Overnight, an Israeli strike turned my family’s home in Gaza into a graveyard
One of the author’s nieces, pictured in Gaza in December 2023 before being killed in an Israeli air strike on the family’s home on 27 September 2025
Yousef Aljamal writes in Middle East Eye on 1 December 2025:
On 27 September, I woke up at 5.10am in my apartment in Turkey, feeling suffocated and thirsty. I was uneasy for no clear reason. I reached for my phone to read the latest updates from Gaza. I saw a message in my town’s news-sharing group in Gaza that an Israeli air strike had targeted my family’s home.
I texted my brother, Abood, but the message did not go through. Moments later, my mother, who now lives near me in Turkey, called. Her voice trembled with fear as she asked whether I had read the news. I walked straight out of my apartment and down the road to her house.
My heart froze, and my chest felt heavy. I refused to believe that my worst nightmare during the Gaza genocide had become real, but the feeling of suffocation would not go away. On the way, I called a friend in Gaza. Together, we managed to reach my sister, Sarah. That small victory gave me hope that my family had survived.
But soon after, Sarah told me that Abood, his wife, also named Sarah, and their two daughters, Huda and Zainab, had been killed. The air strike had also killed my sister Ghalia, her husband Yousef and their daughters, Mariam and Zainab, as well as my brother-in-law, Dr Khaled. My sister Mariam and two of her five children were injured.
The missile destroyed not only the walls, doors and floors I grew up with. It felt as though it shattered the memories that lived inside them, too
I have experienced immense loss during the Gaza genocide, but it is different when an air strike hits your own home. Something deeper is taken when the place that helped shape you is destroyed.
The missile destroyed not only the walls, doors and floors I grew up with. It felt as though it shattered the memories that lived inside them, too – ones I shared with my beloved family members in that space.
A wave of grief washed over me, leaving a hollow ache in my chest.
I also felt helpless and guilty. The night before the air strike on our home, my sister had sent me a list of 24 family members she hoped I could help evacuate. It included my surviving siblings, nephews and nieces. They were excited at the idea of being saved from the genocide, of living without fear or destruction, of putting their children to sleep without wondering whether they would survive the night. All of that hope vanished in a single moment.
Our lives changed forever.
Abood’s strength
My brother Abood’s death hit me especially hard. Within our family, he was known as Baba Abood, or “Father Abood”, because he played such a big role in keeping our family in Gaza together throughout the genocide. When starvation intensified, he went out in search of food. When water ran out, he found more. He fixed what broke and was street smart, skilled at navigating impossible conditions.