The sirens blared through the streets outside and within minutes were synced to the sirens on CNN. The city of Gaza was buzzing with the excitement of hosting such important guests. I was eight years old and trying to figure out what exactly was going on. The weight of the visit started to sink in as I watched the international news channel film the very neighborhood we were living in.

My parents and their friends soon let their impatience get the best of them and rounded us up to go outside. Our group descended into the street and joined the throngs of people accumulating along the main road. The onlookers craned their necks competing to catch the first glimpse of the motorcade.

Then the soldiers and long black limos rounded the corner and the crowd cheered enthusiastically. My dad picked up my little sister so she could get a better look and I stepped out on to the edge of the sidewalk for a front row view. A white man leaned toward the window of his limo and waved as the vehicle whizzed past. I waved back.

My dad bent down toward me and explained, “That is President Clinton and his wife Hilary. He’s the president of the United States.”

I recognized the man in the next limo. That was Yasser Arafat who was the Palestinian leader at the time. I had seen him at a ribbon cutting ceremony before and he was always on local news channels.

“You will want to remember this.” My mom added.

I looked around and tried to take it all in. I paid attention to the dust billowing behind the parade of long cars and felt the sun beating down on my shoulders. Most notably I sensed the palpable energy of happiness and pride resonating in that street as everyone swung their Palestinian flags toward they sky.

I now understand the importance of these major world leaders meeting at the Palestinian Authority headquarters that day. I was standing on the periphery of history unfolding between the first and second Intifada.

Living in the Gaza Strip was the first time that I developed an awareness of the conflict between Palestine and Israel. Up until we moved there we had been living in a small village in the West Bank that was a glen of comfort tucked deep in the countryside. In this city of Gaza it was hard to think that everything was okay when we were enclosed on all sides by refugee camps and border check points.

On the bus ride to school I always noticed the morbid graffiti etched on almost every wall. The graphic scenes of violence, despair, anger, and dripping blood were painted everywhere. These were places that people could display their patriotic heartache and brokenness in an artistic cry for all to see. Nothing was edited to consider, or protect, my young eyes.

I went to a private Catholic elementary school and during recess we were unleashed into the church compound. Instead of “cops and robbers” we played “Palestinians and Israelis”. I remember dodging lemon trees and running frantically through the courtyard trying to get away from classmates pointing pretend guns formed by their hands.

Although there were certainly echos of the first Intifada all around us, the 1990’s really were the best years in recent history to live in the area. Business was booming and there was money being invested into major infrastructure.  We went to school openings, art fairs, worker cooperative celebrations, marathon runs raising money for local charities, and were given private tours of the shiny new airport under construction. Everyone was proud to show our family all the new projects in progress, and there was such a bright vision for the future despite the evident pain of the past.

The beach was only a 10 minute walk from our house and we were there every other day. We spent countless afternoons in our swimsuits drinking sugary coca cola and swimming in the sparkling Mediterranean Sea. There were always friends from school or church congregating at the water and they would set up their beach towels next to ours.

It was a vibrant and exciting time to call Gaza home.

My dad was teaching English at the Islamic University of Gaza and my mother was working on various micro-financing projects in the refugee camps. She helped provide money (via MCC) for farmers to buy new tractors, kindergartens to have running water, and women to own sewing machines. This meant that we spent a lot of time in the camps visiting my dad’s students or mom’s co-workers.

The camps were so vividly alive, and housed a multitude of colors and smells! I played tag with kids in the dirt streets between the concrete houses until we were out of breath and called in for dinner. We would then sit on cushions on the floor and dig our small hands into mountains of rice and chicken as our parents poured us hot tea. It was magnificent.

Our family also visited farms outside of the refugee camps sometimes too. I would run through fields of endless plump strawberries and scoop up as many as I could fit into my mouth. There were also donkey rides, birthday parties, barbecues, getting lost in huge green houses, and farmers gifted us kittens to take home. I’m not sure my parents were so thrilled about taking home pets, but I personally couldn’t think of a better party favor.

On the drive back to the city I would poke my head out of our little yellow Subaru’s window and look out at the mysterious gated ghost towns along the highway. They were quiet and blank and their red tiled roofs stood out against the luscious Palestinian countryside. These were the hollow and stark Israeli settlements.

They seemed so out of place to me.

The other thing that didn’t seem to fit were the border crossings. I became used to them as we went in and out of Jerusalem at least once a month. Although this was routine, it never made sense to me that we needed approval to leave the city and drive only a short distance away.

There were once a couple of men trying to leave the same time our family was. A tall Israeli soldier in a green army uniform was patting them down forcefully and asking a lot of questions. The young Palestinians appeared uneasy as the soldier, Ray Bans perched on top of his head, shifted his massive gun around so he could better access their pockets. I didn’t say anything as my dad took my hand, flashed our USA passports, and we went straight through. I heard the soldier bark at one of the men to open his backpack for inspection as we accelerated away from the check point.

I still don’t know how to accept the privilege I experienced moving throughout the Middle East growing up. I felt Palestinian. I felt that Gaza was my home. I was comfortable and fully integrated. Most days it was virtually impossible to realize how temporary that would be, but ultimately I was able to leave. I left. Our family moved back to the United States and not long after that I turned on the news to watched my old city burn.

Years later, when I was in high school in Cairo, a bus I was sitting on was stopped in traffic. We didn’t budge for a long time and eventually word circulated that it was because Yasser Arafat’s body was in processional from the airport to his military funeral. He had died in France and was to receive a brief service, in his birth country of Egypt, before being sent to his final resting place in Ramallah.

I leaned my head against the dusty bus window and watched a very different motorcade make its way somberly past me. So much had changed since the joyous occasion I witnessed as a kid in the crowd watching him pass by with the Clinton’s. A wall was being built around the West Bank, gun shots and screams now overtook the street once bursting with pride and hope, and Israeli jets had bombed the shiny new airport.

I am continually perplexed by each headline that describes the horror taking place in that tiny strip of land. I feel like each bomb and each shot is aimed at my heart. I tremble and pray often for all of the good friends, that I feel like I abandoned, who face the true reality of that line of fire.

My whole body desperately yearns for the Palestine I once knew. That Palestine no longer exists and there is no plane ticket that can take me there. I haven’t been back to visit Gaza since we left in 1999 – without any anticipation of what was to come. We visited the West Bank and Jerusalem years later, but Gaza has never been safe enough to return to. Those strawberry fields and quiet days on the beach live only in my memory.