[Al Arabiya Latest] A year after Israel's devastating air, land and sea assault on the impoverished Gaza Strip, Kamal Awaja's family is still living in a tent on the rubble of their home and a few miles away the Sawafieri family is raising chickens by hand after Israeli bulldozers crushed tens of thousands of birds in their cages, systematically destroying a fully-automated farm.
During the three-week assault, which Israel launched on Dec. 27, the Awaja's were trapped behind the front lines when ground troops backed by tanks and aircraft stormed into northern Gaza in what would prove to be the deadliest Israeli attack ever launched on the coastal territory.
Awaja and his wife were wounded as they tried to flee and it was four days before they were able to get to a hospital, he says.
Their eight-year-old son Ibrahim was shot dead as their home was destroyed.
Now the smiling boy with curly black hair stares down from memorial posters hanging on the family's tent, which has been cobbled together from canvas shelters donated by aid groups, dingy plastic tarps and wool blankets.
Israel has sealed Gaza off from all but vital humanitarian aid and the limited amount of cement and iron smuggled in through tunnels from Egypt is beyond the financial means of the vast majority of the territory's 1.5 million residents, most of whom rely on foreign aid.
| Perhaps they should complain to their government, which they elected. |
Some 6,400 homes were severely damaged or destroyed during the war, according to United Nations figures. Most of those who lost homes now share crowded apartments with relatives or huddle under tents supplied by aid groups.
| Next time don't start a war. It always ends badly for the common people. |
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