Huda Emad Hegazi He speaks about the war he experiences every day with aplomb, but with a sweet voice and Andalusian accent. The 26-year-old reporter grew up in Linares (Jaén) up to 18. She traveled to Gaza on vacation with her Palestinian family like every summer in 2016. She was trapped in the Strip when the border with Egypt closed. He decided to stay there and study. He saw that his Spanish-speaking profile gave him opportunities and became a journalist. Now he reports on the conflict for the W Radio network and the Hispan TV and Telesur television stations. Israeli forces have killed more than 130 journalists like her in Gazaaccording to Reporters Without Borders. They add to the more than 44,000 deaths in the Israeli attacks, mostly women and children.
Huda lives in a tent on the grounds of a Gazan hospital. He has avoided death on several occasions. And he has seen the horror of war face to face. He talks about all this with El Periódico de España by phone from the center of Gaza.
-How is the situation where you are?
-I am in the city of Deir al Balah, and it is getting worse. This morning the bombing intensified in the nearby area of Al Nuseirat. Food is starting to run out.
-How is your family?
-My father and my older brother are in Spain, in Linares, which is where we are from. My father is a teacher at a school and my brother is studying architecture in Granada. Those who are here, in northern Gaza, are my mother, 50, my sister, 22, and my brother, 10. Our house was destroyed at the beginning of the war. I came to the south to work with my team. They stayed. They are now on the coast of Gaza City. Yesterday my mother called me at two in the morning saying that they heard the bombings.
-Do you get food?
-Very little. The worst was in April and May. Sometimes they didn’t eat or they each ate half a slice of bread. There was no flour or rice. When they were surrounded by the army, the neighbors tried to share what they had. Now the border remains closed and no food or humanitarian aid is entering. My family, who can afford it, turns to the black market. There are products, but with super high prices. A kilo of tomatoes, for example, is about 70-80 euros. A kilo of potatoes can reach 100 euros. People have not worked for a year and cannot pay them.
-And does food reach you in the center of the Strip?
-Yesterday I paid the equivalent of three euros for a single tomato in Deir al Balah. Until now the situation in the center of the Strip was relatively good. There was some fruit, some vegetables, sometimes you could find some meat. But, for the last month or month and a half, everything has been getting worse rapidly.
-In general, does war increase or decrease in intensity?
-It goes in spurts. Two weeks ago the situation was calmer than in Lebanon. between yesterday and today [por el miércoles y el jueves] attacks here have increased again. There are days when there are 70 or 80 victims, others 15 or 20.
-Has your life been in danger during these 14 months of war?
-Many times. The time I was most afraid was when they attacked the Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, where my colleagues and I were living. We were all sleeping. We woke up to the sound of rock debris or shrapnel falling on the tents. We ran away. I left everything except my cell phone behind, I left without money or passport. Our store burned. I saw a huge fire in the opposite one. I saw people burning in front of me. It was a “viral” image: an immobilized person who was burning alive. On another occasion they attacked a nearby store with a missile. If it had been a bigger bomb, they would have dismembered us all.
-After seeing so much war, do you know how to distinguish the types of bombs?
-Yeah. And even the type of plane from which they are launched. There are some that make a lot of noise, disappear and, after a few seconds, launch one of the one-ton missiles. When we heard that plane at night, we ran out of our tents and hid in the hospital.
-Did you think about leaving when Spain repatriated the Spanish-Palestinians at the beginning of the war?
-We were thinking about it. But they had to cross the dangerous point of Netzarim and they did not dare. Nobody knew that the war would last so long. We thought it was going to be as short as the previous ones. I didn’t want to leave my job because I’m passionate about it. I have always wanted to convey what is happening to the Palestinian people.
-What is a work day like for a journalist in Gaza?
-The day repeats itself during the last months. We got up after little sleep because ambulances can be heard on the hospital grounds all the time. The issue of going to the bathroom is very frustrating: you have to go outside and wait in line. Then I watch the news. If there has been an attack, for example, in the Khan Younis area, I will cover it, as long as the area is safe and the Israeli Army is not there. That is, until two in the afternoon. Then, starting at three, I start going live with Latin America.
-Why are you in the hospital? Is it safer?
-No, they have bombed it nine times. Most journalists settle here to cover the victims who arrive and because the hospital helps us with electricity and internet. Our work depends on it.
-What do you think is going to happen now?
-I think there is a small possibility that, after the truce in Lebanon, there will be one between Israel and Hamas. But on the ground there are signs that everything is going to be prolonged. Israel is building watchtowers and paving. They are preparing to occupy territories. And Hamas has said it will not sign the truce if Israeli soldiers do not leave.
-What relationship do you have with Hamas?
-We don’t see them. We don’t know where they are. They don’t go to the places where we are.
-Have you had any encounter with Israeli soldiers?
-Face to face, no. I have seen them from afar. But what they have told me is terrifying.
-What have they told you?
-Apparently, the Army is always afraid of anyone and, when they approach, they shoot.
-Do you know any of the dead journalists?
-Yes, in the first weeks of the war they killed my first cousin, Rushdi Al-Sarraj, who was a journalist. And Hamza al-Dahdouh, the son of the head of Al Jazeera. The day he was killed we had had breakfast together just a few hours before.
-Psychologically, how do you endure it?
-They are streaks. Sometimes you get ahead, sometimes you get down. Especially because I’m far from my family; I literally have no one. And for the fear of losing the people you love. But my coworkers give me strength to continue.
