Asim Rafiqui

Show Navigation
  • Portfolio
  • About
  • Contact
  • Archive
    • All Galleries
    • Search
    • Cart
    • Lightbox
    • Client Area

Search Results

Refine Search
Match all words
Match any word
Prints
Personal Use
Royalty-Free
Rights-Managed
(leave unchecked to
search all images)
{ 11 images found }

Loading ()...

  • Outside an eye clinic
    RAA008SE103.jpg
  • Early morning scene
    RAA008SE031.jpg
  • Families rest and play at the gates of the Nagnath
    RAA008SE107.jpg
  • Street scene
    RAA008SE112.jpg
  • Street scene at a local market
    RAA008SE116.jpg
  • Street scene in Baroda, Gujarat
    RAA008SE041.jpg
  • Ismail Ibrahim Abu Eida and I sat together near the rubble of what had once been his family home, sipping our freshly brewed cups of tea He seemed to take pleasure in poking at the wood fire under the tea pot, and refilling the cups of those sitting about him. <br />
<br />
He sat in the dirt, while I balanced myself on a 3-and-a-half legged plastic chair that had been bought over for me. The mist that covered the citrus groves was now lifting as the day grew hotter, revealing the devastation that had once been the Jabaliya industrial zone. <br />
<br />
He pointed towards the West and said "There is Israel." I could see a wire fence, and the silhouettes of soldiers walking along it. Israeli farmers had begun working their fields that morning as jeeps filled with soldiers raced back and forth along the border areas and snipers kept an eye on the few Palestinians who dared to return to their lands.  Despite the cease fire, farmers were being shot and killed at random.  <br />
<br />
"I used to work in Israel," he mumbled after a few minutes "but that was a different time, a different world."
    gaza_27209_027.jpg
  • I found it impossible to take my eyes off Najwaen Rabi Ahmed Sultan's face. Not only because of her beauty, but also because of the strength that seemed to emanate from within her. <br />
<br />
She and her family had fled from their home as the Israeli tanks devastated Beit Lahiya and spent weeks moving between shelters set up in various local school buildings.  The indignities faced by her sisters and her mother left a deep impression on her. <br />
<br />
I come from a cultured, educated family she fumed - a family of traditions and history. But for weeks we suffered like animals, dependent on others and at the mercy of the whims and taunts of rude and callous aid agency staff. <br />
<br />
She held herself upright, looked me straight in the eyes It was too much to bear - to be able to do nothing, to watch my mother plead and beg for our food, blankets or a place to wash.. No child should ever have to see that.
    gaza_27195_015.jpg
  • I asked Issa Abdul Hadi el Batrans' brothers if I could meet with him. They shook their heads and looked away apologetically. "His world has become unbearable to him," his youngest brother said to me, "he is unable to face anyone or anything."<br />
<br />
His only remaining child, Abdil Hadi, sat in her uncle's lap and stared at me.<br />
<br />
16 days earlier, on January 16th 2009, Issa Abdul Hadi el Batran's wife Manal, his 13 year old daughter Islam, his 10 year old daughter Iman, his 8 year old daughter Ihsan, his 6 year old son Bilal and his 5 year old son Ezzedine were killed in a missile attack on their home. <br />
<br />
My interview had ended before it could begin. Abdil Hadi continued to stare at me. I asked to hold her and saw questions in her eyes.
    gaza_27181_004.jpg
  • "Tell me one thing you liked to do with your brother?" I asked.<br />
<br />
She let her eyes wander, bit her lip and made as if to think. "I liked walking with him to school."<br />
<br />
Noor Samoni, sister of 8-year-old Zakaria Hamid Samoni, who was killed by a rocket fired from an Israeli helicopter operating in their neighborhood, laughed when she said this and hid behind her mother.<br />
<br />
"Who will you walk with now?"<br />
<br />
"I don't need to. Mama says that they killed the school as well."
    gaza_27184_021.jpg
  • "Sons are the light of their mother's eyes," she said," and my eyes have lost their light."<br />
<br />
She kept dialing a number in Egypt. Consoling relatives and neighbors who filled the front compound of her home kept handing her their mobiles in the hope that one of them would connect to the Egyptian hospital where Nabila Jadali's sons had been sent for treatment. <br />
<br />
She had already buried Mohamad Jadali. Her son had not survived the rain of shells that landed in her home. She had no time to mourn however. Two other sons were in an emergency room in Egypt, evacuated across the Rafah border, and she was unable to locate them. <br />
<br />
Abdil Hadi had been blinded in the same attack and Khalil had lost his legs. <br />
<br />
She had lost one son but had no time to think about that. She had two more she could possibly loose.
    gaza_27181_013.jpg
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
x