Don't ask me to have hope, not again

Don't ask me to have hope, not again.

Today, I had to hug one of my closest friends as he cried over his beloved uncle who was martyred.

And I couldn't even stay with him long, because the emergency room was overflowing; children, women, bodies torn apart, injuries we didn't even know where to begin.

Minutes later, I checked the local news and panicked when I saw that another family home had been attacked, and I thought it was my uncle's family. It turned out to be a house belonging to one of my uncles relatives.

I was exhausted from my morning shift and finally ready to rest, when the airstrikes hit my camp.

Ambulances rushed in one after another, carrying more wounded than we could ever treat. For hours, until this very moment, I have seen children, women, and young men, blown apart again. Everyone was screaming in pain, vomiting blood, collapsing as the minutes passed.

One young man arrived with blood pouring from his lungs, his abdomen, even his urine.

I felt something solid under the skin of his abdomen, I wasn't sure at first what it was. But then I knew: a large piece of shrapnel, that entered from his back, and settled just under his skin.

How can anyone ask me to have hope, when my people are left to bleed and suffer this, without end, at the mercy of those who believe they can punish the innocent whenever they choose.

I walked into the room and started shouting at the camera, desperate for the world to hear me. But deep down, I knew it wouldn't matter, because nothing will change. And here I am, writing this through exhaustion, knowing it's probably meaningless. I've been doing this for hundreds of days, and it hasn't saveda single life.