The last time Ibrahim Alanqar heard gunshots he was in Gaza city, sipping tea in his aunt’s apartment.

When Alanqar, Abu Dhabi junior, asked about the bullet holes in the walls, his uncle shrugged as if they belonged there, a few feet away from family portraits.

That was in 2004, during the second intifada, a violent Palestinian uprising against Israelis.

Even though he was one of the few that possessed a Palestinian passport, tightened security and increased sanctions would prevent Alanqar from returning to Gaza.

The recently ended 23-day war between Israel and Hamas, the militant Islamic group governing the Gaza strip, brought back Alanqar’s memories of littered streets and bullet holes. He said he worried students on campus wouldn’t understand, or worse still, wouldn’t care about the recent violence.

According to a statement by the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the war began with Israel responding to repeated rocket and mortar attacks from Gaza. Israel sent aerial and ground initiatives into Gaza on Dec. 27 to destroy Hamas’ security compounds and government buildings.

Alanqar said paying attention to the situation in Israel was important for the student body.

“At least one person on this campus will become involved in politics,” he said. “And what happened in Gaza won’t be the last time violence erupts in Palestine.”

Kimmy Lear, Minneapolis senior, has spent her life studying Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. She said she worried about the media coverage of the conflict. “You don’t get the whole story if you only get one point of view,” Lear said.

Alanqar agreed, and he said the closeness between the United States and Israel caused him to seek out other news sources on a daily basis, usually BBC and Al-Jazeera.

Alanqar and Lear said one of the issues that seemed to be misrepresented was the number of deaths and the causes.

According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, damages were high on both sides of the Israeli-Gaza border, but civilians in the Gaza strip comprised the most casualties.

While exact numbers are being debated by human rights groups, during the conflict an estimated 1,314 Palestinians were killed, 512 of whom were women and children.

The high number of civilian Palestinian casualties doesn’t mean that Israelis haven’t suffered, Lear said. The reason Israeli casualties were so low was because of protective measures taken by the government.

“Israel has a top-of-the-line army and security systems,” she said. “It allows citizens near the rocket attacks to take cover. They still suffer damages and destruction.”

Lear said the defenses, which included bomb shelters and an early-warning siren system for incoming rockets, were put in place in response to years of being bombarded by Hamas’ bombs and rockets.

Philip Schrodt, professor of political science, said another factor that might have thrown perceptions off about the death toll was the living conditions of each side. Citizens in the Gaza strip are far more crowded than citizens of southern Israel, and they do not have the means to take cover, Schrodt said.

Schrodt spent nine months teaching at Birzeit University in the West Bank. He said even though Israeli armed forces tried to warn civilians of aerial attacks and urged them to evacuate, it didn’t matter.

“Where would they go? The sea?” Schrodt said.

Living conditions in the Gaza strip had steadily worsened since the last time Alanqar was there. He said he thought it was because of the economic sanctions placed on the region by western powers in response to Hamas being elected. Hamas has openly denounced Israel and negotiations with western powers while promoting constant shelling of Israel and suicide attacks, which have not been used since 2005.

Alanqar said people supporting another intifada wasn’t likely.

“The people are tired,” he said, “They are tired of the economic sanctions and the danger. They are tired of their children growing up in a war zone.”

— — Edited by Carly Halvorson