Free A Month by the Sea by Dervla Murphy Page B

sat Khalil, with whom I had already talked several times at the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR). A small, slight, middle-aged man, he was pale and fine-featured and abstractedly cold in manner – perhaps a cover-up for the sorrow and frustration felt by all such workers throughout the OPT unless they are simply ‘in it for the money’ (which can happen). The PCHR is a rare and precious source of reliable information about contentious events on the Strip. Unreliable information comes by the truckload.
    This tournament consisted of four 30-minute matches and the hundreds of youthful spectators were loudly partisan in a cheerful way. The not-so-young players wore soft shoes and quite often had to pause when the chalk dust aggravated their smokers’ coughs. Kicks now and then rebounded from the walls, one just missing my head, but in general there was something soothingly ritualistic about the slow pace and gracefully controlled movements.
    Then I became aware that Mohammed was worriedly reading text messages. When I looked at him questioningly he explained. His fifty-eight-year-old mother was on dialysis and in dire need of a drug at present unavailable. That afternoon the doctor had warned, ‘She may die within 48 hours.’ Now a text had told him of a relevant drugs consignment being held in Ramallah because the donor (or some PA bureaucrats?) didn’t want Hamas to benefit from it. There was nothing to be done, though a mother lay dying. Gaza truly is a prison, not metaphorically but in reality. Had some tragedy befallen my family, requiring my immediate departure, I could not have left the Strip before 2 July.
    Mohammed showed me pictures of his son, now aged eight. During Cast Lead the child thought their shrapnel-victim neighbours had been killed by flying glass and decided to build himself a house without windows.
    The muezzin’s evening summons interrupted the second game.All shoes came off and, though there could be no washing, both teams formed a line led in prayer by the referee. Mohammed commented, ‘It’s not that all are so religious, this is just the custom and the culture.’ He glanced at Khalil who nodded his agreement. Yet again I heard the argument that ‘the Middle East problem’ does not have religion at its root though it so well suits the ‘ international community’ (code for the US and its allies) to harp on about Islamic terrorism. Echoing many other Palestinians, Mohammed urged me always to use ‘Zionist’ rather than ‘Jewish’ in relation to Israel’s multiple crimes. In Bologna he had shared a student flat with a Jew who became and remains a close friend. He recalled Palestine’s pre-Zionist harmony and affirmed, ‘We can live together again and we will! Some time in the future, in spite of everything!’ Again he glanced at Khalil who nodded – then added, with quiet vehemence, ‘Support BDS!’ referring to the Palestinian call for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel until it complies with international law.
    Between the second and third rounds all eight teams posed for photographs – with me as the reluctant centrepiece. Minutes into the fourth round the electricity went off, to no one’s surprise. There were disappointed groans but no angry shouts. Matches flared here and there in the blackness and a few ISM torches enabled us to find our way out to the starlit car park. The tournament would be completed on the morrow. ‘Gazans are adaptable,’ observed Mohammed. ‘It’s how we have to be.’
    As we drove out of the darkened town, candles were flitting like glow-worms through homes lucky enough to have them. Khalil remarked, in his precise, slightly squeaky voice, ‘Isn’t it sad to think how Gaza seemed in 1660. Travellers compared its cultural life and economic importance to Paris.’
    I didn’t feel it necessary to reply; he seemed to be talking almost to himself.

Three
    Vik’s closest Gazan friend was Mohammed al-Zaim, a tall, handsome