For my generation, and thereby for myself as well, it was hard to fully imagine what happened to our parents and grandparents in 1948 — how they were uprooted and torn from their land. How and why did they get the idea to leave their homes?

Sometimes, in response to all these questions, I allowed myself to think that perhaps they weren't brave enough to defend themselves. Other times, I told myself that they were abandoned by their Arab neighbors... and the same story repeats itself! The feeling of having been abandoned by fellow Arab countries; none of them want us — or any other country for that matter! We see how a neighbouring country is not even willing to open its own borders to let in trucks with food and medicine for the people of Gaza, who are dying from starvation and lack of healthcare. But maybe they just don't want to. 

It's hard for me to believe, to realise the extent of which my life was suddenly turned upside down, from one day to the next, by becoming "stateless." That is to say: I was torn away from my homeland, far away from my family, the town I remember from my childhood and youth, and the place where I still have family and friends.

Since the Nakba, 75 years ago, we have only managed to know what happened in 1948 through the raw testimonies of our elders — generations that will soon be gone. Thanks to them, we got to learn about their daily lives — they told us about the expulsions and how they were conducted  and gave us their accounts of the massacres committed at the time. But their testimonies were vague, leaving the door open to interpretation, like a film with no outline or end, where we piece together all the scenes and sequences based on their stories.

Each time that I filmed an elderly person to document their story of the Nakba, I had to use my imagination to try to construct their situation inside my mind and be able to describe it and better understand it. But I failed, every time. 

Today, after spending 120 days under bombardment in Gaza, and after 208 days of horrors imposed on two and a half million civilians, I can finally understand what actually happened to our elders. What they have told us and described to us over the last 75 years; I can finally imagine it - especially since our generation is currently experiencing a situation that is perhaps much harder and even more heartbreaking than the one our elders experienced!

I have gotten to know, discovered for myself, what it means to leave your home, what it's like to be homeless, what it's like to be hungry, to try to sleep without food, and what it's like to be powerless with your children, unable to explain the reason for this violent outbreak to my daughter! 

Now that I've experienced and realized what it's like to be bombarded every day for four months and how precious our lives are, I have had to run away from every risk; not to die and leave my orphaned daughters behind. I've known the incredible luck of miraculously escaping death, finding myself to be the only survivor among a dozen dead in a house bombing; how lucky I was among all those victims, all the friends and family... What meaning can we ascribe to our lives?

This war was not my choice, nor that of other Palestinians, nor did I choose to leave Gaza. What do you do when you brutally find yourself in the middle of extreme violence? How do you survive surrounded by war? Stay and take illusionary security measures? Listen to the orders of an army that sees us as animals and whose soldiers have a license to kill as if it were hunting season? To leave behind all the beauty and flaws that make up Gaza? Ultimately being forced into exile and experiencing the pain of the diaspora, leaving family and friends behind in a wounded homeland.

In the past, I was perhaps more motivated to stay in France. I remember very well how stressed I was when I was a student in Corsica, my insomnia, night after night, how my body was present while my heart and head remained in Gaza. It was an exceptional time for me and I could have chosen to stay in France. But I didn't want to, because my aim was to use my degree to make films about Gaza. I wanted to be with my family and in the country that had given me everything. My return wasn't easy because, as an expatriate, I experienced two shocks: upon my arrival abroad and upon the return to my country. But I have nothing to complain about, I succeeded on all fronts, I became a reference director, journalist, teacher, husband and father in a country that has never been stable.

I left Gaza by force, like a tree uprooted from its soil, just like my ancestors did 75 years ago. Will I plant my roots in a new land? I have returned to this society where I once dreamed of becoming a citizen. I came back here to ensure a dignified and beautiful life for my wife and three daughters, who were taken from Gaza without any form of transition (and are still living in the past). I made the choice to leave Gaza, to come to France and ask for protection, to recover and build a new life, but is it possible for a person to rebuild their life while becoming stateless?