Mohammed on Denman

Previously, in the August 1st and October 24th, 2024 editions of The Islands Grapevine, I related the story of Mohammed Al Zaza, a young Palestinian refugee from Gaza, co-sponsored by the B.C. Muslim Association and the Vancouver chapter of Independent Jewish Voice (I.J.V.), who lived with us for several months last year. To briefly recap: he was badly injured in an Israeli “mowing the grass” bombing attack in 2011 at the age of 15, and then transported to a Tel Aviv hospital where he spent two years undergoing multiple operations, then sent back to Gaza in need of further medical treatment. 

He found his way to Egypt, and then Turkey, where he was helped by the generosity of friends in Israel for 5 years. Confined to the situation, not having proper documentation as an immigrant in Turkey, Mohammed ended up in the Canadian Embassy in Ankara. Again, with the help of the same group of Jewish Israelis, and in liaison with Vancouver’s I.J.V., Mohammed was put on a flight to Canada. A friend of ours asked us to lodge him for his initial stay in Vancouver. He ended up staying with us for several months until he had to get further treatment and several operations at UBC’s Health Science, G.F. Strong and Vancouver General hospitals. 

His weakened body speaks for the suffering he has had to endure all these years since that Israeli bomb changed his life forever. As if things were not bad enough, he lost three of his brothers since October 7th: one in November following the initial strike on Gaza and buried somewhere under a collapsed building, a second one killed fetching water for his family a few months ago, and a third one in need of dialysis, died for lack of medical treatment. It has been hell for him and it is only through the amazing support of friends and volunteers in Vancouver, that Mohammed has managed to keep hope guiding his indomitable spirit. 

Two weeks ago he spent a few days with us on beautiful Denman Island and visited Hornby Island for lunch in Rae Maté’s beautiful art studio, and a chat with Gabor Maté. It was the first time Mohammed saw B.C. beyond Vancouver’s bustling life. In our home on Lacon, he went swimming, stretched on a deck chair, sipped strong coffee, gazed at the sea while thinking of all his family and lost friends in Gaza, who might be looking at a similar ocean thousands of miles away, wishing this nightmare would fade away. Here’s the beautiful text he wrote. It is translated from his Arabic:

“They said I would not remain, that I was finished, but they never understood that those born from the womb of this land do not die, and that those raised on sunlight and blood are never forgotten. They bombed me to silence my voice and bury my truth, but they forgot that my heartbeat echoes with the pulse of the earth, and that when I fall, my roots rise from beneath me. I am never buried. I am planted, We are the people of this land. We do not surrender what is ours, not to force nor to fear. We do not shake the hand that stole our olives, our homes, our children’s laughter. Every bullet they fire awakens a thousand memories, every wall they build tears down a thousand silences, and every attempt to erase us gives birth to a thousand rebels. I do not run. I do not forget. I am the promised one like fire, like rain, like resurrection. I am not a passing name in the footnotes of history. I am the story. I am the land itself speaking back. They tried to end me, but I am just beginning. and from me grows resistance.”