On seeing what's not meant to be seen

I spent last September and October volunteering with the Lebanese Civil Defense at the start of Israel’s barbaric war on Lebanon. I was in ambulances transporting victims of the pager attacks. I also manned the fire engine’s water pump while my colleagues extinguished flames engulfing an undetonated missile. As part of my duties, I was a paramedic, firefighter, and rescue worker — depending on wherever it was that I was most needed.

I went on my last search-and-rescue mission in late October, at the site of an Israeli airstrike that had pulverized several buildings next to Rafik Hariri University Hospital in Jnah. Our team was searching for martyrs beneath the rubble days after the attack. The small block of destroyed buildings was situated in an impoverished neighborhood where mostly migrants and Beirut’s lower-income families live.

All of the dead and injured were civilians. In the two days that I had been on-site, we sifted through mountains of rubble, searching for any sign of life. By the afternoon of my second day, we were unable to recover any bodies, only limbs.

The endless onslaught and destruction blended into a single memory, marked by a mélange of new sensations: my legs teetering on debris, the acrid taste and smell from the residue of bunker busters, and particles of dust finding their way into my eyes and throat like knives, the buzz of drones, and the wail of a martyr’s mother. My feet wobbled as I stood on the precipice of the crater. Below, my colleagues were digging out two martyrs — a mother and her son — who were buried under layers of concrete.

As they dug, the ‘corpse smell,’ ريحة جثث, climbed through the air, increasing in intensity until it was unbearable. The closer you are to extracting the bodies, the worse the smell gets. The martyrs’ family, the father and his son, watched somberly. Inside the belly of the crater, the bodies were about to be freed. A child emerged intact — he could have been asleep — his body lifeless and limp. His mother, weighed down by a block of concrete, was in pieces. Both of them were greyed either by death or by dust. I wasn’t sure.

All of the dead and injured were civilians. In the two days that I had been on-site, we sifted through mountains of rubble, searching for any sign of life. By the afternoon of my second day, we were unable to recover any bodies, only limbs.

A deeply selfish thought flashed in my mind: I wished I had never seen this.

I watched the body bags being lifted out in the mouth of a Caterpillar, and I knew that, from that point onwards, I would always be somebody who had seen this. And I would never be the same.

Scenes from a rescue mission. Photo courtesy of Thurraya Zreik.

Scenes from a rescue mission. Photo courtesy of Thurraya Zreik. 

Throughout my time as a first responder paramedic, I came across accidents, suicides, natural deaths, overdoses, bodies maimed, and bodies in various stages of decay. It was never easy; there is the common understanding among most people that we shouldn’t see such things unless we have consented to it. Regardless, I always tried to maintain an air of bravado and nonchalance that mirrored that of my (mostly male) colleagues.

I often chastised myself, asking myself who I thought I was and what I was trying to prove. I spoke with my friends, consulted my family, and brought it up in therapy. I grieved, reflected, and practiced measured self-compassion.

Responding to mass casualties in a war quickly revealed that an amputation from an accident is unlike an amputation inflicted by shrapnel. Searching for a drowned body is not the same as digging for corpses from the debris of what was once their neighbor’s living room. Responding to death and injury does not compare to bearing witness to atrocity. Even after a year of watching the slaughter in Gaza through my screen, I was still not prepared for what I had seen in my city. What I witnessed of the Israeli campaign of terror left me with a deep, burning wound.

I was suddenly split into two versions of myself: a before and an after.

The trivial little complexes of my previous life, like survivors’ guilt and imposter syndrome, were knocked out of me. Everything felt inconsequential, silly, superficial, and absurd, and far, far away.

After my last mission, I boarded a plane to Sardinia to pursue a doctorate degree in trauma. I scrambled to create a semblance of a normal life, listening to the news everyday and waking up to garbage trucks after mistaking them for airstrikes. I grew avoidant and fearsome of the mundane things like taking out the compost because the smell of rotting organic matter still reminds me of the smell of corpses — and probably will, forever.

Even after a year of watching the slaughter in Gaza through my screen, I was still not prepared for what I had seen in my city. What I witnessed of the Israeli campaign of terror left me with a deep, burning wound.

I quickly realized that the hardest thing was not that I suddenly found myself in Sardinia, but just being here — in this world. It is difficult, after having seen Things to carry on living in a world mostly populated by people who have not seen, nor smelt, nor in any way felt, these Things. Sometimes there is a palpable barrier between the world and me. Other times, I move through the world imperceptibly, like a ghost.

It is hard to carry all of these Things with me because they are Things that are not meant to be seen. They are also not meant to be shared with other people in your life. How could I possibly burden my loved ones with this, when they had not consented to it like I did? Even if they did, people are quick to move past the fact that you have seen Things, even if they do not know what those Things are.

The result is a lonely existence, and feeling like I have been sentenced to a life through which I must float alone. Despite my disdain towards the frivolities of life, I still indulge in the absurdity of normalcy. During the week I work at my department and write my silly little reviews, while conducting my silly little research. On weekends, I attend my silly little music lessons and shop for some silly little shoes and go on silly little treks to forage silly little mushrooms. I enjoy it wholly, but memories superimpose themselves on what is right in front of me, a reel of the Things I’ve seen projected onto my screen of the world.

Scenes from a rescue mission. Photo courtesy of Thurraya Zreik.

Scenes from a rescue mission. Photo courtesy of Thurraya Zreik. 

I understand why people do not want to imagine the Things that I have seen. But I feel angry and resentful. I also recognize that I cannot expect others to pay the price for having the ability to walk around unhaunted. I have been permanently changed, forever carrying a deep wound. And I wish desperately that, when people look at me, this wound was not invisible. Because at the deepest, most self-centered, and childish level, I am desperately craving for something to be tethered to again.

I watched the men around me, who never before failed to display their machismo, fall apart for the first time. Or maybe it was the frequency, the sheer volume, of bodies and blood and mangled limbs, one after the other, day after day. What I do know is that it was the way people were killed and maimed: in their cars, in their kitchens, on their balconies, with their children, that showed me the piercing injustice of it all. 

I often wonder if these Things had so radically transformed me because I watched the men around me, who never before failed to display their machismo, fall apart for the first time. Or maybe it was the frequency, the sheer volume, of bodies and blood and mangled limbs, one after the other, day after day. What I do know is that it was the way people were killed and maimed: in their cars, in their kitchens, on their balconies, with their children, that showed me the piercing injustice of it all. Every death and injury, every drop of blood spilled, every limb lost, every martyr is victim to a system of erasure with deep, expansive roots. I picture myself tripping over these roots and smashing my face. I imagine myself being strangled by them in my sleep.

I am perhaps the most insignificant casualty of this massive, sprawling monster, but since I can speak only on my behalf, I must say: I have been changed forever. Something inside me is fundamentally broken, transformed, vanished, or all of the above. I may be lucky to have survived the war, but I am now a ghost. Silly, broken, and untethered, I will forever carry the weight of these Things and what they meant: shards from a larger campaign of extermination, stripping the meaning of life as it strips away life itself.