Rawya Mohammed Zaid Al-Kafarna, 23 years old, from Beit Hanoun, northern Gaza, currently displaced in Al-Rimal neighborhood, Gaza City

Testimony Date: January 28, 2025

On the night following the start of the war, shortly after midnight on October 8, 2023, we began receiving voice recordings on our phones and our neighbors’ phones ordering the immediate evacuation of Beit Hanoun. My family and I, along with our neighbors and relatives, fled our home on the town’s outskirts and headed to Jabalia Camp. We arrived at the Jabalia Girls’ School near Abu Rashid. The next morning, we awoke to the devastating news that our house had been bombed and that the neighbors who hadn’t left were now just remains beneath the rubble of their homes.

We stayed at the school for an extended period, even through the first ground incursion into Jabalia Camp in November 2023, during which we were besieged but didn’t evacuate. However, during the second incursion in May 2024, we were forced to flee again, this time to western North Gaza. We went to Beit Lahia, avoiding Gaza City due to the extreme difficulty of transportation and the size of our family, especially with many young siblings. We stayed with friends for 13 days before returning to the Jabalia Girls’ School, which had sustained damage, leaving it partially exposed to the neighboring schools. We remained there until the third incursion into northern Gaza.

On October 5, 2024, more voice recordings and messages arrived, ordering the evacuation of all towns in the northern governorate toward western Gaza City. We hesitated, thinking it might pass quietly like the first incursion—but no one could predict what the next day would bring.

The early days of the ground invasion were filled with fear and tension. Every day we woke up and went to sleep asking: How far had the tanks advanced? What was happening? What was the plan? Was this the Generals’ plan? We heard of deaths and injuries every hour. Movement outside the school was minimal due to the quadcopter drones constantly hovering above, often dropping sound bombs—even in the school corridors. Despite the danger, I continued to care for my family and assist my relatives and other displaced people sheltering with us.

On October 14, 2024, around 10 a.m., I was with my mother Shireen Al-Kafarna (44), my sister Halima (20), my brother Zaid (14), and several other displaced relatives near the water tank at the school entrance, collecting water—something we could only do every three days due to the water shortage and the ongoing danger.

That morning showed no sign of what was to come. Suddenly, three Israeli artillery shells hit the schoolyard. One landed right beside the sand mound near the water tank where we stood.

My mother was hit in the head and had shrapnel lodged in her jaw. She tried to run toward the classrooms, but when she turned, she saw my sister, brother, and I had collapsed. Everyone rushed to help. I found myself in a prostrated position, lying on the ground. When I opened my eyes and realized I’d been injured, I saw that my right arm was shredded and bleeding heavily. I thought I had lost it. Using my left arm, I held it to my chest. My sister Halima’s legs were in a similar state—she looked like she had lost both of them. I tried to help her stand, but the pain in my right side made it impossible. I realized I was bleeding from my abdomen too, so I shifted slightly to shield her. My mother returned and dragged Halima to where I was hiding, knowing we couldn’t make it upstairs to the third floor.

After 45 minutes of agony and relentless bleeding, the shelling subsided a bit. Some of the young men in the school came to our aid. They transported Halima in a wheelchair to a nearby school’s medical point, where volunteers couldn’t manage her condition. They took her to Kamal Adwan Hospital and sent an ambulance for the rest of us. While waiting, a volunteer tied a bandage around my arm to stop the bleeding. They suggested carrying me on a blanket, but I refused due to my abdominal injury. When the ambulance arrived, it took me, my injured mother, and my father, who had come to accompany us. The medics couldn’t carry out the dead at that time—only the wounded. Another ambulance tried to follow us but was targeted and couldn’t leave the area.

We reached Al-Awda Hospital in Tel Al-Zaatar at around 11:30 a.m. In the emergency room, my arm was bandaged, I received three units of blood, and they cut off my clothes to begin exploratory surgery since imaging was unavailable. Within minutes, they decided to operate. Those few minutes were full of panic—I resisted the doctors’ decision to amputate my arm. “My arm still has a pulse,” I told them. “If you cut it off, I’ll tear this hospital down.” The surgeon reassured me they would not amputate. Under anesthesia, they removed two pieces of shrapnel—one lodged near my spine, the other in my abdomen which tore my liver and caused intestinal injuries. Internal bleeding was controlled during the surgery. However, my arm required specialized orthopedic care unavailable at Al-Awda.

They tried transferring me to Al-Ma’madani Hospital, but the Israeli side refused. The same happened with Halima—her condition was too severe for Kamal Adwan Hospital, so she was transferred to Al-Awda where I was. My aunt came with her while my parents returned to the school. That was the last time I saw my parents for a long while.

After four days, my condition hadn’t stabilized. I was still in immense pain and needed daily dressing changes, but the situation on the ground was deteriorating. Seeing the state of the severely injured, I gave up my care so they could be treated. Even though my injuries were serious, I couldn’t bear seeing others in worse shape.

Eventually, the doctor and I had no choice but to discharge me. My aunt and I left in the afternoon, hoping to return to the school and reunite with our family. We left Halima behind and were taken by ambulance to the Yemen Al-Saeed area, about 500 meters from the school. The ambulance couldn’t go further, so we walked. I was wrapped in a heavy blanket, clearly wounded, and my aunt was helping me. Quadcopter Ddrones flew overhead, and we soon realized they were shooting. One opened fire on the ambulance that had just dropped us off.

It didn’t return—it was diverted to help other wounded people trapped in the siege on Beit Lahia.

It became clear we wouldn’t reach our family. When we tried to go back, the quadcopter drones fire rained down on us. Another ambulance saved us and took us to Kamal Adwan Hospital.

There, the staff initially refused to admit me due to severe shortages and the threat of advancing Israeli forces. But my deteriorating condition left us no choice. I slept on a stretcher on the floor with only a saline drip and requests for more blood as my levels had dropped to six. With no real supplies, I was transferred to the Indonesian Hospital in Tel Al-Zaatar for basic care.

At 9 p.m., I arrived and received antibiotics. I still needed blood, but there was none. At 2 a.m., the Israeli army stormed the hospital and laid siege to it. Shelling intensified around the hospital and nearby shelters in Sheikh Zayed. We could see the army burning the schools by throwing different kinds of bombs at them. A hill near the hospital—Tel Al-Zaatar—was constantly shelled. Everyone gathered on the first floor for safety: around 90 people including patients, doctors, and nurses.

The next morning, the army contacted a doctor and asked him to write down all our names. He gave the list to a messenger holding a white flag to deliver to the soldiers at the gate. The soldiers asked how many ambulances we needed and were told three—an underestimate. The army ordered us to remain on the first floor, not go outside or near windows, and wait for evacuation orders.

We waited, but no word came.

We lived through twelve days that felt like hell. We didn’t have enough food or water, but what was even harder was the complete lack of medicine and medical supplies. It was impossible to reach the pharmacy to bring back what was left of the dressings and gauze. This caused an infection in the wound left by the surgery on my arm.

In the first few days, I managed to change the dressing using some gauze I had saved earlier, but once it ran out, I—like many of the other wounded—had to resort to using sanitary pads to dress our wounds. I remember the nurse squeezing out the fluid that had collected around the infection—the pain was unbearable, almost enough to kill me. But I couldn’t even scream or make a sound. I was afraid the men and boys around me would hear, and because of the danger that surrounded us, the place had lost all sense of privacy for the wounded.

After twelve days, we noticed a slight withdrawal of the army, and some of the hospital staff went out to assess the situation. They returned with some food left behind by the soldiers— a little drinking water and some canned goods. We were overjoyed with this leftover food, as if the war had ended. We shared it, and I remember that I got an apple and a carton of pasteurized milk. I felt immense happiness when I ate them.

The situation on the ground was still uncertain, and we couldn’t move beyond the hospital yard. Not more than a day passed before the tanks returned and surrounded the area again.

We learned that the army had started forcibly evacuating the residents of Beit Lahiya and that they would pass by the hospital on their way to the Civil Administration checkpoint. On that day, the army not only threatened the hospital by refusing to admit hundreds of wounded people who needed at least some care, but they also demanded that we evacuate the hospital and join the forced displacement convoys heading to the checkpoint and leave the north.

My health was worsening with no food, water, or treatment, and my diabetic aunt had started to lose her ability to bear the conditions. So, we, along with many others who were in the hospital, joined the forcible displacement convoy around 8 a.m.

The tanks surrounded us on both sides, and drones hovered above our heads like flies. The number of evacuees was close to fifty thousand. The road was difficult and harsh, and we could see decaying bodies, unrecognizable, scattered around us. We reached the Civil Administration checkpoint on Salah al-Din Road and waited for our turn. We stayed there for three hours under the scorching sun, wishing for even a sip of water. Then it was our turn. We passed through the checkpoint, the camera took our pictures, and then we were on our way. I didn’t know where my family was, and I couldn’t contact any of them. My aunt and I were taken by a donkey-drawn cart to Al-Shifa Hospital. I was in a pitiful state after the exhaustion from the long walk. My wound was bleeding and causing me pain. On the way to the hospital, my phone had a poor signal. I managed to make a call to my sister, who told me that the family had been displaced to the shelter schools in the Rimal neighborhood, near the Patients’ Friends Hospital. The cart took us there, and I met relatives who quickly brought my parents, and I was reunited with my family.

I am currently suffering from the condition of my arm. My arm is missing bones and muscles, and I can’t get the proper medical care to improve my arm’s condition in any hospital. My arm is no longer what it used to be, and my whole life is no longer the same.