Ghazal Mhanna, 15 — Trainers’ Academy, Tulkarm
He sat on his bench in the garden sipping his coffee quietly, enjoying the warm sunshine and the gentle spring breeze. Usaid glanced towards the wall to find that its shadow had disappeared…
The Stranger
Malak Mohammed al-Atawneh, 15 — Beit Kahil
He was beaten daily by his father, who came home drunk every day. No one defended him except his mother, but she was too weak to protect him, and often took the blows for him.
Ahmed grew up, and with him grew his hatred of his father and his resentment towards him. He had an overwhelming desire to rid himself of this wicked father. Ahmed became full of hatred towards the entire world, withdrawn, rarely leaving his room and only going out when forced to. When he did leave the house, he often got into fights with the neighbours’ children or the owner of the grocery shop near his home, sometimes even inventing reasons to pick quarrels with passers-by.
One day, while sitting alone on the hill near their house with a sharp knife, he saw a scrawny dog approaching him. He did not know how he approached the dog and stabbed it in the belly. The dog fell to the ground, drenched in blood. Ahmed stabbed the dog again, a third time, a fourth, until it fell dead. Unconsciously, he cut the dog into several pieces, then hid its body in a nearby cave.
When he returned home he showed no regret or remorse for what he had done. He went to sleep, and early the next morning he crept out of his room on tiptoe. He went to the hill with his knife, carrying his beloved cat Bayyoud. There in the cave he killed the cat, cut it up and buried it beside the dog. He repeated this several times.
His father grew suspicious of Ahmed’s repeated early morning departures, so one day he decided to follow him to see where he went. That day the father crept after Ahmed. And what horror he saw: he saw his son Ahmed slaughtering a rabbit, cutting it limb from limb, then burying it in the earth. The father felt terror, and involuntarily let out a scream that echoed throughout the cave. Ahmed immediately became aware of his father’s presence in the cave. He felt intense rage, remembering all those days when his father had beaten him and his mother so brutally, every single day. Before he knew it, he was moving towards his father, raising the knife to his face. The father stepped back in panic but stumbled over a stone and fell to the ground. Ahmed pounced on his father and was about to stab him with the knife, but the father dodged the blow, managed to get up and fled.
Ahmed did not return home for several days, but when he did return he found the police waiting for him. He tried to run, but they managed to catch him. After being examined by a psychiatrist, it was decided he should be placed in a psychiatric hospital.
It was painful for the mother, who did not stop crying for days and weeks. But it was at the same time a lesson for the father, who realised how wrong he had been when he beat his son in childhood, causing him this psychological trauma that had turned him into a young man empty of feeling or emotion.
The father’s treatment of his wife improved greatly, and after a few months Ahmed was returned home, having recovered from his mental illness and become a normal young man. The father rejoiced at Ahmed’s return, embraced him, showered him with a father’s affection and promised him that what he had done in the past would not be repeated. And indeed, Ahmed completed his university studies and became a successful veterinarian.
The End
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