My name is Amira, I am 48 years old. I have 3 children aged 19, 16 and 14. Every night I doubt that tomorrow will come and I will see the light of day again. Living without electricity, without water is not easy. We have been cut off from the world for 3 weeks now. The bombs during this attack are different to the ones that we usually hear, their sound is so high, I had never heard anything like it before this attack. Last night I could not make my legs stop shaking, I was shaking because it is very cold, and we have nothing to warm us, only our clothes and blankets. But we don’t even have enough of these as we are now sharing our house with our neighbors who had to flee their own house as it was bombed and completely burnt out last night. This is all adding to my state of anxiety. My neighbor is terrified, especially as she had to flee her home, she can’t sleep. We had to give her a pill to help her sleep tonight.

You know, since the siege began and the Israelis stopped most things coming into Gaza, we had to use our own electricity motors to light up our homes. But since the war started we have not been able to buy benzene for the motors and so we haven’t had electricity. Just for a start this means that there’s been so many times I haven’t been able to charge my mobile phone and this makes me furious as I feel so isolated from the world. We also don’t have landlines as the phone lines in our neighborhood were cut during the bombardment.

This is not a normal attack; this is an attack on all of us. I haven’t been out of the house yet, but I am afraid of what I will see after this war is finished. I keep thinking of all the people who lost their homes - where are they going to go after the war is finished? Many of them are having to live in schools and this worries the families as well as the students who are supposed to study there. I imagine that the situation will be very difficult - more than my mind can think of right now. I also keep thinking about those who have lost somebody, a father, a mother, a sister a brother or whatever relative, how can they be compensated? You can never compensate for the death of a loved one.

There is so much news, information and small details that my mind has not being able to absorb. I’ll tell you the story of a friend of my son. His father was killed along with another 6 relatives from the same family. He was able to recognize his father from the eye glasses his father was wearing; people are saying they were burnt with white phosphorus.

I feel that each one us is only able to see and worry about his or her own little world, her family, her friends and even that is too much sometimes. I feel humanity and the concept of humanity has been killed during this war. The crime being committed here is enormous, and human dignity is being trampled on. I feel as if we are the criminals for being alive.

Sometimes I feel that the Israelis should just finish us all off once and for all, that this would be better than living with the feeling of waiting for my turn, or my children's turn to die. I feel that nowhere in Gaza is safe and that things are even worse after they bombarded the UN school that was shelter for the many families who fled or whose homes were destroyed. At least 40 of the parents and the children who were staying there were killed. On top of that the hospital was also attacked. So this means to me that there is no safe place at all, everywhere can and is being attacked.

Last night was horrible, there was bombardment during all the hours of the day and night. It was non stop; I seriously thought that any of the bombs was going to land in my house. Every time I hear the sound of a bomb, I feel that it is coming for us in my house. Every sound I hear feels like a bomb coming for me. Every time there is bombing, the houses and all the windows shake – it feels like a warning.

I am also afraid that after all the pain during this war, we will just go back again to living under siege. If I knew that after this war the siege would be lifted I would still have a little hope, but it terrifies me to think that after this war ends, the siege will continue as if nothing had happened - that all the restrictions on electricity, food, basic goods will continue and we will remain trapped here unable to leave, even to visit friends and family in the West Bank.

You know what? We all will all need therapy to be able to look at our lives, ourselves and what has happened with some perspective. The pharmacist told me the other day that what most people wanted were pills for the nerves. This was before the war. I wonder if a pill will be enough after the war.