50 years of Arab dispossession

4- We must follow Abou Bakr's (the first Guided Khaliph) commandments to his army on its way to Palestine: "Do not kill a child; an elderly, or a woman; do not burn trees, or demolish a single house; do not chase someone running away; do not mutilate bodies of the dead; and do not come near those who dedicate themselves to worshipping."

If it were for me I would say: "let your swords rest in their shields, do not fight anybody, there is enough room in the world for all." But who would listen to me nnow or pay any attention to what I think. Like Jesus, I say "my kingdom is not of this world". *** The hiss of bullets goes day and night, unabated, the sound of like we had never heard before, not even during the past world wars. Whenever we get into our houses we expect the celling to fall on our heads, and wehnever we walk it is always in the shadow of a wall or san-filled barrels as we are always afraid of a stary bullet hitting us.

It is worth recording that whenever the roaring of bombs and mines or the hissing of bullets intensify, friends and family members phone us one after the other, no matter at what late hour. Our house is located at an area of Katamon that looks from afar like the mouth of a volcano constantly throwing fire and smoke. They keep phoning to know whether we still exist. We congratulate each other on safety, though we feel the same way Mutanabi felt when he said: "Though safe now, I may not exist for long. For I walk from death to death."

No wonder, with such a state of affairs, that inhabitants of Katamon are constantly thinking of moving to another neighbourhood, or even another country. They want to run away from this constant worry and the danger confronting them day and night. What depresses one so much is the terror which overtakes women and children. Many people have left either to the old city, to Beit Jala, to Amman, to Cairo or wherever. Very few of the proprietors have remained. Us, the Mahfouz brothers, Farid Srouji, Daoud Taleil and Youssef Abdou.

Sunday, March 28, 1948 All day we have been collecting whatever news we can get on the battle in the south between a Jewish convoy and the Arabs. All what we knew at the beginning was that the Arabs attacked the convoy while on its way back to Jerusalem. We also learned that the Arabs erected barracades like high walls in the way of the convoy, and that the [British] army was unable to get to the battlefield. We kept hearing deep shelling from afar, and we were afraid that the army was ponding the Arabs with its cannons. It was even said that the Jews bombed the Arabs from aeroplanes using tons of bombs. At nine o'clock we opened the radio and listened to what it had to say: "14 Jewish men were killed, while nearly 45 others were injured. The rest ran to shelter in an empty house but the Arabs surrounded the place and kept firing. When the army interfered the only thing it could do to stop the fighting and prevent more blood shed was