“This amazing book tells the life story of Dr Izzeldin Abuelaish, a Palestinian who has lived through half a century of horror and destruction in Gaza. Abuelaish, like so many Palestinians, has endured loss, privation and suffering on a scale that is unimaginable. His response is not hatred and violence, which would be all too understandable. Instead he has produced a great work of insight and compassion that tries to point the way towards peace and reconciliation.
He grew up in the shadow of al-Nakba (“the Catastrophe”), the division of Palestine after the creation of the Israeli state in 1948. He came from an established land-owning family based in the south of the country. Overnight they were dispossessed, and his childhood was spent in the Jabalia refugee camp in Gaza.
His family, which had been prosperous, were now in deep poverty. There were 11 of them and he records how they “lived in one room which measured about 10 feet by 10 feet. There was no electricity, no running water; there were no toilets in the house.”
When he was 10, they found a new house to live in. Five years later it was bulldozed by one of Ariel Sharon’s tanks. His brother Noor fell into Israeli hands, went to prison, and later vanished. The book suggests his mother, a stoical woman to whom he acknowledges a huge debt, never fully recovered.
Education, and some inspirational teachers, were his redemption. Eventually he won a scholarship to study medicine in Cairo, and then gynaecology at the University of London.”
Read more by clicking the link.A truly astonishing goodness.
Who is the Light of the world now?
How my heart sings 