By Soozy Duncan, The Indypendent, 3 September 2009
With what seems like more buildings collapsed than standing, 5,686 miles does not begin to measure the distance between New York City and Jabalia, Gaza. Only two miles from the Israeli border, the town and its enormous refugee camp were destroyed by Israel’s “Operation Cast Lead” in December and January. Now children, excited at seeing the buses drive past, run barefoot from the tents they’ve been living in for the past six months, tents probably not unlike the ones their grandparents or great-grandparents lived in when they first fled their homes and came to Gaza in 1948. Some elders shake their heads — it’s not the first time outsiders have come to see the devastation, but life has yet to change.