Meet the generation of Palestinian division
Palestinian youth hope reconciliation will compensate for the dreams they lost as a result of the 10-year-long internal division.
Back in June 2007, Palestinian Ihab Abu Armanah, 18, was taking his national high school exams, the “tawjihi,” at the Nuseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip amid an exchange of fire between Hamas and Fatah gunmen.
On June 14, 2007, Hamas took over Gaza, and the geographical division turned into a deep political division that resulted in clashes.
Today, a decade later, the two Palestinian rival movements are exerting ambitious efforts to ensure the success of the reconciliation agreement reached on Oct. 12 in Cairo. But for Abu Armanah, the Hamas-Fatah reconciliation, which aims at handing over control of Gaza back to the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority, is meaningless.
Like most of his generation in the Gaza Strip, Abu Armanah was unable to pursue his academic studies or achieve his future plans under a 10-year-long siege imposed by Israel and Egypt on the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip. He told Al-Monitor, “I was worried and terrified. I made sure to finish all of my exams in just half an hour and to run back home.”
