Just days after Israel began its siege on Gaza in October 2023, Reem Ahmed and her family were bombed by Israel. The 25-year-old artist and architect was buried under rubble. Her family believed she was dead. Washington Post reporter Ruby Mellen worked with illustrator and comics artist Rama Duwaji to take readers into Reem’s experience of spending 12 hours buried in rubble.

We depicted this story as a comic to visually immerse readers into a story that wasn’t captured by cameras and to reflect Reem’s identity as an artist.

Reporting by Ruby Mellen. Illustrations by Rama Duwaji. Editing by Reem Akkad and Hannah Good. Design editing by Christine Ashack and Joseph Moore. Copy editing by Brian Cleveland.

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