I JUST WANT TO GO HOME

She went to Gaza with her new husband a few months ago to visit his family - now this South African woman is trapped as war rages all around

- JACQUES MYBURGH

HER life should have been so different. Six months ago she married her Palestinian husband and they’d planned to carve out a life for themselves in the beautiful Cape, in between the mountain and the sea.

Things looked rosy for Angela van der-Merwe – but instead of watching the clouds roll in over Table Mountain, she now has to keep a wary eye on the sky for airstrikes from Israel.

“You feel like a hostage. You can’t go anywhere. You wonder if you’re going to be the next target,” she tells YOU over a WhatsApp video call from Rafah, north of Gaza City, where she’s sheltering with a backpack and only the clothes on her back.

Angela (36) has been at a United Nations (UN) shelter near the Rafah bor­ der post for 10 days.

Her husband, Asharf Skaik, chose to stay behind with his family in the Gaza Strip for the time being and each day in the war­torn area feels like an eternity, she says.

“Every day you get up with new hope that today is the day you will finally get out of the country.

“That you can finally get away from the war and the sorrow and every day there is no news.”

The nights are the hardest for her. When darkness descends she lies on a thin mattress on the floor with her backpack, which serves as a pillow, listening to the cries of refugees, the stutter of assault rifles and the sound of airstrikes.

“There are bombs falling all the time. You can’t fall asleep. You hear people crying and praying. Everyone here lives in fear,” she says.

Exhaustion and fear are etched on her face.

“I want to come home,” she pleads. “I want to get away.”