Palestinians Defy Northern Gaza Evacuation Orders

 ‘Death Better Than Leaving’

GAZA (KI) – The Zionist regime’s army pounded the Jabalya Refugee Camp in the northern Gaza Strip, in the latest episode of the regime’s ongoing onslaught that has killed more than 42,000 people since last year, Anadolu Agency reports.

As part of the onslaught, the occupying regime’s army ordered Palestinian residents in Jabalya, Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahia to leave their homes and head south.
Many Palestinians, however, said they would not leave.
“Death is better than leaving,” Ibrahim Awda, 42, who lives with his family in a tent in the Jabalya refugee camp, told Anadolu.
“The Occupation is trying to force us to migrate and move south after a year of steadfastness in the north and after losing our homes and jobs,” he said.
Awda, who lost two sons and his home in Israeli attacks, said Palestinian residents in the Jabalya Camp refuse to heed the regime’s evacuation orders.
“They will not leave their homes in northern Gaza unless we die,” the defiant Palestinian said.
According to an Anadolu reporter, the Israeli army has slapped a tight siege around northern Gaza from all directions, cutting it off from Gaza City.
The military aggression in Jabalya is the third by the Israeli army in the camp since the outbreak of the Gaza conflict last year.
Hundreds of Palestinians were killed and thousands injured in Israeli artillery shelling and air strikes in the camp in past months, according to local health authorities.
Awda said the Israeli army is trying to deceive residents of northern Gaza by claiming that the territory’s south is “safe” for them.
“Israel’s continued crimes and deliberate killing of displaced civilians expose its lies,” he added.
He cited the death of at least 26 people this weekend in Israeli attacks on a school and mosque sheltering displaced people in the central city of Deir Al-Balah.
“These massacres occurred on the same day the Israeli army issued evacuation orders for us to head south,” Awda said.
Mureed Ahmad, 26, shares the same view.
“We refused to leave our homes since the first day of the war. We will not accept to leave now,” he told Anadolu.
The young Palestinian believes that the Israeli army is using “military pressure” to force the residents of Jabalya to evacuate and move south.
 “This policy has proved its failure,” he said. “Palestinian residents refuse to leave their homes although the Israeli army forces are closing in.”
Palestinian authorities estimate that there are around 700,000 people still living in northern Gaza.
As’ad al-Nadi, a resident of Jabalya, said he had sought to flee the area with his family towards a “safe zone” in western Gaza City.
“However, we were directly targeted, leaving my 16-year-old son injured,” he recalled.
He had to carry his son on his shoulder to be moved by an ambulance to the al-Ahli Baptist Hospital for medical attention.
Although he still fears for his family, al-Nadi says he will not leave his home in Jabalya and move south.
“I may move within northern Gaza, but I will never move to the south,” he stressed. “All those who fled to southern Gaza with the outbreak of the war have been unable to return to northern Gaza until today.”