“I’ve been working in the region since the 90’s.
When Hamas won this year’s election, Palestinians were hoping that their economic and social situation would improve, but instead it got worse. The arm wrestling between Hamas, Fatah, Israel and the rest of the world is now drowning the people of Gaza. Late June, after four month of international embargo, the economical situation was already bad, but when the pro-Hamas armed militants abducted an Israeli soldiers, the Israeli army launched a large scale military operation over the Gaza Strip. Now, taking pictures in Gaza has become a struggle. Danger is coming from different sides. On one side, the Israeli airstrikes, snipers and tanks firing; on the other side, a crawling civil war, which Palestinians are not proud of, plus the constant kidnapping threat. But in the end, the biggest challenge is to photograph the situation in a way that will not be redundant. Gaza’s problems are not new and the world have been looking at pictures of the Palestinian misery since so long that even the most violent images have no more impact nor any sense. Even my eyes are tired of the Palestinian drama sometime, and that is maybe why I get caught by details. As the conflict and the pain has become ordinary even for the Palestinians themselves, my intention is to look at the ordinary as well. Life without electricity, an empty fridge, a Television with out images, in the room of a house which construction may never be achieved. Children wearing bright color tee shirts as only sign of happiness, or a plastic cup holding a lonely rose in a hospital room…. I’m not looking for direct impact any more, and beside funerals and destruction, I want to show the daily life of the people in Gaza through their personal environment.”

Alexandra Boulat