On 14 May 1948, Simsim village faced a fierce attack by Israeli troops. As a result, my father removed the family to the Seifa area, north of Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza. About three months later, we and many villagers came back to the village to protect our lands and properties.
A survivor from Simsim, northeast of Gaza, describes the May 1948 attack that drove his family out of the village when he was ten years old.
Jaber Ahmad Mohammad Shaban was born in 1938 in Simsim, a farming village about 14 kilometers northeast of Gaza, whose roughly 1,500 residents cultivated cereals, citrus and vegetables. The village was attacked in mid-May 1948 by units of the Negev Brigade; its people were expelled toward Gaza and were never permitted to return. The family went back once, three months after the first flight, to try to protect their land, but a second attack — by air, tanks and ground troops in the early hours of the morning — forced them out for good.
Shaban recorded his testimony for Al Mezan’s Nakba Day 2024 series. He describes years of poverty in the Jabaliya refugee camp, his later work with UNRWA, and a hope of return he says he still holds at the age of 85. Simsim’s lands are today used by Kibbutz Gvar’am.
Sources
Source
Quoted exactly as published by Al Mezan Center for Human Rights. Visit the archive for the full testimony.
Al Mezan Center for Human Rights