KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip: Palestinian couple Mahmoud and Fatima Jarghoun sold their jewelry so they could perform the Hajj pilgrimage to Makkah — a journey they have been yearning to make for years. But with no way out of the Gaza Strip, their dream has been dashed.
“We are living inside a prison. Without the Rafah border, there is no way in and no way out,” said Mahmoud Jarghoun, 67, referring to the crossing to Egypt that has been shut since Israel seized it in May during its Gaza offensive.
Jarghoun said the deep disappointment of being unable to make the pilgrimage had compounded the pain inflicted by the war, speaking at his shattered home in Khan Younis, where the floor was strewn with rubble and masonry.
“Unfortunately, we lost our house,” he said, estimating repair costs at some $20,000. “Then came the closure of the border and we can’t go to Hajj, we can’t go to it. It was two blows at once,” he said.
“The pain of the war, the pain of the destruction, the pain of the siege and the pain of not being able to go to Hajj.”
The Hajj is one of the five basic obligations of a Muslim and every believer who has the means should perform the pilgrimage at least once in his or her lifetime. It begins on Friday.
Palestinians typically wait years for their turn after registering their names with the Palestinian authorities. Jarghoun said they had been waiting almost 18 years.
He said they had “sold everything in our possession, so that we can perform this duty. We are at the end of our lifetime. Unfortunately, the border was closed, closing with it all our hopes to perform this duty.”
Fatima Jarghoun, 65, said the couple had been very happy when their names were approved for the Hajj. But “at the end, all our dreams were gone. We were very, very upset,” she said.
Israel has besieged and laid waste to much of the Gaza Strip since launching an offensive in retaliation for the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack that killed some 1,200 people in Israel, according to Israeli tallies.
Israel’s offensive has killed more than 37,000 people in Gaza, according to the Palestinian enclave’s health ministry.
Gaza war shatters pilgrimage dream for Palestinian couple
https://arab.news/m44bu
Gaza war shatters pilgrimage dream for Palestinian couple
- Palestinians typically wait years for their turn after registering their names with the Palestinian authorities
Iran’s new supreme leader ‘safe and sound’ despite war injury reports: president’s son
TEHRAN: Iran's new supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei is "safe and sound" despite reports of an injury during the war with Israel and the United States, said the son of the Iranian president on Wednesday.
"I heard news that Mr Mojtaba Khamenei had been injured. I have asked some friends who had connections. They told me that, thank God, he is safe and sound," said Yousef Pezeshkian, who is also a government adviser, in a post on his Telegram channel.
State television had called Khamenei a "wounded veteran of the Ramadan war" but never specified his injury.
The new supreme leader is the son and successor of the Islamic republic's longtime ruler Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed in US-Israeli strikes on Iran on February 28 which triggered a war across the Middle East.
The 56-year-old Mojtaba Khamenei, a discreet figure who has rarely appeared in public or spoken at official events, has yet to address the nation or issue a written statement since he was declared supreme leader on Sunday.
In a Wednesday report, the New York Times quoting three unnamed Iranian officials said that Khamenei "had suffered injuries, including to his legs, but that he was alert and sheltering at a highly secure location with limited communication".
