By Nourdine Jamal, APAN’s Correspondent in Gaza
Images: Nourdine Jamal
May 11 2026 29, 2026
This is all that remains of a library that once held more than 10,000 books.
Blackened shelves. Pages reduced to ash. Here, in Al-Zawiya Market in Gaza City, Abu Jameel, 65, stands in the middle of loss, as if guarding a memory that has burned. The library was never just a business. It was a lifelong passion.
“Since I was a child, I loved collecting old coins and stamps,” he says. “I used to go to the sea and find ancient coins… it was pure joy for me.”
Step by step, that passion grew. He began by selling simple items, then opened a small shop where he bought old books and antiques. Over time, collecting turned into a profession.
“I started trading in antiques. Every piece I had carried a story.”
Before the war, I used to visit his shop in Al-Zawiya Market almost every week. It wasn’t just a bookstore; it was a hidden treasure. Among its shelves were rare books from the 1990s, along with old documents, coins, and paper currency that were nearly impossible to find elsewhere. It felt like a quiet refuge in the middle of a crowded city.
When asked to describe his library in one word, he smiles and answers in English:
“Home.”
But that home did not survive.
“A heavy strike hit the library,” Abu Jameel says. “More than 10,000 books burned. Most of my old books, documents, coins, and paper currency are gone.” A single strike erased years of passion and work. The loss did not stop there.
His home in Tal al-Hawa was completely destroyed. After being displaced to the south, he returned to find it reduced to rubble.
“We could hardly believe we made it back… We returned and found our home destroyed. So I had no choice but to stay here, with my family, in what’s left of the library.”
In one corner of the burned space, Abu Jameel and his family have laid out what blankets they could find. The back of the library, once a place for reading, has become a temporary shelter. Between charred walls lives a man who spent his life preserving knowledge, now searching for a roof to protect his family. The books that survived are few, scattered and covered in dust. But to him, they are not just objects.
“This is not just stuff… this is my whole life.”
Still, he refuses to give up.
“I believe a person should never surrender,” he says. “You have to keep going despite everything. I have no other job, and I hate staying at home without working. So I decided to reconnect with life and rebuild my library again. I still have hope.”
The smell of burned paper still lingers in the air. The library is gone. The home is gone.
But hope, as Abu Jameel insists, is still alive.
Translated by Nourdine Shnino