861: Group Chat
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Family group chat. Created May 19th, 2023. Two years ago. Before. Yusuf Hamash. Send this link to Asil, Salsabil, and Heba so they can enter the group. Manal. We are all gathered together. What a blessing. Heart emoji. I don't have Hassan or Ahmed. Yusuf must add them. I sent the link above, you idiots, so you can send it to them. Yusuf reshares link. Send them the link. I sent it.

Manal, we want to go out tomorrow, to the beach. Okay, why is the group called the shitty family? Yeah, who's the son of a gun who names a group? Laughing emoji. Please, isn't this Yusuf's doing? It's Yusuf. I did it for your sake, sister. God bless you, pride of the Arabs. Manal wants to invite us to the beach, Hadil. I want to take you to the beach. When? We're thinking either tomorrow or Monday.

I will let my children go, but what day? We're thinking Monday. We need a watermelon. That's the most important thing. You're making conditions as well? The watermelon is more important than you. I'm being mocked. Yusuf, whoever wants to go with us, like this message. I will set up a time later. Where? To the beach. But what day? Tomorrow, clown face.

Yusuf, who started this group chat for his family, he's been on our show before. Yusuf Hamash. He was a humanitarian aid worker in Gaza. Grew up there, lived there his whole life. He started this group chat with his family months before the war, before October 7th, when Hamas attacked southern Israel. After that, Yusuf became responsible for moving his whole family, his four sisters, their extended families, from one place to another, trying to escape Israel's bombing.

After six months of displacement and near-death experiences and worrying for his children, Youssef did something he thought he'd never do. He left Gaza. This was last spring. He went with his wife, mother, and his kids to Egypt. His sisters decided to stay behind. And since that time, almost no one has been able to leave Gaza. That was a little more than a year ago. The group chat is still going. What are they talking about in the WhatsApp group?

I don't know. Daily life, complaining or making fun, sending, I don't know. Sometimes it's jokes, sometimes they're crying. It depends. Voice, text, photos, everything. This is like the refuge for them where they go. More of the sisters are talking and my mother and we just observe. We, meaning the people who are outside Gaza now. Yousef, his wife, his kids and his mom.

Inside Gaza, the sisters make plans, talk about who they ran into that day, share pictures of their kids, of bombings. They send voice memos to each other to share news and cheer each other up. Hadil, my sister, is feeling down. Come, ya Hadil, let's go out, let's go somewhere. I'm buying. I have Ahmed's money. My sister is feeling low, so let's do something fun.

In a year plus since Yusuf has left, the sisters have all moved again. They're not all together anymore. And they keep moving. They've survived airstrikes, illnesses, months with no food at all coming in. And they keep checking in here in the chat. Yusuf, the problem solver in the family, the don't worry, I'll take care of it guy, he keeps trying to figure out how to solve the same problems over and over again.

When his sister Asil texts, "If I clean, I get dizzy. If I cook, I get dizzy. There's no edible food. It's worse than you can imagine." Yusuf replies, "Buy anything." Asil, "Don't worry about me, love. All is okay." Then they go back and forth. Asil, "One kilo of rice is 35." Yusuf, "No problem. I'll pay." Asil, "A kilo of flour is 50."

Yousef, whatever the price. Asil, the issue is not the price. It's the cash. Yousef, I don't know what one can do. Asil, the situation has become very bad. Yousef, the problem is I can't do anything. Even your money doesn't help you. You can't find food even if you have money. Exactly. If it's available, it's very, very expensive. But mostly, you cannot find it.

What's it like for you to talk to a SEAL? Yousef spent the first six months of the war experiencing everything his family is experiencing. Together.

And when he left, it felt inconceivable that it could go on this way, this much longer. But it has. His phone keeps getting new messages, and he keeps reassuring and responding and arranging and trying to provide comfort.

And then, these last few weeks, being unable anymore, even with all his skills and connections, to get money, cash, into his sister's hands. Hearing how their children are not eating. Something changed for Youssef. He felt literally dumbstruck. Even words are not helpful anymore because they are finished. I used all the words and...

I think I need to start to find other languages, but I keep saying, hopefully it's going to be fine. It's going to be a matter of days, hopefully. You know, all what I can do is just to be supportive. Do you still say those things? It's useless anymore. Even saying them became like something stupid. I didn't know what to say, to be honest. Okay, in Arabic language we have, حَسْبِ اللَّهُ نِعْمَ الْوَكِيلُ Okay, we're really the God against them. All these words became useless.

Leaving Gaza made Youssef the newest member of a well-established club.

There are about 5 million Palestinians living inside the West Bank in Gaza. And the rest, about 9 million Palestinians, live all over the world. People who are trying to maintain family and connections across countries and time zones and bad cell connections. Today's show is about those conversations inside one family and between friends, colleagues.

Yousef's family agreed to share all the messages they sent back and forth to each other over years. We got them translated. All the late night musings and updates and petty resentments and serious resentments and jokes and plans and fears. Intimate moments where you can see how these conversations and relationships change over time. How do you keep being a family?

And we hear from other people on the outside and others inside, figuring out what to say and what to keep secret. Stay with us. Support for This American Life and the following message come from Dataiku.

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Jackson National Life Insurance Company, Lansing, Michigan, and Jackson National Life Insurance Company of New York. Purchase New York. It's This American Life, Act 1. I'm fine. Don't worry. Within any family, there's the group chat and there's the side chat. The person Yusuf is always checking in with most is his youngest sister in Gaza, Asil. June 2024, Yusuf to Asil. Yo, my sister, please confirm you're well.

Asil, I feel like I haven't seen you since the last century. The thing Yusuf says more than anything else in these chats is, please confirm you're well. The thing Asil says most? I'm fine. Don't worry. Yusuf says Asil is the one in the family who's most like him. Practical, can-do, unfazed, also stubborn. Asil is 10 years younger than Yusuf. She's a nurse. She wants to know things and do things. He's young, but he's expert.

She looks to him the same way. She trusts him. When Asil was trying to figure out the safest place to give birth to her first child in a war zone, the person she planned it out with was Yusuf. When she needs advice on anything, Yusuf.

In the beginning of their WhatsApp chat after he left Gaza, you can see Yusuf trying to set the terms of their new situation. His point over and over, the important things have not changed. I'll call every day. Anything you need, I'm here. Yusuf, if you want anything, whatever it is, do not hesitate. Asil jokes, after all, everything is cheap. Yusuf, live and spend.

Asil responds with a voice memo, her and her baby, Sila.

24 hours later, Youssef, seemingly concerned that he didn't get his point across, writes, The most important thing is that you do not lack anything. Buy whatever you want. Relationships shift all the time, sometimes suddenly. But the long, slow changes, they can be just as dramatic. Youssef and Asiel lived within walking distance their whole lives. They saw each other in person all the time. They shared life, a landscape.

And right away, within a week of leaving Gaza, Youssef realized how much information he gathered just by being there, seeing Asil face to face, seeing what she needed.

When he wasn't there, he understood, oh, Asil isn't great at asking for things. And that's my issue with her.

So every time Asil says, "I'm fine," Yusuf has to guess what he can do to help. Four months after he left Gaza, Yusuf was reading and hearing about bombing. Increasingly, the bombing was where she was living. The other sisters were moving. Yusuf figured Asil would too, and made a plan for her to move to a safer area called Al-Mawasi, just like he always did. He would pay for it, of course. Yusuf to Asil: "There's a furnished apartment in this project, 1,000 per month.

Asil, oh my god, it's a lot. I don't know if the war will go on longer or not. The amount of money is a lot. Yusuf, call her. You will love it. The next day. Yusuf, have you seen the apartment? It's a good place. Asil, it's forbidden to be extravagant. I didn't go, no. Four hours later. Asil, it's really nice, honestly, but it's expensive. Yusuf, is it a suitable place? Double question mark. Asil,

I'm fine now. If there's an evacuation, I will leave. She did not move to the apartment. Money was becoming an issue between them in a new way. Yousef had always supported a lot of people in the family. But after he left Gaza, he started doing it through Asil. She'd tell Yousef who among their family and friends in Gaza needed help. Here's how much. Here's a list. He'd coordinate with her to get the money to them.

Asil to Yusuf, everyone thinks I'm the finance ministry. Yusuf, let them think that. This meant now Asil knew how much money Yusuf was giving out, how many people he was supporting in Gaza. Not to mention trying to find a place for his family on the outside. Asil didn't want to add to the burden. Asil, don't worry about me, love. You're going to have travel expenses and expenses that will destroy even mountains. Don't send me money until you guys get settled and organize your matters.

As the months passed, Asil continued to lean on Youssef for some things. But she also, quietly, started trying to manage more things on her own. In August, a few months after Youssef left, Asil's baby was suffering from a terrible rash. She couldn't figure out how to treat it. She couldn't find the cream she needed.

Asil sent me pictures to see if I had any ideas. But she didn't tell Youssef, even though Youssef knows all sorts of medical people in Gaza. No, but it's just one thing that I'm hiding. Now, there's a new disease that has spread targeting children, which is, I don't know, an allergy. It's a skin rash or something like that.

So I don't know how to treat her. And every time I use something, it spreads even more. Why wouldn't you tell him about the skin problem? Because he would be upset. In reality, they're not here, so he won't know what to do. He'll feel like it's his dereliction of duty.

Like he could have done something. I don't want him to feel that way. But couldn't Yousef help you get access to the medicine? Yes, but he'll send his friends to look. In reality, I looked a lot and I couldn't find anything. So I don't know what the solution is.

I don't want them to be worried over there because I can solve this. As long as I can solve this, there's no need to let them worry and no need to tell them. Keeping things from each other. This became a bigger part of their relationship. Yusuf was traveling around Egypt, England, trying to get asylum somewhere in the world. He told Asil about some of it, and he edited out stuff that would be too sharp a contrast to Asil's life.

He'd share a selfie from the train, but he would not tell her about taking the kids to see the pyramids, the Nile. He'd gleefully tell her he's near where David Beckham lives, but he wouldn't mention the restaurant he went to that day. Asil knew he was keeping stuff from her, and in the text, she's constantly nudging him to send her pictures and updates. And when he does share something, she responds quickly, with hearts, and says things like, "'I am happy just seeing your pictures. It's amazing, bro.'"

Yusuf sends a picture of himself on a bike in London. Asil, wow, smiley face, it's amazing. And an athlete, smiley face, heart. Another time. A selfie of Yusuf in Cairo. Asil, advice for you, smiley face, heart. This haircut looks good on you. Asil had pushed Yusuf to leave Gaza. She considered going with him, but the cost was enormous, more than Yusuf could cover. And she didn't want to leave her in-laws and extended family behind in Gaza.

She's genuinely very happy for Youssef. But there's also a new, unfamiliar feeling. Whenever something happens that upsets me, I blame him for not being here. I don't say that to him, but internally I blame him. You were not supposed to leave. You were supposed to stay here. It's like a psychological war between me and myself. Youssef knows it without her saying it, because he feels it too.

How often are you thinking about that, Youssef? Every time you talk to them? Yeah.

One of the reasons Asil didn't leave Gaza with Youssef is she thought the war would end soon. Another reason? She wanted to go home, to the north, where her house is, in Jabalia. She wanted to raise her daughter at home. She thought about it every day. She was waiting and waiting for the Israeli military to allow residents of the north to return. These months and months of text messages really convey just how long she was stuck.

You can see Asil getting ground down over time. There's no electricity, no clean water. She keeps getting sick. There's bombings and drones and just uncertainty. Endless uncertainty. September 2024. Asil. Oh, by God, we are tired. I wish I had listened to you and gone with you. October. Asil. Officially, I swear to God that I cannot bear the situation at all.

November. Asil, Sila has malnutrition. Yusuf, oh my God, what did the doctor tell you? Asil, she told me she has malnutrition and she's very underweight and needs vitamins. I don't know what to feed her. I didn't feed her canned food because I was afraid she'd get sick. Today is the first time I regret giving birth. Yusuf, may God help you, sister. January, 2025. Voice memo from Asil to the group chat. I want to tell you Happy New Year.

Oh, I forgot to say, Happy New Year. I hope that next year, no, no, this year, yes, this year we see you all. I hope you'll be looking forward to seeing us and we'll be looking forward to seeing you and Happy New Year. That's it. Then, January 15th, some news. Hamash family group chat. Aseel, the president of Qatar wants to announce a ceasefire soon.

Oh God, get excited guys. The war is over. It's a truce. It's a truce. It's over. Oh God, a truce. Thank God. The moment Israel and Hamas agreed to a ceasefire last January, Asil began planning her return to the north, to her house. It was time, the thing she'd been waiting for. But Yusuf was against it. Yusuf to Asil, in my opinion, sister, you should stay where you are.

It's early, my sister, and I hear strange things in the north. Asil. But I'm tired. How long will we continue like this? Yusuf. One by one, everything will be solved. Asil. But man, the house is important. Yusuf. Leave it to me. The war just stopped yesterday. Their other sisters were fine to wait and see. But Asil kept pressing to go north.

Yousef had access to satellite images, and his assessment was if a seal went north, she'd find that she had no house anymore. You know for sure?

The area where they live, it's not far from Kamal Edwan Hospital in the northern part of Gaza. And then recently this military campaign was mainly in that area. And all of that area was livid. And honestly, for the northern part of Gaza where I am from and all my relatives, it's impossible that any house is still standing there. Yousef and Asil's texts about this went on for weeks. Their back and forth reads like Yousef is still that older brother who's in control.

But one of the things Asil is not telling him, she and her husband Ahmed have already begun moving their things north. Yusuf thinks he's still in a position to grant permission. Asil tells him, it's already done. Yusuf to Asil, you can go for two days and try it, but try not to move your things. Asil.

Ahmed transferred 90% of them. Smiley face. She was already there. I came back because I know I belong to this place. I wanted to come back. I want to fix up my place and live in it. I want to have my inner calm back. Is there anything there? The house was blown out and there were no walls.

There were only the support pillars, the ceiling and the floors. That's what was left. So I had to make a wall out of tarp. I covered the entire house with tarp and I'm trying to adapt. What is around you? Are there buildings and is there anything there?

I still have a bit of a roof over my head, but my neighbors next door set up a tent on top of the rubble of their house. And it's the same with the neighbors all the way down the street. Those whose houses are still standing, they fixed them, and they live in them now. Others set up tents on the rubble of their homes.

What did Yousef think of you moving back to Jabalia? Yousef didn't know I was moving back. He only knew I was coming to check on the place and belongings and then go back south.

But then I moved back and let him deal with my decision. I shocked him with that. He didn't approve of me going back north. Okay. And what did he say when he found out you were staying? He told me to wait a bit, take more time, be careful with my decision. And I told him, no, I'm going to stay for a bit. I feel that I belong to this place and I need to stay here. Yousef saw that Asil was not alone in this decision.

As soon as people were allowed back, 376,000 Palestinians returned to their homes in the north. And they returned to places with no roads or schools or hospitals or clean water and to homes that were damaged and destroyed. But they still went back. After weeks of pushing back, Youssef got it.

It was easy to urge patience from the outside, but it was hard in the South, where they'd been forced to live for more than a year. Towns in the South were overwhelmed by displaced people from the North. There was tension between people from the North and South. There was months and months of displacement. People were tired, degraded. It was better to be in a tent where your home was than in a tent in Rafah or Hanunas.

Now that she was home, Asil began trying to live, not just survive. Her husband Ahmed set up a solar panel and started a phone charging station, a small business. Asil found a job with an NGO doing data entry. Youssef hadn't wanted her to work. He thought going outside was unsafe. But Asil wanted to have money of her own. Youssef told me despite his objections, he was proud seeing what Asil had created. For two months, the ceasefire held.

March 18th, Hamas family group chat. The war is back. Damn. God is sufficient for me and he is the best disposer of affairs. 2.39 a.m., Yusuf writes. Call Asil. I can't get through. Seven hours later, Asil. I'm fine. Don't worry.

Now that she was back north and the war was back on, all the little ways Asil had been gathering herself over the last year, making her own decisions, working for her own money, relying mostly on herself, became essential for her survival. It's like she anticipated a time when, even with love and support from the outside, she was going to need to be entirely self-sufficient. That time was now.

When Israel violated the ceasefire in March, it launched one of the deadliest days of the war. 400 people killed in a single day. In the north and also throughout the Gaza Strip. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, "This is only the beginning." Israel barred all food, aid, and any other supplies from coming into the territory. A complete ban that would end up lasting more than two months. What are you eating?

What's available is rice, lentils, tuna, sardines, and other canned food. For food, there's no flour. I ran out of flour a while ago. The flour in the market was not good for consumption because it was mixed with plaster by the sellers. May God guide them.

There's a bombed house next to us and there was flour under the rubble. You dug through the rubble of your neighbor's house? Yes, that's correct. We were confident there was flour because our neighbor told us there was flour in his home. He also told us that if we could get it, we should eat it. Wow.

We collaborated with the neighbors and got it out. I don't know if you can imagine it, but it used to be a five-story building, and now it's only half a story. The whole situation was like a drowning person who's clutching at a straw. We all hoped that we could get the flower out. They didn't get all of it out. I think they got about two bags, and everyone ended up with a small bag.

We took some of the flour and sifted it twice and ate it. There was sand and plaster in it, but we made it work. The flour lasted two days. Asil stopped working. She tried not to go out more than she needed to.

There were evacuation orders for areas in the north in April, again in May, but also orders in the south and some in the middle area of Gaza. And threats of a new Israeli ground invasion in the north. And bombs. Asil was coming back from visiting an injured relative in the hospital. She was almost home. And there was an explosion right where the car was going to drop her off. This was two weeks ago. I couldn't understand what was happening. I didn't know where to go.

Suddenly children appeared and they were covered in blood. People were running, carrying martyrs. It was very bizarre, to be honest. They were carrying the martyr on a donkey cart, but there was no donkey. People were pulling it. And I said to myself, look at what we've become. What brought us to this life? I don't want to evacuate. I don't want to leave.

I feel comfortable where I am, and if I left, I'd be anxious all the time. It's better for me to stay in my house and maintain my dignity. And that's it. How long will you stay there? I don't want to leave, but if they bombed somewhere near me, that's when I would leave. I'm not going to leave. I'm not going to leave. I'm going to leave.

Didn't that happen today? They bombed somewhere close to where you are. I meant something closer. Today's bombing was close, but there was still a street between us. So they would have to bomb the street you are living on for you to leave? No, inshallah, no. No, God forbid. No, no. Are your sisters or Youssef or other people trying to convince you to leave? No.

Yes, he wasn't convinced, but I'm doing what I want. What's in the news is not like what's on the ground. They exaggerate in the news. I tell them the situation where I live still allows me to wait a bit longer in my house. They should listen to me and be patient. Did you tell Yousef you were going? Will you tell him about what happened today?

Not yet. I will tell him. He'd be pretty mad, most probably. He won't be happy that I got out during this dangerous situation. He would tell me to not leave home in the first place or to go stay with my sisters. I've been telling him since yesterday that the situation where I am is good. You can see in the chat when Asil does tell him. And she's right. He pleads with her to leave, to go to her sisters who are sheltering in Gaza City.

But she doesn't want to leave. In her home, she managed to collect bedding, some furniture, a small generator, toys for the baby, the beginnings of something livable. If they leave, everything could be gone when they get back. And Asil tells Yusuf, nowhere is safe. May 15th, 2.25 p.m. Asil, I'm fine, my love. Don't worry. Yusuf.

God is sufficient for us, and he is the best disposer of affairs, my sister. By midnight that night, more bombs. Hamash family group chat. Can someone check on Asil? Banal. Yusuf is talking to her. I don't know. She was refusing to leave yesterday, and then it became night. Then, okay, it wasn't safe to move, so I said, okay, let's see until tomorrow. Then, in the night, everything changed, you know.

We were chatting, texting each other. The last message at 2 a.m., and inshallah everything's fine and we'll meet soon. It's like, you know, changing nice messages.

Then at 3:15, she texts me, "I cannot breathe. I cannot see anything." And she sent this video. In the video, the camera is pointed at what looks like a pile of rubble, but it's hard to see because it's dark and they're surrounded by a cloud of dust and debris.

In the upper corner of the video, there's a piece of drywall, maybe a fallen ceiling. Asil is saying, I can't see a thing, calling for her husband, Ahmed. Someone says, Ahmed is there, he's there. Asil says, I hope they don't bomb again. Ahmed! Ahmed is gone, he's gone. Why is he coming back again?

And then? I panic. I keep calling, no phone calls. Waking up Hibban Hadil trying to call there or call Alaa. Alaa, so we can call her husband. She's texted 3.18 a.m. They bombed the house next to my house. It's full of dead bodies. Most of the house collapsed. Everything collapsed on us. Pray for us. And she asked, pray for us that this night pass.

And then she didn't respond. Yeah. I got messages from Asil that night, too. She wrote, I hope to stay alive until the morning. This is the hardest night since the beginning of the war. I'm so scared. And she wrote, I feel like I won't meet my family again. Did she sound different to you than she has sounded at other scary moments?

Yeah. It's not the first time that they go through this. They go through it a lot, and she never reach out. When she know that nothing I can do, I'm outside, especially at 3 a.m., it's quite serious. She always trying to spare me. It was serious. She's not just scared. She was about to die. It took 11 hours before he heard anything. His other sister, Hepa, finally got through to Asil.

They'd survived. Heba was hiring an ambulance to try to get Asil out. She wasn't injured. It was just the only way the family could figure out how to get to her. She's moving to Gaza City? Yeah. Wow. One second. So my sister, Heba, is texting me now saying that it was very hard to send the ambulance, and he just agreed. Hamash family group chat. Yusuf to the group.

Asil has arrived at the girl's house. Are you asking or telling? Yusuf, I'm telling you. Upside down face. Thank God she's safe. Thank God. May God keep them safe and well. God willing. And then, 5.51 p.m., Asil shows back up in the chat. Asil, I'm fine, guys, but I'm devastated. I got a text, too. I'm fine, she said, but my psyche is broken. Asil has not gone back since. 19 months is a long time.

Long enough to move four times, to create a home out of nothing, to start a new business. Long enough for Asil to be pregnant, to deliver her first baby, and for that baby to learn to roll over, crawl, and walk. Long enough to feel certain that this cannot possibly go on any longer. The day after this terrible night, Asil sent me one more text. I'm pregnant.

I don't know if I should be worried or upset or happy. I don't know what to feel. When Asil and Yusuf shared their messages, I started reading from the beginning and didn't stop for hours and hours until I was finished. Hundreds of pages and photos and videos later. After I was done, I kept scrolling back up to the beginning, to how the story starts. Two years ago. A family planning a day at the beach. Make a cinnamon roll, Heba, and arrange it here.

"Heba, I'm scared you'll ruin the cinnamon roll. You're good at baking cake. Bake a cake." "Hadil's cinnamon roll is tasty." "I'll make a cake and you won't eat it." "Who told you we won't eat it?" "Okay, I'll make you a cake." "Aseel, do you want to bring the nuts? Bring the seeds and nuts." "Aseel, shall I make you a crepe?" "No." "Aseel, shall I make you some pastries?" "Come on, Aseel. Manal and I will work with you. Do you know how to make a cinnamon roll?"

It felt like a shock being in the presence of a family in this way, in the banality of a moment. I understood, oh, this is what this family was. This is what was destroyed. Coming up, a refresher. How many pounds are in a kilo again? 2.2 pounds and other memorable measurements. That's in a minute from Chicago Public Radio when our program continues.

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It's This American Life. I'm Hannah Jaffe-Waltz, sitting in for Ira Glass. Today's show, Group Chat. We're hearing from Palestinians living outside the West Bank and Gaza, checking in with people there. We've arrived at Act 2 of our program, Act 2, Week 11.

Mohamed Mahawish left Gaza a year ago, around the same time as Yusuf, just before the border closed. Mohamed's a reporter. He's lived in Gaza his whole life. And he spent the last year since he left continuing to report and talk to people back home. Some are people he knows, others he finds through his reporting.

He's been trying to document each phase of the current war. Last fall, the messages and voice memos Mohammed was getting from people in Gaza were about evacuations, or about people figuring out where to move to be safe. In November and December, the messages were about the cold. Winter was coming. Now, they've turned to food.

Israel has imposed restrictions on food and supplies entering Gaza throughout the war. In March, they began a total blockade. No food was allowed in for 11 weeks. Israel said it was to pressure Hamas to release hostages.

Now, just this week, Israel is allowing a trickle of food, but it's doing so through a brand new, privately run system that's backed by Israel and the U.S. This new system now has only three food distribution sites running. There used to be hundreds. A U.N. official has said the new system, quote, cannot possibly meet Gaza's needs.

The upshot, as of the moment I'm saying this, is there's still not enough food inside Gaza, especially in the north. Mohammed has been talking to people there. Here he is. A few weeks ago, I got a phone call from my friend, Abdelhakim Aburayas. He's in Gaza, in the north. He said, "I can't explain the pain in my stomach, in my bones, in my head." I knew exactly what he meant.

Right before I left Gaza a year ago, I was in the north of the Strip. There was a blockade then as well. No food or supplies. My son and I were both diagnosed with acute malnutrition. Now, it's not just the north. All of Gaza is hungry. When I call people there now, all I hear are stories of hunger. The quiet and desperate tricks that people have come up with to survive.

A father living in my old neighborhood, at Daraz, told me his family of five shared a single Snickers bar for lunch. We slice it like cake, he said. We make it a moment. I talked to a son in charge of searching for food for his whole family, who told me, We boil herbs to trick our bodies into thinking we're full. We feed the children first, then wait to see if there is anything left. Most nights, there isn't.

Now, I'm talking a lot to another person in the north, Hodeskeik. She's 20 years old. A few months ago, she messaged me out of the blue. She said she wanted to be a journalist, asked me for advice on how to pitch to news outlets. These days, I message her for updates. I called her on week 11 of the blockade, week 11 of no food going into Gaza. We don't just talk about food. She has ambitions.

I asked which journalists from Gaza she'd been reading lately. So I read for Hind Al-Khudari, her reports. And also I read for Ahmed Al-Dramli. If you know him, of course you know him. So you're not reading my work. Okay, thank you. Of course, no. I swear, I read for you. Sorry.

I wrote some vocabularies and I will send you some photos after finishing this interview to show you what I'm reading for you. She did. Huda is a very serious student. She's studying English literature online through the Islamic University of Gaza. First in her class, she told me studying brings her peace. It was nighttime in Gaza when we talked, nine hours since she'd last eaten.

And I bought a bottle of water here next to me. Every time I feel like hangry, I drink some and then I feel like, oh, I'm full. And I'm intending to drink a lot of water in the coming days in order to stay alive. This is the only way my stomach will be full a little bit. This is how I make myself patient with hangry.

It's exam time right now. Huda has been putting her headphones on and studying late into the night. I was astonished by Huda's ability to stay focused. Nighttime is terrifying in Gaza. All we could hear was explosions and the sound of drones getting closer. But Huda just studies through it. So when all of my siblings and my parents fell asleep, I studied. So I

When I get hungry sometimes at night, you know what I do? I go to the kitchen and I eat a spoon of zaatar. So we have a jar of zaatar. Okay. So in order to not make my mom know

notice that I am eating from it I go to the kitchen so you sneak a bite in silence so that no one exactly thank god that my parents don't know English okay and sometimes I feel like I am guilty because it's for my siblings in the morning that oh my god but I want to satisfy my hunger and I'm studying and I want to focus yeah

And then after eating those two spoons, I drank like one or two cups of water. In order to feel like I had dinner, you know, I yearned for eating some cheese. Before the war, Huda was the kind of person who liked to take pictures of what she was eating, especially when she made it.

These days, when she gets hungry, she scrolls through those pictures. She said it helps her feel full just looking at them. She told me about a photo of maklouba from 2022, a screenshot of a burger ad. She told me she zooms in and pretends she's picking the crispy bits off the chicken. I wanted to have an idea about

if you've ever been to the market lately and what kinds of things that are still being sold.

Okay, so most of the market shelves are really scarce and are empty. You can see some canned food or even lentils, rice, soup, pasta. These are the items that are currently available, but in a very, very, very expensive prices. Like almost $11 for a candy bar.

A year ago, prices were high, but not this high. People still had stored food. There were still some farms. The market I used to shop at still had stock. There were snacks and there were green leaves. Some vegetables, some green vegetables. That are not available now. I hope they were available so I can make myself busy with them while studying. There was also some coffee. There was also some...

There was some sugar that we would use sometimes. We can sweeten some water with sugar and we can drink it so it could have some sort of a feeling of a sweet thing that could be enough for the body to feel full at some point somehow. Sugar, is it available? How much does it cost to get one kilo of sugar? Let me ask my brother, how does it cost? $30. $30.

$30 for one kilo? Yeah. Oh my god. A kilo is a little over two pounds. Before the war, a kilo of sugar cost about 25 cents, 30 cents on the high end. When I was still in Gaza, a kilo of sugar was already outrageous, $16. And it was already hard to find. Now, there's almost nothing. Farmland has been wiped out. Greenhouses turned to ash.

It's not just the food that's gone. There is no fuel to cook what little might be left. Rice, lentils, there is no fuel to even boil water. There isn't any burning wood around you, right? Yeah, there is no wood right now. We sometimes put some plastics, you know, or nylon or whatever we find, you know, in the street in order to fuel the fire.

When I study, I have my notebooks, which are really close to my heart, and I can't let them burn. Give them up, yeah. Yeah. But I have another papers. These are for my mom when she burns the food. When she cooks, yeah. We burn some of our clothes. Okay.

And it's something like you, when we burn these things, you know, I feel like we are burning some of our memories, a huge number, a huge amount of our memories. I dreamed of my cousin that was killed in the first beginning of the war just two days ago.

She was telling me that she was missing me and that she wants me to eat some food. She tells me that she feels like I am hungry. She was cooking for me something that I love, which is the pasta. But in a very...

in a very delicious way she made it in the dream and then when I woke up I felt like I am full I felt like I don't want to eat you know it's really something indescribable and I felt so sad when I saw her I'm sorry I'm so sorry for your loss I'm so sorry

I remember the way hunger settled into my body. Not just as pain, but as a kind of silence. When I stood up, the room spun. My mouth tasted like metal. My limbs felt heavy, like I was wading through water. I stopped feeling hunger as a craving.

it became something else, a slow shutting down. I have never ever expected to reach to such level, to seek food, to think of food, to only just want to, I just want to eat food. And I feel like people are going insane. We could lose our minds if we didn't have food immediately. When I first talked to Huda, I could tell she was ambitious.

She talked about wanting to be a teacher. She dreamt of getting her master's degree abroad.

But just before we talked, she had started to rethink that plan. Because she doesn't want to leave Gaza behind. The Israelis are trying to erase all the traces of Palestinians and uprooted them. And they are trying to put the idea of traveling and to get out of Gaza. But we will not. We will always stay in our homes.

And sometimes I feel like how does the wall outside Gaza feel? How is the walls, you know, behind the Rafah crossing? Like, how did you feel when you get on a plane? Can you tell me? I was surprised by Huda's question and I had trouble answering it. It slammed me back to the moment as I was crossing into Egypt.

No drones, no sounds of war. People were just living only 30 minutes away from Gaza. Sipping sodas, grilling on the street, kids heading to school, others coming back from college. The world outside Gaza, it's an overwhelming mix of things. My mouth isn't capable of what it wants to speak. I think it's good for us to be in other parts of the world to share what is happening back home.

But to do that, I had to leave everything behind, knowing I may never go back. My home is out of reach. This is kind of breaking my heart. Huda texted me after our call and surprised me with another question. She asked what I had for breakfast. I lied. I said coffee and toast. These two things are still available somewhere in Gaza. I did not tell her I had one egg, a cookie, and a cup of tea.

Mohamed Mahawish is a journalist and writer from Gaza. Diane Wu produced this story. You can find more of Mohamed's reporting in Al Jazeera and MSNBC. He's also a contributing writer for The Nation, which is where we first read about his experiences with hunger. Hoda's access to food has not changed since Mohamed spoke with her two weeks ago. One last thing before we end today's show. Almost every day, someone asks me about a kid we put on the show six months ago.

Banyas. She's in Gaza. The thing people always want to know, how is she doing? This is a question I find very difficult to answer. But here we go. I'm going to try. Banyas is still in central Gaza, where she's been displaced from the north. She turned nine during the ceasefire in January. She's living in an apartment with a yard. There are long stretches when she can't go outside, when it's not safe enough. When she can go out, there are kids nearby she plays with.

She draws. She pretends to be a naturalist. Banias loves bugs. She does remote school for a few hours each week. She's skinnier. Banias' family has far more resources than most people in Gaza. But still, her parents spend most of the day trying to find food lately, or waiting in lines to access an oven where they can cook bread if they have flour. Most days, they don't. They eat lentils and rice or lentils and pasta. They're running out of canned food.

Her mom told me on a good day, they'll also share one fried potato for the family of four. How is Banyas doing? Should be a really simple question. Banyas is wonderful. She's charming, endlessly curious and energetic and bursting with things to say. She's very funny. And Banyas is still incredibly good at creating her own reality.

I'm so happy today. I'm really, really, really, really happy. Yeah? Why? The kids are playing in the backyard and I'm standing here in the balcony. Uh-huh. There is our clothes. Uh-huh. Sometimes it was loud bumping around us. That's sometimes. Oh, here's one. Yeah, I just heard it.

It's not close of us. This is a lemon tree. I want to show you an olive tree we like to climb. This olive tree is so easy to climb. I just stepped out. Oh, I was about to fall. Okay, I'll switch the camera to show you. I'll hold the phone tightly and you step out.

Are you climbing the tree right now? And I'm climbing. Look, this is the olive tree. And I'm here. Here am I. Woohoo! I'm the king of the den. I'm the queen of the garden. Oh, Banyas, is it safe there? It is safe. Don't worry about us. But there's some shooting around us. Yeah, I can hear it. So...

So don't go to high places. I'll just get down. Yeah, maybe come down. So I doesn't get shooted. Yeah, maybe you should go back inside. No, it's okay. It's far away from us. It sounds close. If you're scared, we can go inside. Yeah, why don't we go inside?

You don't you want to go inside? Yeah. All right. Let's go. That's how Banias is doing, fiercely protecting and inventing a childhood for herself, a childhood that is constrained in every way by shooting and bombing, by a lack of nutrition, education and safety. That's how she's doing.

Oh person, person, we're really missing you. It breaks all of our hearts to know that you just want to come on home. So come on home, the telephone. And it just doesn't seem to do to let you know how much it's true that we love you. Yeah, we love you. Oh person, person, person.

♪ A person, person, person ♪

Our show today was produced by Lily Sullivan. Nancy Updike edited the show. The people who put our show together include Michael Kamate, Angela Gervasi, Ira Glass, Cassie Howley, Valerie Kipnis, Seth Lind, Miki Meek, Catherine Raimondo, Stone Nelson, Nadia Raymond, Anthony Roman, Alyssa Shipp, Christopher Switala, and Marisa Robertson-Textor. Our managing editor is Sara Abdurrahman. Our senior editor is David Kestenbaum. Emmanuel Berry is our executive editor.

Special thanks today to Hany Hawasli, Laura Albast, Rania Mustafa, Dana Balut, Rachel Strom, Emna Jgal, Lizzie Ratner, and Suzanne Gabber. Thanks also to KCRW in Los Angeles, where I've been recording this week and have had help from Katie Gilchrist, Phil Richards, Mike Stark, and Mike Newport.

Voice over for Asil in Act One was performed by Tara Abood. Our website, thisamericanlife.org. If you become a This American Life partner, you'll get bonus content, ad-free listening, and more. To join, go to thisamericanlife.org slash lifepartners. That link is also in the show notes.

This American Life is delivered to public radio stations by PRX, the Public Radio Exchange. I'm Hannah Jaffe-Walt. Ira Glass will be back next week with more stories of This American Life. A person, person, person. A person, person, person.

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