Los Angeles Times

Commentary: As a Gaza teen, I used to dream of college. Now I feel sentenced to death by Israel’s bombings

People gather around a crater among destroyed buildings in the aftermath of an overnight Israeli bombing in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on Dec. 3, 2023.

SOUTHERN GAZA — Until two months ago, my life as a 17-year-old in Gaza was marked by the predictable anxieties and aspirations of a student applying to university. I dreamt of crossing borders to pursue a better life — of landing on my feet at an American school and, eventually, of returning to serve my community as a doctor. Education was my blueprint for escaping this city of war.

Now as I huddle in a cramped, dimly lit room with 12 other women in Rafah, those

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