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Gaza landlords refuse to rent to 'targeted families'

Landlords and residents in the Gaza Strip are reluctant to live next to families who were targeted by Israel in the recent war, fearing they may also become targets in any future confrontation.
A Palestinian man throws a flag atop the rubble of the home of Hamas Gaza leader Ismail Haniyeh, which Gaza's interior ministry said was hit by a missile fired by Israeli aircraft before dawn on Tuesday, causing damage but no casualties, in Gaza City July 29, 2014. Israel's military pounded targets in the Gaza Strip on Tuesday after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his country needed to be prepared for a long conflict in the Palestinian enclave, squashing any hopes of a swift end to 22 days of fightin

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — The tragedy that befell Yasser Hajj, who lost all his family members on July 10 after Israel shelled his home in Khan Yunis, was followed by isolation. Hajj was forced to leave his destroyed home and had a hard time finding a new place to rent. The building owner's excuse was always the same — “We do not rent to targeted families or resistance members.”

Hajj told Al-Monitor: “I never expected this to happen after I had lost my family, especially because everyone knows my relatives are not members of the targeted resistance [Hamas]. My mother, father, younger siblings and I are not members of the resistance.”

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