With its unceasing bombardment of our homes and neighborhoods—which has killed over 23,000 people, reduced our cities to nothing, and made millions of us internally displaced refugees—Israel has transformed Gaza into a slaughterhouse. And with its continuous targeting of hospitals, bakeries, water wells, solar panels, and markets, Israel is depriving us of all the necessities of life. It is a gruesome attempt to break our spirit and destroy our hope, and it has turned every second of every day into a gamble with death.

This is what it takes to get through just one day in Gaza.

Each day, my family, along with three other families, goes on a mission to get what we need to make it to the next morning. When someone leaves the house, my mother and my aunts say a prayer.

Usually, two of my cousins are the first to go. From 4 am to 4 pm, they are trying to get bread at the bakery. The lines are endless, and Israel has no problem bombing bakeries, so this is not a simple task. Sometimes they will return victorious with one bag of bread. Or they return filled with disappointment: Either there was no bread, or people started fighting in the line and my cousins were afraid to stay there any longer.

My aunts, my mother, and I are usually responsible for going to the market twice a week. Our markets were once filled with delicious treats and lively colors. Now they look like they’re part of a ghost town, and so do we. We move like phantoms, eyes scanning desperately. A good day is when we get some potatoes, onions, salt, a small bag of rice, and two cans of beans or tuna.

Meanwhile, my brother and another cousin collect our phones and batteries and try to find a place to charge them. This could be a shop, a neighbor’s house (if the neighbor has solar panels that haven’t been bombed), a school, or a hospital.

We remain terrified until everyone returns. Every sound we hear is alarming; every time a bomb goes off, our hearts sink. Once we hear a knock at the door, we can finally catch our breath.

When the sun sets, the darkness seems to swallow even the faintest glimmer of hope. The bombs are like a thunderstorm that never ends.

How do we keep doing this? The simple answer is that we love each other too much not to.

The other thing that carries us forward is an all-consuming desire to know what is happening to our friends and our world here in Gaza. I spend every day looking for news about all the places and names I have ever known. Just as I breathe a little easier when someone returns from an errand, a loved one’s reply to my messages brings me a brief inkling of peace.