For the deaf children of Gaza, disability has
a new and perilous dimension amid the fighting. Jan McGirk reports from Jabalia
on the work of the Welfare Association, which provides specialised care
Jihad Kafarneh finally cracked a smile yesterday. It was only the second time
in three weeks, since the siege of Gaza was at its height. The 14-year-old
Palestinian, who was born deaf in Beit Hanoun town, was a silent witness to the
Israeli army's pre-dawn attack on a neighbour's four-storey house last month.
Blood puddled an inch deep in the lane where 17 members of the al-Athamna family
lay dying, blasted apart by tank shells.
Jihad had been curled up on his
mattress, trying to figure out why shudders were suddenly wracking his body. He
felt weird vibrations cramping deep in his gut, yet he was not sick. Could it be
an earthquake? The treads of dozens of tanks outside rocked the bedroom floor
while the staccato automatic gunfire raked walls and windows. He rushed outside
to see. Unable to hear the shouts of troops ordering him to leave, the
light-haired boy stood still, transfixed by the horror around him. The tang of
blood and cordite stung the smoky air. Within moments furious Israeli soldiers
rushed toward him. Jihad did not heed their commands so they kicked him to the
ground. Boot-shaped bruises still mottle his skin.
For four days, Jihad
cowered inside his home, too frightened to leave his bedroom and attend classes
for the hearing impaired at the Jabalia Rehabilitation Society. His school for
90 children in northern Gaza is supported by the Welfare Association, one of the
three charities picked for The Independent's 2006 Christmas Appeal. Today Jihad
sits in a cosy nook in the school's library, surrounded by other deaf children
who were just as confused and frightened by the Israeli military offensive,
lyrically codenamed Operation Autumn Clouds, which had overrun their home town.
Jihad is no longer morose and watchful. He is the centre of attention,
describing that awful night, using international sign language to choreograph a
battle in the air. The other girls and boys interrupt, their hands a flurry of
precise signs. A teacher and social worker oversee this discussion before it
becomes a silent shoutdown. Eid Wahdan, a tall 12-year-old, tells with his hands
how he had watched the fighting from his window until a bullet pierced his
chest. He was unaware of any troops ordering him to get away, and they had aimed
at a boy in pyjamas looking out of his bedroom window.
The children have
drawn on white paper stick figures bristling with weapons and lop-sided stars of
David on attack helicopters and tanks. In one drawing, a tall house collapses in
a corner. When I point to a lone figure, sketched with a big knit cap, and ask
why the mouth is drawn in such a grim line, the boys snicker at my naivete and
one makes a bold sign: "He's a Palestinian with a rocket," the teacher
translates. The children grin.
Communication skills are the aim of all the
programmes for the deaf run by the Rehabilitation Society, which has been
operating in Jabalia for 15 years. There is a sister school in Deir al-Balah
Camp in central Gaza.
Speech therapy, which is provided for a wide range of
disabled students, is paramount for the deaf. After a screening service
calibrates their degree of hearing loss, professionals and volunteers are on
hand to tailor the course to individual or group needs.
A visit to the
innovative FM transmitter lab supported by the Welfare
Association, where at first glance the students appear to be plugged
into generic iPods, is a revelation. Soundwaves can be amplified until some
profoundly deaf children are able to hear for the first time ever, albeit inside
their earpieces.
"Youngsters will jump into the air at the novelty of
hearing sound for the first time," says the director, Khalid Abu Shuaib. This
wireless FM system works up to a range of about 60 metres from the teacher's
desk, and in optimum cases, a pupil's hearing ability can be raised up to 80 per
cent of normal capacity. Students are able to repeat teachers' phrases, learning
to modulate volume and pitch so that eventually the non-deaf can understand
them. One 16-year-old in a spangled scarf talks in a high-pitched voice and is
shown how to bring the tone down.
"When the hearing ability goes up, so does
their grades," Abu Shuaib said. "These sessions measurably lift confidence and
their intelligence." The Welfare Association also provides free hearing aids,
plus vital instructions on how to use them and keep them running in spite of
Gaza's dire conditions. Family support and community integration are crucial
factors, too, to prevent the deaf from becoming isolated with a disability which
is invisible to the rest of the world.
Jabalia's principal audial
technician, Akram Eid, is concerned that services must be limited to children
over the age of four as diagnosing hearing loss in nursery-age children and
starting therapy early would eliminate learning gaps and prevent social
isolation. "Hi-tech equipment to measure the very young is extremely expensive,"
he said, "and right now our inability to test the little ones is what bothers me
the most. But we are working on it." For more than three months, a blockade
delayed medical equipment from entering Gaza, and five months of sustained
military assaults increased the challenges inside the rehabilitation centre.
In an area as densely packed as the Gaza Strip, where 1.4 million people are
crammed into a walled-off space 10km by 40km, the incidence of deafness is
disproportionately high. Hearing loss tends to run in families, and Palestinian
families are large.
The Jabalia school's energetic director, Hussein Abu
Mansour, grew up in an extended family where five members have a disability.
Consequently, his international sign language is as fluent as his Arabic or
English, and he posts pictorials of the hand signals alongside translations in
curvy Arabic script and English. Just one sign needs no translation: a notice
barring any weapons from the campus.
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