Shrook. I found Rushdie's name on a list of the journalists who had been killed in Gaza. I looked him up. The first picture I saw was from Shrook's Instagram. Rushdie was snuggled with Dania in a chair, looking down at her. I messaged Shrook on WhatsApp, and she started sending me voice memos. Today is 131, uh...

day of this genocidal war, the war that feels forever. Yes, day and night, my daughter and I, we were able to sleep finally after an epic week of being sick. Anyways, it's very heavy, it's very heavy. Like sometimes I just feel numb regarding everything that is happening and also the breastfeeding as well.

And I don't want to stop it. I don't want to stop this breastfeeding because, let me say, I'm sorry for this. So I don't want to stop this breastfeeding. My daughter now, she's one year and three months, and I don't want to stop it. I can stop it, but I don't want to stop it. Breastfeeding is a good thing that keeps both of us close to each other. And also when it comes to breastfeeding,

Day 139. Dania's 15 months old. Shrouk's living in a small house in Rafah with her family. Her sisters and brothers and their families, too. I sleep in one room, along with 12 children and six adults.

And those all of them are my relatives. All of them are women. And what I did today that I finally I got shower after almost eight days. Thanks God I was able to take a shower. Sorry, that's my daughter. She's hugging me. Babe to mama. One day in Rafah, Shrug decides she's going to make herself a coffee.

like Rushdie used to. And once I started to fix myself a cup of coffee... She sends me this message as she's walking down the street. I remember that I was fine at that moment, but then just something that crossed my heart at that moment, saying that solo, I'm fixing the coffee, solo, I'm drinking it, solo, I started to sob.

Her sisters come into the kitchen and they're confused because Shrook hasn't really cried since Rushdie died. And there she is, sobbing over a cup of coffee. Since then, my family decided that they're going to fix me the cup of coffee. So since that moment till now, I'm not fixing a cup of coffee at all. It's only my family. So whenever I want a coffee, I just ask them easily. And sometimes they just fix it and give it to me.

I'm not ready for this. And I really wonder for how long I'm going to stand this way. One morning, I wake up to a new voice message on my phone from Shrew. She's moved again, still in Rafah. She and her sisters found an apartment just for them. So the apartment that we moved for, this is Dalia. She's making noise. Anyways, hello.

I hope that it is a safe place. You try your best to be as safe as you can, but at least we got lucky to find an apartment. She'll have her own bedroom, so she and Dania will have some privacy. Hey, so I'm whispering. I'm sorry because Dania's sleeping and it's 2 a.m. now and they cannot sleep. Yesterday, they started the invasion.

of the western part of the Rafah city. Day 213. I get this message from Shrook. Israel has begun the invasion of Rafah, where according to Reuters, over a million Palestinians have fled, including Shrook. And you cannot imagine, like, how, where all of these displaced people were caught.

Really, there's no place and I cannot sleep because we are quite close to the army soldiers. We can hear the bombings all the time and I'm just afraid, like, because I've seen what's happened in the past seven months when it comes to the invasion. What does it mean to have the soldiers quite close to you? I cannot sleep because I'm thinking of where the hell shall I escape?

Along with my daughter and family. City by city, the places that Shrouk and Dania can find refuge have disappeared. So I keep checking in to see how they are. Hey there, thank you for reaching out. Actually, after the invasion of Rafah, we decided to go to the middle area of the Gaza Strip. To a city called Deir al-Bala. Dania and Shrouk are now living in a tent.

Shrook's still working, going out every day to film and document Gazan stories, walking for hours to find internet, to upload footage. While Shrook works, Dania stays with her sisters. They have kids her same age.

Actually, Shruk says, the one bright spot in all of this is that Dania spends her days playing with her cousins. At night, when Shruk comes home, the sunset calms her down. She spends her evenings with Dania, who's talking now. She just turned two. Sometimes Shruk thinks of going to the sea. She thinks of the time when the beach was free of tents. She thinks of her husband. We used to go to the sea.

We bring our coffee with us and we just sit. Like most of the time we don't talk, we just sit. A sunset is such an invitation. Like I didn't see you today and I miss you and I want to see you today. Like and to watch the sunset together. So, you know, it's a symbol of love. Like I'm going to invite you for a coffee in front of the sea. This is my daughter. This is Dania.

She's smiling while talking about her father. Rushdie was the 23rd journalist killed in this war. In November, Sharouk was honored in New York by the Committee to Protect Journalists with the 2024 International Press Freedom Award. Sharouk is still living and reporting in Dhirabala. Her daughter, Danya, is now two. Since the ceasefire was reached, Sharouk thinks about returning home to Gaza City,

but has no physical home to return to. The original score for this story was by Renzo Gorio. It was edited by Nancy Lopez and Anna Sussman. It was produced by Ashley Kleek, Regina Barriaco, and Shana Shealy. Now, after the break, we're going to hear from a kid who's been cooking her way through the war. Stay tuned. Welcome back to Snap Judgment, the recipe for survival episode. My name is Glenn Washington.

And staff producer Shaina Shealy was home in D.C., doom-scrolling on her phone when a video popped up on her Instagram feed from Gaza. And this video was so different from the videos she was used to seeing from the region that she just couldn't stop watching. The video is of a kid standing on a rooftop in Gaza.

She's in a t-shirt and flared blue jeans. And she's grating pita bread by hand into a bowl full of crumbs. War knafa, she says. Let's get started. Chef Renad. She has wavy brown hair, long bangs tucked behind her ears. Sometimes she wears bandanas.

Her smile is so radiant, I can't not smile back at my phone. In this video, Chef instructs her audience step by step on how to make fake cream. Water, cornstarch, semolina, milk powder. Mix it together. You can hear surveillance drones overhead all the while. The dish she's making, kanafeh, is conventionally made with layers of melty, gooey cheese and orange, oily pastry threads.

But Chef does not have any of those things, so she improvises. At the end of the video, she holds a round metal tray in front of the camera, topped with crispy breadcrumbs, orange from food dye. It's amazing, she says. So delicious. The video on Instagram got 370,000 likes.

Chef Renaud's videos were so different from the ones I was used to seeing from Gaza. Her content wasn't about death and destruction. It was about the sweetness of life. I needed to talk to this chef, but I knew it would be tough. For one, Chef Renaud is in high demand. And it was days after the January ceasefire announcement. Her family was hosting dozens of displaced people in their apartment. Why would she talk to me?

So I actually reached out to Shrook, the award-winning war journalist from our last story, for advice. And Shrook was like, oh yeah, I love Shafranad.

Within minutes, I got this message from the chef's older sister. By accident, I was calling Shiroq and she told me about this. We love her so much. Rinad loves Shiroq so much. And she told me that she will record the interview. Rinad?

And now, Shrook is at the chef's apartment with Renad and her sister and a translator. I'm on speakerphone from my house in D.C. Hi, I'm Renad. Hi, Renad. Guys, we are having Renad and we are having Nurhan at the same time. I'm so lucky to have both of them around me.

And each time I'm looking at Renad, I feel hungry. I don't know why. Maybe because she's a chef. Soon, Chef Renad is serving Shrook cheesecake. Wow. And then coffee.

And these sweet cheese rolls. I'm lucky to do this broadcasting. I'm eating lots of tasty dishes. Eventually, Shrouk and Chef Renad sit down together. I'm going to eat.

OK, my name is Renad. I'm from Deir el-Balah. I'm 10 years old. The next month I will be 11. And what do you want people to know about you? That I love life a lot and I miss my school, my friends and Gaza as before the war. 10-year-old Renad should be in the 6th grade.

But she hasn't been to school in over a year, since before the war started. And a few months into those empty, unpredictable days, she and her older sister, Norhan, started making these cooking videos. It's me. Everyone, it's me, Norhan. This is the person in the shadow. Norhan is 25, a pharmacist. But because of the war, I prefer to stay at my home and...

and decide to save my sister's mental health by keeping her busy with something she loves. So it was cooking. Norhan is basically Renad's producer. Okay, guys, I am the one who filmed the videos, edited the videos, published the videos. She writes captions for Renad like, Can you tell me how many times I said the word fluffy? We make the most delicious bread in the whole world.

And Rinat just eating. Yeah, she's very good at cooking but I'm doing all the work. I don't mind be suffering for my little sister. She's my baby. Yeah.

She says Renad is her cotton candy. Chef Renad says her content includes these three main things. Three things which are cooking and talking about Gaza and my smile, of course. So people loved my smile and my cooking.

She goes for that ASMR thing too. Scraping the top of fried bread. I love that sound, that crunchy sound and crispy sound of the food. Shrook is translating for Renat here. She jumps in every so often. Always prefer to eat stuff that is just crispy from outside.

Renaud is the kind of chef that tastes as she goes. I remember I was cooking a mushroom soup and I forgot myself. I started eating the mushroom even before I cook it. I tried to taste it and then I found myself eating the entire mushroom. She collects recipes online and then uses them for inspiration for her own creations. Most of her recipes are based on what she receives in aid packages.

what she calls "boxes that fall from the sky" from other countries. There's this video where she makes something called "war sandwich." She sautés crushed garlic with onion, pomegranate syrup, and canned olives. She adds chopped meat from a can she got in an aid box. Then she wraps the fried meat in flatbread.

And then she douses the entire wrap in a water and flour paste, and then coats the entire sandwich in breadcrumbs, deep fries it — make sure we hear how crunchy it is — and then dunks it into tahini sauce. She promises us it's nicer than shawarma. Or my favorite, the war lollipop. She boils sugar in a big spoon over a gas burner.

She says that after it liquefies, she pours it over toothpicks. It cools into these brown hard globs. Not the most appealing, and she knows it. At the end of the video, she says, The shapes are as frightening as bombs. In every one of her videos, Chef Renaud seems so satisfied with her creations. Overjoyed at what she's cooked up.

But she says that eating food that comes as aid doesn't feel good. She tells us there was this one time she really missed eating cheese. Like, she wanted cheese so bad that she and her sister got up really early on a cold, windy morning, and they got seats on a donkey cart and settled in for a four-hour journey to get to a market in Khan Yunis. I'm going to be very upset with you and your parents. We're

I was afraid of not having or getting the cheese because I would be very desperate and disappointed for not having it. She said the trip was miserable. The donkey was really tired over walking on broken streets. And when she got to Khan Yunus, she could barely recognize the city.

She saw sewage everywhere. The streets were so packed with tents, it was hard to maneuver the donkey cart between them. The cheese she was looking for? It's a special kind of cheddar called greatest. And she actually found it in the market. It was never an easy journey to go and look for cheese around. And I found it. How did you feel when you found it?

I felt like when I found it, I felt like it's not a cheese, it's a treasure that I found. She finds cheese, it feels like a patient finds a medicine. This is according to Renate. She came home and used the cheese in a noodle recipe with canned mushrooms.

Chef seems pretty sure that the real reason people watch her videos is her smile. And I think that my smile is the biggest factor for my being famous. It is a very good smile, a constant in her videos. When Chef Renad's sister, Norhan, started posting her cooking videos, she got message after message about Renad's smile.

And she kept saying this word, contagious. Contagious. I didn't know the meaning of this word, but when I searched about it, it means like when the people see Renat's smile, she also smiles. So it was... It is a kind of conviction. Yes. Do you ever feel like it's hard to keep the smile on all the time? Um...

For sure, I'm trying to be smiling all the time. I hide behind this smile a lot of sadness over martyred people and my friends who have passed away during this war, and I can't see them anymore. And, of course, my school has stopped.

I always try to smile in order to lighten the suffering inside me. Behind her videos, there were times Renad couldn't smile this past year. Times when she was hungry and had no food. And times when she had food, but she couldn't smile.

but couldn't bring herself to cook it. I wasn't a full chai to share anything about food at a time that my people are starving. The only thing that gets her posting again is when one of her experiments works. Like when she managed to get fluffy pancakes without eggs or milk.

To that moment, I felt this is such an award. Okay, guys, let's go to the proof to see the location of the kitchen, the small kitchen of Renat. Let's go. Shrook walks up three flights of stairs with Chef Renat and Norhan to the rooftop kitchen. Wow, it's sunny today. Yeah. They get to the roof and Renat sets up.

So, what do we have here? You're going to cook something for us? She's making salad. It's the first dish Chef Renaud ever made, one of her favorites. So you added the pepper and the salad. Now you're going to hit it. You're going to smash it. Yeah.

So she is mixing the tomato with the pepper. Try to make it more juicy. She adds spices and lemon juice. Lots of lemon, wow. And finally, she mixes it all together. Shruk leans in for a taste. Mmm, it's very yummy. Spicy. Time to clean this mess. Let's go, Bain.

We're going to miss you, Shrook. We're going to miss you too, guys. It was a lovely day with you. It's sunset now. Shrook leaves their apartment with a full stomach and heads back home from a day of work, back to her daughter, Dania. You can find Chef Renad at RenadFromGaza on YouTube, Instagram, or wherever you get your social media accounts.

Many thanks to Chef Renad and her sister, Norhan Atala, and Ansam Ismail Kaloub, who helped with this translation. Sharouk recorded the audio in Gaza. Another special thanks to the Committee to Protect Journalists for sharing their extensive reporting from the Gaza Strip. This story was edited by Nancy Lopez and is produced by Sheena Shealy.

Now, if you missed even a moment, know that Snap ventures into places others dare not tread. The Snap Judgment Podcast awaits your ears each and every week. And Snap recently released the brand new podcast series, Fire Escape.

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