Growing up in Gaza, I didn’t realize that the siege I was living under was unique or that others didn’t face a constant threat of death. It was only after I left that I understood I had grown up in a concentration camp, and that it shaped my life.

As a graduate student from Gaza studying in Wyoming, I live in two dimensions: one where life moves peacefully forward, and another where everything I love is collapsing. I live in both worlds at once, holding grief and strength in the same breath.