those broken dreams of the students
Eight dead after the raid at the "Training Center" UN
from our correspondent FRANCESCA Caferra
BECOME joiner, help pharmacist, technical electricity. They maybe small but real dreams, the eight children who died early Saturday during an Israeli raid on Gaza.
Like thousands of their peers were in school, a vocational school operated by the United Nations, when the bombing started. Terrified, they fled from the building, only to be hit in the courtyard, which is 200 meters from the establishment of the Hamas government, target of the attack. Twenty more were their fellow injured, some are in serious condition.
The story of the boys of Gaza Training Center has become a symbol of the tragedy that we live in the Strip. "They all had 17 or 18 years - tells Sami Mshasha, an official with UNRWA, the UN agency that deals with the Palestinians and who runs the school - were there to learn a trade, not to remain in the street. The end of that that is horrible. "
When the bomb hit the school, many students were able to shelter: For those closer to the government palace, however, there was no escape: "Our guards tried to pull them out, but it was impossible - says the official - was difficult also to get ambulances into the chaos. There were parents who were screaming, others who came running to look for their children. We have officially requested that the Israeli government to open an investigation, because this demonstrates to us that the surgical operation was not at all as they say. But today we can not help ask questions, perhaps we should have kept the schools closed that day. There was a lot of tension. Maybe we were wrong us. And now it's too late. "
Mshasha's doubts are shared by many in the Gaza Strip, when Israeli attacks began on Saturday morning, many schools were in the middle of lessons. In those with the double shift was finishing the first rotation and the second beginning. For this reason the bombs have surprised many children outside the home or in the classrooms, and many parents in the street as they ran to fetch their children. In the newspaper Haaretz Hamir Hass, the Israeli journalist who knows Gaza, said yesterday the stories of fathers and mothers caught between the anxiety caused by the bombing and that the fate of their children. "I arrived at the school of my daughter and I found myself in front of hundreds of girls who ran away screaming. I was the first adult who arrived there. We are strict about me crying," he tells a parent, Abu Muhammad. The teacher, Umm Salah, told how he had to bring relief to children in his class injured by broken glass. Only then could run in search of her children: "Some of my students began to cry. Others have remained silent, paralyzed. "
One of the sons of the teacher was in the street when his mother found him. The Major had already taken refuge in the house, greeted by a terrified grandmother." I thought I'd turn on the TV to calm them down, but then I saw the pictures. I have sent them off and doing homework. "
Mshasha concerned that memories like these in an indelible mark not only the students of the Professional Institute UNRWA, but also of other schools." In recent months we found a rate of much less attention. The boys came to school hungry, because at home there was nothing to eat. Or depressed, because did not see the future and understand that parents can not do anything for them.
We have reactivated the tables, and created services for psychological assistance. But faced with a tragedy like this, or for the death of your classmates with that spirit will come back? ".
A question that affects thousands of students. UNRWA operates the largest educational system in Gaza: 200 thousand students , 9000 teachers and 240 school buildings on which they rely in access to education of an entire generation of Palestinian children. "I hope you will return. Also because they have nothing else, "said the official.
(Republic December 29, 2008)
Like thousands of their peers were in school, a vocational school operated by the United Nations, when the bombing started. Terrified, they fled from the building, only to be hit in the courtyard, which is 200 meters from the establishment of the Hamas government, target of the attack. Twenty more were their fellow injured, some are in serious condition.
The story of the boys of Gaza Training Center has become a symbol of the tragedy that we live in the Strip. "They all had 17 or 18 years - tells Sami Mshasha, an official with UNRWA, the UN agency that deals with the Palestinians and who runs the school - were there to learn a trade, not to remain in the street. The end of that that is horrible. "
When the bomb hit the school, many students were able to shelter: For those closer to the government palace, however, there was no escape: "Our guards tried to pull them out, but it was impossible - says the official - was difficult also to get ambulances into the chaos. There were parents who were screaming, others who came running to look for their children. We have officially requested that the Israeli government to open an investigation, because this demonstrates to us that the surgical operation was not at all as they say. But today we can not help ask questions, perhaps we should have kept the schools closed that day. There was a lot of tension. Maybe we were wrong us. And now it's too late. "
Mshasha's doubts are shared by many in the Gaza Strip, when Israeli attacks began on Saturday morning, many schools were in the middle of lessons. In those with the double shift was finishing the first rotation and the second beginning. For this reason the bombs have surprised many children outside the home or in the classrooms, and many parents in the street as they ran to fetch their children. In the newspaper Haaretz Hamir Hass, the Israeli journalist who knows Gaza, said yesterday the stories of fathers and mothers caught between the anxiety caused by the bombing and that the fate of their children. "I arrived at the school of my daughter and I found myself in front of hundreds of girls who ran away screaming. I was the first adult who arrived there. We are strict about me crying," he tells a parent, Abu Muhammad. The teacher, Umm Salah, told how he had to bring relief to children in his class injured by broken glass. Only then could run in search of her children: "Some of my students began to cry. Others have remained silent, paralyzed. "
One of the sons of the teacher was in the street when his mother found him. The Major had already taken refuge in the house, greeted by a terrified grandmother." I thought I'd turn on the TV to calm them down, but then I saw the pictures. I have sent them off and doing homework. "
Mshasha concerned that memories like these in an indelible mark not only the students of the Professional Institute UNRWA, but also of other schools." In recent months we found a rate of much less attention. The boys came to school hungry, because at home there was nothing to eat. Or depressed, because did not see the future and understand that parents can not do anything for them.
We have reactivated the tables, and created services for psychological assistance. But faced with a tragedy like this, or for the death of your classmates with that spirit will come back? ".
A question that affects thousands of students. UNRWA operates the largest educational system in Gaza: 200 thousand students , 9000 teachers and 240 school buildings on which they rely in access to education of an entire generation of Palestinian children. "I hope you will return. Also because they have nothing else, "said the official.
(Republic December 29, 2008)
