Manufacturing Dissent: Gaza's Realities

Gaza’s Forgotten Families Update #2 (With Receipts): Baby Boxes Delivered

KairosTimeNow — Sat, 13 Jun 2026 00:22:35 GMT

Welcome to the second update from the initiative Gaza’s Forgotten Families.

A reminder. This initiative was set up to reach those families who have no access to social media or no family members abroad to advocate for them and therefore have no way of asking for assistance in the most dire circumstances.

In today’s update we are delighted to let you know that we delivered on our first ‘Baby Box Initiative’. This initiative specifically targeted families with infants who were struggling to meet the most basic needs of those babies. We delivered Baby Boxes to nine families. Each box contained baby formula, diapers and baby bottles – all items desperately needed by families with small babies trying to survive in desperate conditions. We launched this part of the initiative having received reports of families with infants struggling to keep those babies alive.

So in the interest of transparency let’s see how these costs break down:

Since our first distribution we managed to raise an additional $635 and the following section explains the distribution of these funds and the costs associated with them.

Funds received and disbursement

Total raised through donations: $635
Net disbursed to campaign manager after Stripe processing: $614
Less Wire transfer fee to move funds into crypto platform: $52
Amount received inside Gaza: $583
After Crypto conversion and access costs (approximately 10%) the resulting cash available for distribution inside Gaza: $506
Of that amount $502 was used directly toward aid purchases for our first Baby Box distribution.

WHATS NEXT?

We are not stopping here - our next targeted Initiative will be

‘THE ESSENTIALS INITIATIVE’

As we continue listening to the needs on the ground, our next phase will focus on the essentials families need to preserve health, dignity, and daily survival. This initiative involves the procurement and distribution of three separate ‘aid packages’ broken down as follows:

Care Package One — Hygiene Supplies for 50 Families

This will include purchasing items (where available) like soap, shampoo, toothpaste and toothbrushes, household cleaning supplies, sanitizing materials, etc.

Costs:

50 families x $50 per package = $1000
Supporting costs: Transportation and procurement: $50, Distribution and delivery: $50, Documentation and follow-up: $50
Total: $1,150

Care Package Two – Usable water distribution for approx. 1000 individuals

Provide emergency water access to displaced communities facing severe shortages. Basic water access for several days.

Plan: Supply 1 truck of usable water

Cost:

Water truck: $400
Supporting Costs: Coordination and distribution: $50
Total: $450

Donate to Gaza's Forgotten

Care Package Three – Bread Distribution for 50 families

Provide bread to families struggling to secure daily meals. This will support immediate food access for 1-2 days

Plan: 50 families x 13 loaves per family (approx. 250 individuals)

Cost:

Bread: $300
Transportation: $50
Distribution: $50
Total: $400

Financial Summary for all three Care Packages

Hygiene Initiative → $1,150
Water Initiative → $450
Bread Initiative → $400
TOTAL CURRENT TARGET: $2,000

Every initiative will continue to follow our commitment to transparency through the provision of receipts (where possible), photo and video evidence, distribution documentation and periodic progress reports.

Every single dollar raised helps us move from waiting to action.

So lets reach this current target of $2000 and get these care packages into the hands of desperate families who are crying out for help – before its too late.

Please continue to donate to this great initiative. Please share this update with friends, colleagues and family. You can be reassured when doing so that you are funding an initiative that is making an immediate difference on the ground in Gaza, that is reaching those hardest to reach and that at all times is transparent and accountable for every cent raised.

Thank you for helping us continue to reach families who have no one else and no way to raise their own funds. Our aim is to reach as many families as possible and the more donations we receive the more families we can reach. Its that simple.

Our aim is to help keep people alive long enough for them to survive this genocide. This WILL end. And your donations can help keep some man, woman, child or infant alive long enough to survive it. That’s the brutal reality.

Thank you again in advance and lets get this current $2000 target reached!

📎 https://chuffed.org/project/183781-gaza-forgotten-families-fund

Manufacturing Dissent exists because of you. We’re independent—powered only by readers and listeners. For less than a coffee, you can join us. Annual memberships are 30% off. Stand with us. Fuel citizen journalism. Keep dissent alive.

Gaza’s Forgotten Families Update #2: Baby Boxes Delivered

KairosTimeNow — Thu, 11 Jun 2026 16:36:20 GMT

Welcome to the second update from the initiative Gaza’s Forgotten Families.

So in the interest of transparency let’s see how these costs break down:

Since our first distribution we managed to raise an additional $635 and the following section explains the distribution of these funds and the costs associated with them.

Funds received and disbursement

Total raised through donations: $635
Net disbursed to campaign manager after Stripe processing: $614
Less Wire transfer fee to move funds into crypto platform: $52
Amount received inside Gaza: $583
After Crypto conversion and access costs (approximately 10%) the resulting cash available for distribution inside Gaza: $506
Of that amount $502 was used directly toward aid purchases for our first Baby Box distribution.

WHATS NEXT?

We are not stopping here - our next targeted Initiative will be

‘THE ESSENTIALS INITIATIVE’

Care Package One — Hygiene Supplies for 50 Families

This will include purchasing items (where available) like soap, shampoo, toothpaste and toothbrushes, household cleaning supplies, sanitizing materials, etc.

Costs:

50 families x $50 per package = $1000
Supporting costs: Transportation and procurement: $50, Distribution and delivery: $50, Documentation and follow-up: $50
Total: $1,150

Care Package Two – Usable water distribution for approx. 1000 individuals

Provide emergency water access to displaced communities facing severe shortages. Basic water access for several days.

Plan: Supply 1 truck of usable water

Cost:

Water truck: $400
Supporting Costs: Coordination and distribution: $50
Total: $450

Donate to Gaza's Forgotten

Care Package Three – Bread Distribution for 50 families

Provide bread to families struggling to secure daily meals. This will support immediate food access for 1-2 days

Plan: 50 families x 13 loaves per family (approx. 250 individuals)

Cost:

Bread: $300
Transportation: $50
Distribution: $50
Total: $400

Financial Summary for all three Care Packages

Hygiene Initiative → $1,150
Water Initiative → $450
Bread Initiative → $400
TOTAL CURRENT TARGET: $2,000

Every single dollar raised helps us move from waiting to action.

So lets reach this current target of $2000 and get these care packages into the hands of desperate families who are crying out for help – before its too late.

Thank you again in advance and lets get this current $2000 target reached!

📎 https://chuffed.org/project/183781-gaza-forgotten-families-fund

Manufacturing Dissent exists because of you. We’re independent—powered only by readers and listeners. For less than a coffee, you can join us. Annual memberships are 30% off. Stand with us. Fuel citizen journalism. Keep dissent alive.

In Gaza… Survival Alone Is a Battle

Abood A — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 06:44:34 GMT

I am writing this article separately from everything I usually post, because some experiences should never remain trapped inside memory. There are moments in war that completely change you, moments that make you see people, life, and even yourself differently. I am not sharing this story to blame anyone or justify anyone’s actions, but because what I lived through may one day happen to someone else too, and perhaps my experience could help them survive.

At the beginning of the war, we were displaced to southern Gaza, specifically to Khan Younis. We ended up staying in a school on Salah al-Din Street, just like thousands of other families searching for nothing more than safety from bombing and death.

In the middle of that fear, some of our relatives called us and said they also wanted to come to the south and needed a place to stay. My father immediately replied, “Come. I will find you a good place.”

They arrived and stayed with us, and despite the fear surrounding us, their presence brought some comfort. We tried to support one another emotionally, sharing fear, hunger, and uncertainty while convincing ourselves that maybe tomorrow would somehow be better.

But war never gives anyone enough time to feel safe.

Israeli forces gradually advanced deeper into Khan Younis until we were almost completely surrounded. We wanted to leave, but where could we go? Every road felt dangerous, every destination uncertain, and every decision felt like it could be our last.

We delayed leaving… and perhaps that was our biggest mistake.

The next morning, we woke up to a terrifying reality: the school had been completely surrounded.

Amid the panic and chaos, we discovered that our relatives had already left without informing us, without taking us with them, and without even remembering us, as if we did not exist at all.

I will not lie… I kept asking myself: why? Why didn’t they tell us? Why didn’t they take us with them?

Even today, I still do not know the answer.

Despite everything, I do not blame them.

In moments of war, people think only with their deepest instinct: “How do I save my family?”

It is a painful truth, but it is still the truth. When death feels this close, everything changes, and fear sometimes becomes stronger than relationships.

It may seem selfish, but in war, survival instinct takes control of everything.

Hours later, Israeli forces stormed the school violently. Explosions, heavy gunfire, and quadcopter drones hovered above us in terrifying ways.

Then everything fell apart.

They took my father.

I cannot fully describe that moment because some pain is too heavy for words. But I still remember the feeling of helplessness, as if my entire world had collapsed in a single moment.

As my family and I made our way toward Rafah — or toward the unknown, because I did not even know the city — I made one of the hardest decisions of my life.

I decided to separate ourselves from our relatives and live independently, just as we once had before the war.

That decision may seem strange to some people, but for me, it became the beginning of a completely new journey. I felt as though I had been born again, as if the war had forced me to grow up overnight.

From that moment on, everything changed. I became more dependent on myself, I started seeing life differently, and I began understanding people and reality in ways I never had before.

And today, after everything that happened, I know that decision changed the course of my life.

And I do not regret it.

War does not only reveal destruction and death… war reveals people.

It reveals their fear, weakness, love, selfishness, and humanity too.

Sometimes life forces you into painful decisions where you do not know whether you are right or wrong, but you make them anyway because survival becomes the only thing that matters.

I am not writing this article to attack anyone. I am writing it to say one thing only:

When you live through war, you realize that staying alive alone can become an entire battle.

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Donate to Alaa (Digital Resistance)

Three Years in Hell

Digital Resistance — Tue, 09 Jun 2026 08:59:59 GMT

Foreword

This article exposes the raw reality of life in Gaza through the voice of a man broken by three devastating years of constant terror, panic attacks, hunger, stolen homes, shattered dreams, and the daily exhaustion of wondering if the next helicopter strike will kill him.

It screams the haunting question every survivor carries: How long must we endure this nightmare in tents, deprived of dignity and basic rights, before we are seen as human beings worthy of compassion.

, Alaa Mazen, is the Palestinian writer behind this piece.

– –

If you want to support his work and help his family, you can donate here:

For three long years, we have endured every kind of suffering imaginable. We have seen things that no human eyes should ever witness. Days heavy as Judgment Day itself, fear choking us, hunger clawing at our guts, loss ripping our families apart, displacement turning us into ghosts, and endless, soul-crushing waiting.

They didn’t just steal our homes and our security. They shattered our spirits, our morale, our dreams. Now we live under constant psychological pressure, tension wrapped around every breath, panic attacks that slam into us without warning. We wake up to fear and fall asleep - if sleep even comes - to anxiety that gnaws at our bones.

They made us feel like we’re already under a death sentence, waiting for the next strike, the next loss, carrying burdens that no human was built to bear. Three years stolen from our lives. Three years that left a pain in our hearts no words can touch, wounds that bleed inside us every single day while the world looks away.

How long will we remain like this? How long will we spend our lives in tents, surrounded by hunger, poverty, and terror? How long must we wait for a normal life like everyone else on this planet? I have the right to medical treatment. I have the right to travel. I have the right to live with dignity. I am a human being with dreams and aspirations. I want to rebuild my life, create my future, and wake up to days that aren’t soaked in constant fear.

Three years have passed like an eternity, dragging enough pain and suffering to last ten lifetimes. We are tired of waiting. Tired of fear. Tired of watching our dreams rot and fade while we breathe this poisoned air. All we want is a chance at life—a chance to live as human beings. Nothing more.

Subscribe to Alaa

Honestly, I’m so tired. Exhausted in my bones, mentally and physically destroyed by everything we’re going through. I feel like I’m suffocating under the weight of this endless suffering. For three years we’ve lived in fear, deprivation, and uncertainty. I tried to be patient. I endured with everything I had. But I can’t go on like I used to.

I just dream of starting my life over. Of being able to travel and escape this hell. Of working with dignity so I can feed my family and give them something better. I’m not asking for luxury. I’m begging for the basic right to exist and build a future like any other human.

I’m not thinking of hurting myself, but I am broken. All my energy is gone. I used to live with dreams and ambitions - working, traveling, planning, hoping. Then suddenly everything was ripped away, and now I’m trapped in a nightmare that never ends. I feel like I’m dying every single second from the despair and exhaustion. Every day I ask: How long will this last? How long will they keep me from living a normal life? I am a human being. I have the right to work, to travel, to build my future, to live with dignity and security. I want my life back. I want the dreams they stole from me. Today we almost died.

My friends, I just want to ask: Why hasn’t the world moved to save us? Why does the world erupt in outrage when a foreigner dies? Why, when an American is taken hostage anywhere, does the entire planet scream? I want an answer.

Why, when we are killed, slaughtered, and starved, do only a few even notice? What does the world think of us? How do they see us? Are we human monsters? Are we not even human? This question haunts me every hour. It never leaves my mind.

I am so tired. We are so tired. Three years of this. How long will we remain like this?

How long?

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Subscribe to Alaa

Update #1: We Didn’t Wait. 20 Families Have Received Aid

KairosTimeNow — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 12:22:48 GMT

When we launched Gaza's Forgotten Families, our original goal was to raise $3,000 to complete our first milestone and reach 40 displaced families living in tents under severe humanitarian conditions.

But we made a decision:

We weren't going to wait.

Because hunger doesn't pause while campaigns process payouts.

As donations started coming in, we realized something important. The campaign payout schedule meant funds would not be released until June 8th, and we did not want families waiting for food if we had a way to begin now.

So the campaign manager made the decision to front the funds and begin the initiative immediately, allowing us to start purchasing and preparing aid before the official campaign transfer date.

Today, funds were sent into Gaza through cryptocurrency so work could begin right away.

For transparency:

Total collected so far: $1,369
Platform processing (Chuffed + Stripe): $49
Amount advanced and sent to begin aid distribution: $1320

(Receipts and documentation will be included in this update and future updates.)

Chuffed campaign on 6/3/2026 at 5 pm EST

Stripe, chuffed’s payment processor dashboard on 6/3/2026

Receipt for cryptocurrency sent to Gaza on 6/3/2026

Funds were immediately put to work.

Last night, local purchases were made and 20 grocery aid bags were assembled for 20 marginalized families. Bulk food were purchased.

These bags contain staple essentials intended to help families secure meals and meet basic household needs under extremely difficult conditions. 20 food parcels created for distribution.

For transparency, we also want to explain how this first distribution was structured. A total of 22 aid bags were purchased and prepared during this first round. 20 bags are being distributed directly to 20 marginalized families, while 2 bags were allocated to local helpers who assisted with sourcing, packing, transporting, and preparing the aid late into the night on June 3rd. In addition, $100 was allocated toward labor and transportation support to compensate auxiliary efforts involved in moving supplies and coordinating distribution logistics on the ground.

We believe in being transparent not only about aid delivered, but also about the real work required to make sure food reaches families safely and efficiently. None of this work happens without people giving their time, transportation, and labor to make distribution possible.

By the time everything was purchased, packed, organized, transported, and returned to the tent, it was already after midnight.

The work continued anyway.

The bags were distributed at June 4th at 2 pm (Gaza Time)

20 families who may never appear on social media, never have a fundraiser, and never have anyone advocate for them online have received support because people chose to act.

This is exactly why this project exists.

Not for headlines.

Not for numbers.

For families.

For people who have no campaign of their own.

And we are not finished.

Our original goal remains:

$3,000

This first round allowed us to begin.

But we still want to complete this first milestone and continue reaching additional families with food, household essentials, and support.

Every additional contribution helps extend this effort further.

If you've already donated, thank you.

You helped move this from an idea into something tangible.

If you've been watching and waiting, this is your reminder:

This campaign is active.

The work is happening.

And we are still building.

Twenty families today.

Then we keep going.

No family forgotten.

https://chuffed.org/project/183781-gaza-forgotten-families-fund

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Campaign Launch: Help Us Reach 40 Forgotten Families in Gaza

KairosTimeNow — Mon, 01 Jun 2026 19:33:26 GMT

This project exists for the families you rarely see online.

The families with no fundraiser.

No relatives abroad.

No phones.

No audience.

No way to tell the world they need help.

For our kickoff campaign, our goal is simple:

Raise $3,000 and deliver direct aid to 40 displaced families living in tents under extreme humanitarian conditions.

Our First Initiative

We want to bless 40 families with direct emergency aid packages valued at approximately $60 each.

Aid will be divided into two categories based on immediate need:

🍚 20 Food & Household Relief Bags — $60 each

Including staple essentials such as:

Flour
Rice
Cooking oil
Sugar
Canned goods
Household necessities

🍼 20 Baby Care Relief Bags — $60 each

Supporting families with infants through:

Formula — $20
Diapers — $35
Feeding bottle — $5

These are not luxury items.

These are survival items.

Why $3,000?

We believe in complete transparency. The campaign goal reflects both direct aid and the real costs of getting that aid into families’ hands.

Approximate allocation:

$2,400 ~ Direct aid bags for 40 families
~10% Platform and payment processing fees
~10% +/- Currency exchange and transfer costs inside Gaza
$50 Transportation and local delivery logistics

Transportation helps move food, water, and supplies directly to displaced families living in tents and temporary shelters.

These costs reduce the amount that reaches the ground, so our fundraising target reflects the true amount needed to put aid into families’ hands.

How Distribution Will Work

Aid will be purchased locally and distributed directly to displaced and marginalized families identified on the ground.

To maintain transparency and accountability, we will provide:

✓ Receipts for purchases whenever available

✓ Photos and video updates of distributions whenever safely possible

✓ Progress updates throughout the campaign

✓ Reporting back on how funds were used

We also believe in honoring labor. If local coordination requires transportation, logistics support, or time spent sourcing and distributing aid, this will be documented openly.

Why This Matters

Our goal is simple:

Get food to hungry families. Get essentials to babies. Reach people who have no campaign of their own.

Behind every tent is a family.

Behind every family is a mother trying to stretch one meal into three.

A father trying to keep dignity alive.

A child who should not know hunger.

This first campaign is small on purpose.

We are starting where we are, with what we have.

Forty families.

One beginning.

No family forgotten.

If this reaches you, distribution is already underway, and there is no end to this effort — every contribution simply allows us to reach the next family waiting.

https://chuffed.org/project/183781-gaza-forgotten-families-fund

Manufacturing Dissent exists because of you. We’re independent—powered only by readers and listeners. For less than a coffee, you can join us. Annual memberships are 30% off. Stand with us. Fuel citizen journalism. Keep dissent alive.

https://chuffed.org/project/ebtihalemrayan

A Day Left to Help Um Rayan Stand on Her Own Feet

Kathy — Sun, 31 May 2026 13:18:53 GMT

I don’t usually write full articles for fundraisers this small. Most of the time, a couple of notes are enough to raise a few hundred dollars. But this time, the campaign isn’t moving, and we’re running out of time. We have one day left to help Um Rayan.

The person managing this campaign is someone I know personally. He isn’t Palestinian — he’s someone who has been helping Palestinians for years — and because of that work, he’s been hit with nonstop banking obstacles. Fundraisers get blocked. Accounts get frozen. Transfers get questioned. Anything connected to Palestinians is treated with suspicion. He’s tried every workaround he could think of, and every path has been shut down. That’s why he’s giving notice that this campaign, like the others he manages, will be closing soon. But every dollar donated will reach the families before he shuts everything down.

“I'm desperately trying to find a way to feed my children and save them from what we'll face after the link closes on Monday. I want to sell cleaning supplies and start a small, simple business, but need $500.” –Um Rayan

Now, look at who this is for. Look at Um Rayan.

She isn’t asking to live off charity.

She isn’t asking for comfort.

She isn’t asking for anything extravagant.

She wants to work. She wants to earn. She wants to feed her children without having to go on social media every single day, begging strangers around the world for a few dollars so they can eat. That is the part people don’t understand — the daily humiliation, the exposure, the desperation of having to publicly plead for survival.

It takes at least fifty dollars a day just to feed her family at the bare minimum.

When you look at it that way, the five hundred dollars she’s asking for isn’t “extra.” It’s not a luxury. It’s a lifeline. It’s a chance to break the cycle of daily begging and stand on her own two feet.

She needs five hundred dollars to start a tiny stall. That’s it. A stall that would let her earn enough to feed her children without having to beg online every day for ten, twenty, fifty dollars just to survive another twenty‑four hours.

If ten percent of the subscribers who usually read these articles donated just one dollar, we would more than get this done.

And yes — some people might think a stall isn’t “urgent” compared to food, water, or medical care. But this is about survival. This is about dignity. This is about giving a mother in Gaza the ability to earn her own income so she doesn’t have to beg for her children’s next meal. She is choosing long‑term stability over immediate relief, even though her family needs both.

Living through genocide is already dehumanizing enough. Being hunted, bombed, displaced — and then having to beg publicly for your children’s survival — is an indignity no one should have to endure. If we can lift even one family out of that cycle, we should.

This isn’t a huge amount. I’m not asking for thousands. I’m asking for five hundred dollars — because that’s all it takes to give one family a chance to stand on their own feet.

If you can donate, please do.

If you can’t, sharing still helps.

Campaign link:

Donate to Um Rayan

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He Knew He Was a Delayed Martyr

Abood A — Sat, 30 May 2026 14:17:02 GMT

Foreword

Gaza loses people faster than the world can keep up with, and every loss leaves another family, another friend, another writer carrying a new wound. One of those losses was Abdul Hadi, a police officer killed in a recent Israeli strike — someone our young writer, , knew personally.

What you’re about to read is his tribute. His memory. His grief. His way of making sure Abdul Hadi doesn’t become just another number.

If you want to support Abood and his family, you can donate through his link or become a free or paid subscriber to his work.

– –

I am writing this article about my friends — the ones I knew closely, sat with for countless hours, and shared fear, hunger, and the sounds of bombardment with during Gaza’s darkest nights. They were ordinary young men like many others in this homeland, yet they carried one unshakable belief in their hearts: that they would one day die as martyrs, facing death without turning their backs.

In northern Gaza, where death was closer than anything else, Hani and Abdul Hadi chose not to flee south to escape the Israeli airstrikes. They remained there among the destruction, surrounded by warplanes, tanks, and endless shelling, believing that protecting their land and their people was a duty they could never abandon.

Before the war, Abdul Hadi was a police officer. When northern Gaza was invaded, he volunteered to help protect his neighborhood and its residents. For five long months, he lived without seeing his family or friends. The only things he saw were smoke, rubble, Israeli soldiers, and tanks. His life was never easy, yet he never surrendered and never thought of running away despite the death surrounding him every single day.

He fought knowing that death followed him everywhere. He often said that no one could escape death — if it did not come today, it would come tomorrow. Every time he survived an attack, he described it as “a delay of death,” as though he already knew how his story would end.

Only two days before he was killed, Israeli forces targeted a police vehicle, but the officers inside survived. Abdul Hadi escaped death once again. That day, he told those around him that death had not gone away — it had only been postponed.

On the day he was killed, Abdul Hadi told his brothers he wanted to visit the police site to greet his fellow officers before Eid. Calmly, as if he were saying goodbye, he told them:

“I will not stay with you much longer… I am a target, and sooner or later they will strike me.”

His family begged him not to go. Fear filled their eyes, but he insisted, as though his heart already knew it was his final journey.

When Abdul Hadi arrived, he sat with his friends for a short while. Suddenly, they heard the sound of a missile landing nearby. Abu Anas — the only survivor of the attack — later said that they stepped out from under the shelter to see where the first missile had landed, never expecting another missile to be waiting for them.

Within seconds, Abdul Hadi and the other officers fell to the ground dead.

Abu Anas was wounded in his leg, but he stayed motionless on the ground pretending to be dead after a quadcopter drone landed only a few meters away from the strike site to confirm they had all been killed. He closed his eyes and remained silent until the drone finally left after confirming their deaths.

Minutes later, people and ambulances rushed to carry the bodies to Al-Shifa Hospital in central Gaza.

I was there waiting for them.

I saw them with my own eyes. I saw their faces torn by shrapnel, and I saw the unbearable grief on the faces of their families. It was a scene too painful for any human heart to endure. The pain was not mine alone — it belonged to a family that had begged him not to go and now looked at him with regret, realizing that their final glance at him had truly been the last.

And despite all this pain, we still carry an unshakable belief: that God has wisdom in everything, that martyrs are alive with their Lord, and that patience in Gaza is not a choice but a faith we have been raised upon through years of war and loss.

Here, we have learned to accept God’s decree and destiny, and not to fear death or the future no matter how dark it becomes, because we believe in the words of God:

“Nothing will ever happen to us except what Allah has ordained for us.”

This is not merely the story of one young man from Gaza. It is the story of an entire generation that chose to remain steadfast despite hunger, fear, siege, and death.

That is why I ask you to help share the stories of these young men who gave up the pleasures of this world in order to protect their homeland, their people, and their dignity — so that they do not become just numbers in news reports, and so the world may know that in Gaza there are men who lived with honor and died with honor.

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https://chuffed.org/project/180060-help-shafiq-in-gaza

A Father Bleeding Out in Gaza Is Begging Us to Save His Children

Jemby — Wed, 27 May 2026 20:06:16 GMT

Ok folks, I’m not going to pull any punches here.

For the last day, we’ve been writing note after note trying to raise $3,900 for a young father in Gaza named Shafeeq — and despite the generosity of a few incredible people, we’ve only managed to raise $308. That’s it. That’s all we have for a man who is literally bleeding internally and two little girls who may not survive the week without medical care.

This is an emergency in the truest sense of the word.

Donate to Shafeeq

Who Shafeeq Is — and Why He’s Dying in Front of Us

Shafeeq is a young father living in a tent in Gaza. A few nights ago, a house beside his tent was bombed. The explosion sent shrapnel tearing into his abdomen. It’s still lodged there. He has not received surgery. He has not received painkillers. He has not received anything. The pain is unbearable.

X‑rays confirm the metal is still inside him.And this isn’t even the first time.

He already has shrapnel lodged in his brain from a previous strike — an injury he also couldn’t afford to treat.

He has lost drastic weight. He is frail. He looks like a man on the edge of collapse.

And yet, when we contacted him to ask what he needed, he didn’t talk about himself.

He talked about his children.

His Baby Daughter Is Suffocating at Night

His youngest daughter has a heart condition. She hasn’t had her medication for a month because they can’t afford it. She is suffocating at night.

She needs $700 for treatment now.

His other daughter needs $200.

That’s $900 just to keep his children alive.

And then there’s him — the father who is trying to hold on long enough to make sure his daughters survive. His own surgeries will cost over $3,000, and he told us he knows that amount “can never be raised.”

He has already resigned himself to dying.

Read that again.

He is preparing for death because he believes the world will not help him.

Why Is the World Letting This Happen?

Reading his messages broke me.

Why is the world letting this happen?

Why are families like this being left to die?

Let’s be honest: our governments helped create this destruction. They funded it, armed it, justified it — and now families like Shafeeq’s are paying the price with their bodies, their hunger, their fear, their children’s lives.

The absolute minimum any of us can do is refuse to look away.

Donate to Shafeeq

What We’re Trying to Do — and Why It Matters Right Now

We are trying to raise $3,900:

$900 for his daughters’ urgent medical care
$3,000 for his own surgeries
Food, water, and basic medicine aren't even taken into consideration for these figures

And after a full day of pushing, pleading, posting, and sharing, we’ve only raised $308.

This family is running out of time.

If we don’t intervene, the father may die.

If we don’t intervene, the baby may die.

This is not an exaggeration.

This is the reality of Gaza right now.

What You Can Do

The absolute minimum any of us can do is share this everywhere:

Share it on Substack
Share it on every social platform you use
Share it with your neighbors, your coworkers, your community
Share it with your church, your mosque, your temple
Share it with anyone who might have even a few dollars to spare

And if you can donate — even $1 — it matters.

If you can donate $10, it matters.

If you can donate $1000, it could save a life.

We are praying for a miracle.

We are praying that this reaches someone with the means to change everything for this family.

But even if we don’t get the miracle, we can still save his daughters.

We can still ease this father’s fear as he fights to stay alive.

Please help in whatever capacity you’re able.

Donate here:

Donate to Shafeeq

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Buried Alive: A Survivor’s Account of the Al‑Helou Hospital Raid and the Systematic Brutality in Gaza

Nouri™️ — Tue, 26 May 2026 15:14:22 GMT

Introduction

In the midst of Gaza’s ongoing siege, firsthand testimonies have become some of the only surviving records of what civilians endure. This long‑form account documents the experience of a survivor who lived through the raid on Al‑Helou Hospital — an assault marked by mass killings, forced stripping, and sexual violence. His story, told in his own words, offers a rare and harrowing window into the brutality inflicted on civilians and the conditions that forced him to hide inside a garbage container for seven days.

Photo: Al Jazeera

Life Before the Raid

“I want to speak honestly, and I swear to God I am telling this with complete truth. I wasn’t like this before the war,” he begins. Hunger, once unimaginable, has become a defining feature of daily life. “Fate has decreed that we now crave food, and we can’t afford to buy it. Our lives in Gaza are a living hell.”

He describes a system of control and deprivation: “The Jews are practicing the most brutal and despicable policies imaginable. Anyone who tries to help the people in Gaza is killed. We live in a closed prison. We are denied food, and they won’t allow us medical treatment. They won’t even allow us to speak or address the media. Anyone who tries to make our voices heard is assassinated.”

This is the environment in which the events at Al‑Helou Hospital unfolded.

The Raid on Al‑Helou Hospital

He recounts the moment the assault began: “I was near the hospital, hiding — may God forgive me for mentioning it — in a garbage container when the occupation forces stormed the area. People fled, not knowing where to escape. Everyone who was there was killed, and no one had a place to hide.”

With no shelter available, he climbed into a garbage container and covered himself with refuse. “They didn’t notice me, because if they had, they would have killed me.”

From inside that container, he witnessed atrocities that no human being should ever see.

Forced Stripping and Sexual Violence

“They forced all the women and children to undress, and those who refused were killed,” he says. “Some women did undress, and then the officer and the devilish soldiers came and raped them.”

He describes watching a woman scream for help: “I saw a woman screaming, ‘Help me!’ but no one came to her aid. The soldiers beat her, and she fell to the ground. Five soldiers raped her, and the officer in charge said, ‘This is the fate of anyone who disobeys our orders.’”

These accounts align with broader patterns reported by survivors across multiple assault sites.

Seven Days in the Garbage

His own survival depended on absolute stillness. “My heart was trembling with anguish. I wanted to do something, but I couldn’t. If they saw me, they would kill me immediately.”

He remained inside the garbage container for seven days.

“I lived in that garbage dump for seven days without food or sleep, living among the refuse. I ate garbage so I wouldn’t die.”

This period reflects both the intensity of the military presence and the impossibility of movement for civilians trapped in active assault zones.

Aftermath

“After the army withdrew, I was one of the first to witness the horrific scenes,” he says. Bodies, destruction, and silence marked the landscape. The psychological impact remains profound: “By God, that scene has never left my mind.”

Conclusion

“This is just one story — one of the many we saw during the war. I want people to know what we saw.”

His testimony stands as both evidence and warning — a record of what civilians endured and a plea for the world to acknowledge the scale of suffering inflicted on Gaza’s population.

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“If you want to help me and my family”

Eid in Gaza… Joy Trying to Survive Beneath the Rubble

Abood A — Fri, 22 May 2026 15:56:05 GMT

Eid is approaching in Gaza, but this time it does not arrive the way we have always known it.
There are no loud laughs filling the markets, no crowded streets carrying the spirit of past years, and no hearts waiting peacefully for the morning of Eid with complete happiness.
In Gaza, Eid now arrives carrying mixed emotions: a little joy we desperately try to hold onto, and immense sorrow imposed by war, destruction, and loss.

Donate to Abood's Family

How can a city exhausted by massacres, with streets buried beneath rubble, welcome another Eid?
And how can parents hide their helplessness from children waiting for Eid clothes and sweets, just as they did every year before?

Gaza’s Children… Still Waiting for Joy

Despite everything, Gaza’s children are still excited for Eid.
A child does not understand politics or war; they only remember that Eid once brought beautiful things:
new clothes, simple toys, family visits, and sweets that were enough to create an entire world of happiness.

But today’s reality is harsh and different.

Many fathers stand helpless before their children’s small wishes, not because they do not want to make them happy, but because war has stolen their ability to do so.
Markets are either empty or unbearably expensive, work has nearly stopped, money has become scarce, while needs continue to grow every single day.

A father now fears hearing his child ask:
“When will we buy Eid clothes?”
Because the answer may break his own heart before it breaks the child’s.

Eid Under Bombing and Fear

In previous years, even during the hardest times, people still tried to create moments of joy despite the siege and suffering.
But after this war, everything changed.

Eid in Gaza has become more connected to fear than peace, and to anxiety more than comfort.
With every occasion, the occupation intensified its bombing and aggression, as if joy itself was forbidden in this city.

How many families welcomed Eid while searching for a martyr beneath the rubble?
How many mothers lost their children only days before the Eid prayers?
And how many children will experience Eid this year without a father, a mother, or even a home?

In Gaza, even celebrations have begun to carry the scent of war.

The Silent Pain of Parents

The hardest feeling for a father or mother is not hunger alone, but the helplessness of being unable to provide for their children’s needs.
To watch your child dream of something simple while you cannot give it to them is a kind of pain words cannot truly describe.

Many parents in Gaza live with this painful feeling every day.
They hide their sorrow, forcing smiles in front of their children despite fear, exhaustion, and heartbreak.

It is a silent suffering that cameras do not always capture, yet it lives inside every home wounded by war.

Gaza… A City That Suffers but Does Not Break

Despite all this destruction, Gaza still tries to hold onto life.
People still exchange Eid greetings, mothers still try to create happiness from the simplest things, and children still run between the ruins as if resisting sadness in their own innocent way.

Gaza is not merely a city living through war; it is a city fighting to keep its humanity alive.

That is why praying for Gaza today is not just words, but a message of solidarity with a people struggling to survive every single day.

Conclusion

Eid in Gaza this year is neither completely joyful nor completely sorrowful.
It is an Eid carrying the tears of mothers, the patience of fathers, and the small dreams of children trying to stay alive amid destruction.

We pray that God grants mercy to the martyrs, healing to the wounded, and patience to every father and mother enduring pain, helplessness, and suffering.
And we pray for the day when Gaza finally wakes up to real peace instead of the sound of bombardment, and when Eid returns as it once was… filled with safety, joy, and life.

Will that day come?
Despite everything, the people of Gaza still believe that after this long night, dawn must eventually rise.

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A Birth Under Fire

Kathy — Mon, 18 May 2026 12:49:31 GMT

Foreword

I want to introduce you to Alaa. Some of you already know him from the notes I’ve shared on Substack. We have been helping his family for months, and many of you have followed their situation closely.

What you are about to read is one of the communications he sent me. It is written like a letter, but it is more than that. It is a record of one night in Gaza. One moment inside the long, brutal, savage reality that Palestinians have been forced to live through during this genocide. It is only one situation among many, but it shows the truth of what families like his face every day and every night.

Alaa wants these stories to be known. He wants the world to understand what life in Gaza has become. I have encouraged him to come onto Substack himself so he can speak directly, in his own voice, and he plans to do that. Until then, I am sharing this piece with his permission.

Most families in Gaza need the world’s attention and help right now. Everyone knows this. Their suffering is immense. If you feel you want to support Alaa and his family, you can do so here.

Donate to Alaa's Family

Photo: Mahmud Hams / AFP Getty Images

My dearest Kathy…

I'm going to tell you about one of the hardest days we've ever endured, a day whose details are still etched in my heart as if it happened yesterday.

On a cold, dark night, in the Abu Iskandar area of northern Gaza, we were surrounded.

Tanks were all around us, planes never left the sky, and the shelling shook the ground beneath our feet. Anyone who tried to leave was killed instantly. There was no hospital, no ambulance, no safe place to escape to.

My mother, my 19-year-old sister, my wife, and my child were all huddled in a small, dark room, shivering with fear, hunger, and cold. We had no food or water, and I hadn't slept for days because of the sheer terror.

That night, which I will never forget, I tried to doze off for a while despite the sound of shelling and explosions, but after only half an hour, I heard a scream that pierced my heart…

“Get up, my son… your sister is giving birth!”

I woke up terrified. I saw my mother crying and screaming my name, and my sister writhing in agony. No one was around to help us. No doctor, no medicine, no electricity… only death surrounded us from the outside and fear gnawing at us from within.

I sat helplessly beside my sister, not knowing what to do or where to take her. I could hear the shelling so close, it felt like the sky was falling on our heads.

I knelt down and cried out, “Oh God… take me, but protect my sister and her baby.”

I wept like I’ve never wept before, and my mother and wife wept with me, while my sister screamed in pain and terror.

Suddenly, blood began to flow from her, and soon the baby was born, but the umbilical cord remained attached inside her womb. We had no medical equipment or doctor to help us.

At that moment, we felt that death had taken everything from us…

But God was with us.

My mother brought a small pair of scissors, her hands trembling with fear, and cut the umbilical cord herself to save my sister and her baby. We thought the baby wouldn't survive and that my sister would bleed to death, but God granted them life amidst the hell.

My wife held the baby to her chest, trying to keep him warm, while my mother stayed by my sister's side, trying to stop the bleeding. We had no clothes for the baby, no diapers, and no milk.

My mother tore up old blankets and fashioned a cloth to wrap the baby in, and we used plastic bags instead of diapers.

Two whole days passed without food… The baby cried from hunger, and we had nothing for him. We gave him water instead of milk, even though he was only a day or two old.

We were expecting him to die at any moment, but God didn't abandon us.

After two days, God blessed my sister with milk, and her baby began to nurse. Only then did I feel my heart beating again.

Today that child is two and a half years old, and every time I look at him, I remember that night… I remember my sister's screams, my mother's tears, my fear and helplessness, and how we waited for death every second.

This isn't a movie or a fairy tale, Kathy…

This is what we lived through in Gaza.

This is how our children were born under bombardment, and this is how we fought death with empty hands and weary hearts, while the world watched in silence.

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Fixing One Car in Gaza Isn’t “Extra” — It’s Survival

Kathy — Sun, 17 May 2026 10:49:29 GMT

You know how everyone in the pro‑Palestine camp keeps saying the same thing: we want families in Gaza to be able to stand on their own feet, not beg the world for every meal, every bottle of water, every basic need. We talk about dignity. We talk about independence. We talk about helping people rebuild their lives instead of living on handouts forever.

Well, here’s a real, concrete situation where that talk actually means something.

Her name is Maryam.

She’s 17. She lives in Gaza with a family of ten. Before October 7, she was a tenth‑grade student living a normal, calm life. She also has a serious medical history — in 2019 she had major surgery in Jordan on her left ear because decay had reached the bones of her skull. They rebuilt her eardrum and her ossicles. She needed follow‑ups every three months. Now, with the nonstop bombing, her ears are in constant pain again.

But this isn’t a “feel sorry for her” story.

This is a family trying to survive with dignity.

Before the war, her father worked nonstop to provide for them. Their car was their livelihood. It was their taxi service, their income, their stability. It’s how they paid for food, water, and medicine for Maryam and her sister.

Then during displacement, her father was in a brutal accident. A speeding car flew over his vehicle and crushed it. The passengers with him were hospitalized with serious injuries. He survived, but the car — the family’s only source of income — was destroyed.

Now they’re stuck.

Not because they’re lazy.

Not because they’re waiting for handouts.

But because the one tool they had to support themselves is gone. And in Gaza right now, repairing a car engine costs a fortune — spare parts are scarce, merchants are exploiting the situation, and everything is inflated beyond reason.

Here’s the part some people might push back on:

“Why should we donate to fix a car when people need food and water?”

Because this car is how they get food and water.

This car is how they survive.

This car is how they stop depending on the world for every single thing.

Fixing this car means one family off the endless list of families who need constant aid. One family able to earn again. One family able to stand with dignity instead of begging for every meal.

I’ll be honest: I don’t know if we can raise the full amount. It’s a lot. It’s more than the usual emergency asks. And people tend to donate faster when the need looks like immediate survival — food, water, medicine, tents.

But this is survival.

Just in a different form.

This is long‑term survival.

This is what it looks like to lift a family up instead of keeping them stuck in crisis mode forever.

And I hope I’m proven wrong about the difficulty. I hope people see the value in helping a family rebuild their independence. I hope people understand that dignity is also a form of aid — and that giving someone the ability to work again is one of the strongest acts of solidarity we can offer.

If you’re able to donate, please do.

If you can’t, sharing matters just as much. Sharing is how these families get seen. Sharing is how the word spreads. Sharing is how help reaches them.

Every bit from every corner of the world adds up.

And together, we can get this done.

One family, back on their feet. One family able to stand with dignity again.

Donate to Maryam's Family

Fundraiser link:

https://chuffed.org/project/maryamcar

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https://chuffed.org/project/179502-marams-family-help-rebuild-hope-food-and-education

A Family of Women Trapped in a Sealed Cage — And the World Pretends Not to See

Kathy — Tue, 12 May 2026 18:15:12 GMT

This is my second article this week for a Palestinian family. I’m writing it because this one is a bit unique in the fact that this is a household made almost entirely of women and little kids. The only two men in the family, the father and the brother, were both injured when Israel bombed their home. They’re bedridden now. They can’t work, can’t move, can’t provide, can’t do anything except try to stay alive. So everything falls on the women. Everything.

Maram is 23. She’s the one carrying the entire family on her back. Eight women and children in a tent that barely counts as shelter. Winter cold cuts through it. Summer heat cooks them inside it. There’s no protection, no privacy, no safety — just survival.

When Israel bombed their home, the whole family was injured. Every single one of them. Some wounds healed enough to move again, some didn’t. And they lost a sister — martyred in the bombing. A loss that they can't fully grieve because survival doesn't allow time for anything that human.

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Their campaign sits at $47. Forty‑seven dollars for a family of eight in a place where even men can’t find work because Gaza’s entire infrastructure has been turned into rubble. So what hope do women have? What hope does a 23‑year‑old woman have when she’s the only one left standing?

“Look what we eat all day long! This is what we expect from the charity every week, and it's never enough. Our bodies are being destroyed by this unclean food. Please,have mercy on us.” –Maram

And this is what they eat — rice from the community center. That’s it. A scoop of rice that’s supposed to last a family of eight. It’s not enough. It’s not even close to enough. Their bodies are breaking down from hunger and unclean food. They’ve gone days without donations. Days.

This is collective punishment. Collective suffering. Gaza is crawling with snakes, rodents, insects — everything that makes survival harder. Everything that makes illness spread faster. Everything that makes life unbearable. And all of it is happening inside a place that is sealed shut on all sides. Land, sea, air — sealed. No escape. No way out. No relief. No future unless the world steps in.

Gaza is a concentration camp. People can argue about the word all they want, but the reality is simple: if you trap a population, bomb them, starve them, cut off their exits, and leave them to rot, that’s a concentration camp. And the world helped make it happen. Which means the world has a responsibility to help the people trapped inside it.

Not everyone can donate — I get that. The economy is brutal everywhere. But everyone reading this has the ability to share. And sharing matters. Sharing is how these families get seen. Sharing is how donations reach them. Sharing is how we push back against the silence.

Share this on Substack.

Share it on Twitter.

Share it on Facebook.

Share it on Upscrolled.

Share it anywhere you have a voice.

Donate to Maram's Family

Share it with your community, your church, your mosque, your temple, your library, your neighbors, your coworkers. Talk about Gaza. Talk about this family. Talk about what’s happening.

Because helping Gaza is not charity — it’s responsibility.

You see what’s happening in Lebanon.

You see what’s happening in Iran.

You see what’s happening in Sudan.

As horrific as those situations are, people there still have a way out. Gaza doesn’t. Gaza is locked in. Gaza is sealed. Gaza is a prison with no exits.

So please — help however you can. Share this. Spread it. Make sure people see Maram’s family. Make sure they’re not forgotten in the noise of everything else happening in the world.

This is about basic human survival. Nothing more, nothing less.

Donate to Maram's Family

If you have any questions regarding if your donations reaches these family, please read this article:

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What Israel's Siege Has Done to Salah's Family

Kathy — Sun, 10 May 2026 12:17:43 GMT

I usually write short notes for families in Gaza. I don’t really do long articles anymore when it comes to fundraising, because the need is so overwhelming and the suffering is endless. But this family… the amount they are carrying, the layers of hardship, the disabilities, the medical needs, the displacement — it’s too much for any one household to bear. Their situation is so heavy that I felt I had to write something longer, something that gives you the full picture.

This article is going out to all my subscribers because I’m hoping that somewhere among you, there are people who will read this, feel it, and dig deep. I know the economy is hard everywhere. I know we’re all dealing with our own crises. But if even 10% of you — honestly, even 1% — donated a few dollars, it would make a real difference for this family. It can literally keep someone alive.

Everyone in Gaza needs the same basics: food, clean water, shelter, medicine. Israel’s siege and blockade have stripped the entire strip down to nothing. People are living in a wasteland — sewage flooding the streets, rodents everywhere, insects, scorpions, contamination, disease. It’s not a livable environment. It’s survival minute by minute. People don’t count days anymore. They count minutes.

And because of that, we — the rest of the world — have a responsibility. None of us can save all of Gaza. But each of us can help one family. If every pro‑Palestine person helped just one household, Palestinians would be lifted up. Their suffering would be eased, even a little.

So today, I’m asking you to take a few minutes to read about Salah and his family. Their campaign has been open for more than two months and has only received about $330. No one can survive on that. And with Israel destroying Gaza’s entire economy, there is no employment left. There is no income. There is no “just work harder.” There is nothing.

They need us. They need the world to help them survive until something changes — until governments grow a spine and stand up to Israel, until this concentration‑camp reality is stopped.

Now let me tell you their story.

Salah and his baby

Salah Al‑Masri and His Family

Salah Al‑Masri is a 24‑year‑old Palestinian from Beit Hanoun. He’s a university graduate and a young father. Before the war, his family lived a normal life. They had a home. They had a supermarket that supported all of them. They had stability.

Israel destroyed all of it in the first days of the war.

Their home was flattened. Their supermarket — their only source of income — was wiped out. Since then, the family has been displaced nine times, moving from one unsafe place to another: Beit Hanoun, Jabalia, Nuseirat, Khan Younis, Rafah, Al‑Shati, Deir Al‑Balah. They are now sheltering near Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis, living in conditions no human being should ever have to endure.

This is a family of 19 people. Many of them have severe disabilities or chronic illnesses. Even in a functioning society, this family would need support. In Gaza’s current reality, their situation is almost impossible.

Mustafa — 39 Years Old, Total Care Dependency

Mustafa’s suffering began in early childhood when he contracted meningitis. The illness left permanent damage. He never developed normally. Over the years, his condition progressed into cerebral palsy and severe muscle atrophy.

He cannot move.

He cannot feed himself.

He cannot perform a single daily task without full assistance.

He has no teeth, so he can only eat soft, specially prepared food. He needs diapers, constant hygiene care, and full‑time supervision. He needs a medical mattress to prevent bedsores. He needs a proper wheelchair.

Right now, he has none of these things.

He lives in silence, in pain, completely dependent on his family for every moment of his life.

Shaimaa — 31 Years Old, Intellectual Disability and Muscle Atrophy

Shaimaa has an intellectual disability, muscular atrophy, and delayed mental development. She needs medical care, social support, and a stable environment — none of which exist under siege and displacement. She cannot work. She cannot live independently. She relies on her family for everything.

Halima

Halima — 20 Years Old, Growth Hormone Deficiency

Halima’s condition affects her physical development and overall health. She needs proper nutrition, medical follow‑up, and stability. Gaza offers none of that right now. Her condition worsens with every month of displacement and deprivation.

Hudhaifa — Serious Leg Injury

Hudhaifa has a severe leg injury that makes movement difficult. In a normal setting, he would need physical therapy, medical imaging, and consistent treatment. In Gaza, he gets none of that. He struggles to move around the shelter.

Jameel — Severe Head Injury

Jameel lives with a serious head injury that requires continuous medication. Access to medication in Gaza is nearly impossible. His condition is unstable and dangerous.

Their Father — Heart Disease, Diabetes, High Blood Pressure

Their father is elderly and chronically ill. He needs medication and monitoring. He needs rest. Instead, he is living in a crowded shelter, surrounded by disease, noise, and constant fear.

What This Family Needs Right Now

This family needs the basics that every human being in their situation deserves:

A wheelchair for Mustafa
A medical mattress
Diapers
Soft food and nutritional support
Medication for multiple family members
Daily living essentials
Food, clean water, and shelter

These are not luxuries. These are survival needs.

https://chuffed.org/project/174571-salah-and-his-child-in-gaza-help-now

Why Your Help Matters

This family cannot work. Even if Gaza’s economy were intact, most of the adults in this household physically cannot work due to their disabilities and medical conditions. They rely entirely on humanitarian support — and right now, that support is barely reaching anyone.

Their campaign has raised only $330 in two months. That is nothing in Gaza’s current reality.

If we can raise enough, we can help them secure:

A proper wheelchair for Mustafa
Medical supplies
Food and water
Diapers
A mattress
Basic stability
A chance to survive this genocide with dignity

Every dollar counts. Truly.

Salah, his brother Mustafa, his child, and his siblings' children.

A Final Word

If you’ve read this far, thank you. Salah’s family is carrying more than any family should ever have to carry. They are surviving minute by minute under a siege designed to break people.

But we can help them.

We can lighten the load.

We can give them a chance to breathe.

If you can spare anything — even a few dollars — it will go a long way.

Let’s do what we can. Let’s help this family survive.

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The Silent Farewell of Souls in Gaza

Abood A — Thu, 07 May 2026 21:29:33 GMT

Foreword

Here’s the next installment of ’s story from Gaza. We don’t really know how to introduce this one — some truths are too raw to wrap in neat language, and this is one of them. All we can do is hand it to you as it is, and let you meet it honestly.

If you want to support , please do so here at this link:

I will tell you about something that cannot be seen with the eyes, but only felt here in Gaza…

Something like a hidden secret that passes between souls before death, as if hearts receive signs that the human mind can neither explain nor fully comprehend. Perhaps my words may sound spiritual, and even I myself do not completely understand them, but I know these things do not happen without reason, and that there are divine causes behind them known only to God.

In Gaza, people have come to believe that every person carries a soul that somehow knows the time of its departure hours before death, and that this soul begins to reveal its final farewell in a silent way that not everyone notices.

A person’s behavior changes strangely before they die…

They become calmer, kinder, and closer to the people they love.

Those around them feel that something about them has changed, that there is a beauty and purity in them they cannot explain, yet they do not realize that destiny is quietly approaching them.

And this is exactly what happens to many of us in Gaza.

Countless stories have repeated themselves in the same heartbreaking way, until they became something understood only by those who have tasted loss.

The young man who is about to be targeted suddenly feels his heart soften toward the people around him, especially toward his mother.

He sits beside her for long periods, looks at her differently, speaks to her with an unusual tenderness, as if he is trying to leave part of his soul inside her heart before leaving this world.

And the mother alone notices these changes deeply.

She feels that her son has become more positive, more peaceful, as though his face is glowing with a light unlike ordinary human light.

She sees him becoming beautiful in a way that hurts the heart, and feels as though his soul has already begun drawing closer to heaven. Yet despite noticing all of this… she will never know destiny, nor will she understand what awaits her son only hours later.

Then destiny arrives suddenly.

An airstrike comes, and God wills for her son to be martyred.

The mother stands shattered before the truth, and only then does she begin to understand everything too late.

She remembers his final looks, the way he sat near her, his calm voice, his strange smile… and she cries:

“My son was saying goodbye to me…

I saw it for days, but I did not understand.

My son was an angel…

My son was someone who will never come again.”

And this mother is right…

She truly noticed what her son’s soul was trying to tell her before his departure, but she could never do anything against destiny.

Because no matter how deeply humans love, they remain powerless before what God has written.

Of course, this may not apply to everyone, because it depends on the spiritual depth within a person, on how close they are to God, and on their faith that everything in this life exists for a reason, even the things the human mind cannot explain.

And in Gaza…

Sometimes it feels as though certain souls begin ascending toward heaven before their bodies even leave this earth, as if God grants them one final light of farewell, so that after death, their memory remains more alive than the living themselves.

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Yousef’s Story…When Pain Becomes Everyday Life

Abood A — Thu, 07 May 2026 03:00:41 GMT

Foreword

hasn’t published anything from in a while. His old account was suspended, and we’ve been waiting to see if we could connect a payment option to his new one so anyone who wanted to support him as a paid subscriber could do it properly. We still haven’t had any luck. I didn’t want to keep holding back the stories he’s been sending. His writing is one of the few ways people can see Gaza through the eyes of someone living it, and it matters for how we humanize Palestinians under siege.

For now, if you’d like to support Abood directly, you can do so at the link below.

In an ordinary moment while sitting with my friend Yousef, I found myself facing a story heavier than any casual conversation. Yousef has been my friend since childhood. We studied together in school and university, growing up with simple dreams of a stable life—but the war changed everything.

Before the war began, Yousef’s father worked as a financial officer at UNRWA, a hardworking man everyone in the family relied on. He was the backbone, the foundation of the household. But the occupation left nothing as it was.

At the beginning of the war, Yousef’s home was hit by a reconnaissance missile, which caused severe injuries to his father’s back. He was immediately taken to the hospital. After examination, the diagnosis was devastating: complete paralysis. It wasn’t just a medical condition—it was a shock that struck the entire family. Their lives turned into fear and disbelief, as if the ground beneath them had collapsed.

The tragedy did not end there. Yousef’s father was dismissed from his job at UNRWA despite his critical condition, and was only given his remaining savings. As months passed, the suffering did not ease—it only grew heavier.

One day, Yousef’s younger brother, a 15-year-old boy, decided to go alone toward the area near where they lived, where occupation forces were stationed, to check on their home: was it still standing or had it been destroyed? He rode his bicycle with the innocence of a child in a place that allowed no innocence. No one saw him, but danger was present. That short journey ended in another tragedy—the family lost their youngest child, deepening their wounds even further.

Yousef found himself facing repeated loss: a father who became paralyzed, a young brother who was gone, and a family struggling to hold itself together amid continuous collapse. He tried to become the remaining support, to carry what was left of his family on his shoulders, but each day broke him a little more inside.

After some time trying to adjust to this pain, the final blow came. His father later passed away—not only from illness, but, as Yousef says, from the weight of sorrow and oppression that crushed his body and soul. The man who once held the family together was gone, in a moment that felt like the end of all stability.

And yet, when I speak to Yousef, I am struck by his strange resilience. He tells me quietly, with a mixture of pain and acceptance:

“Don’t be sad for me… I am not sad. I am happy they are finally at peace. They are no longer living this exhausting life.”

His words do not make the story easier, but they reveal something deeper: the human ability to find meaning even within the harshest forms of loss.

And so Yousef’s story remains not just a tale of pain, but a testimony of a family that endured war’s endless losses—and is still trying to continue despite everything.

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📎https://chuffed.org/project/obaidadami

Obaida Is Sixteen. He Shouldn’t Be Carrying the Weight of a Genocide

Kathy — Wed, 29 Apr 2026 18:13:10 GMT

Obaida is very personal to me. I met him two years ago without ever seeing his face. He was fourteen, speaking in a Twitter space where Palestinians would come up and talk about what they were living through. I remember his voice more than anything else. He sounded exhausted in a way no child should ever sound. Drained. Depressed. Carrying responsibilities that would break most adults. That voice stayed with me.

Obaida

Back then I kept trying to reach him, but with so many people speaking and the host juggling requests, we couldn’t find him again. I left that space feeling like I had failed him. And now, two years later, he’s back in my life. I don’t believe that’s random. I believe it’s because I can help him now in a way I couldn’t then.

Donate to Obaida

Since that first space, I found this Substack community. And the truth is, the help we can give him today is so much more than anything I could have done back then. But only if people see his story. Only if people share it. Sharing is what gets eyes on these campaigns. Sharing is what keeps Palestinian families alive.

His campaign has been open for more than three months and has only received £92. He is sixteen years old, trying to feed his family. If we can shoulder even a fraction of that burden, we should. We can help them get clean water and food. Food is the main issue. Israel’s tight and deliberate chokehold on what enters Gaza, especially food, is something we all know. It is starvation as policy.

He is sixteen. His family of eight has lost all stability and safety because of the genocide. They are living in a makeshift tent made of cloth scraps and worn out blankets. It doesn’t protect them from the cold, the rain, or the heat. His father is 38. His mother is 33. His eldest sister is 17. Then him at 16. His brothers are 14 and 12. His sister is 9. And the youngest is a baby, a year and a half old. Eight people trying to survive inside a tent that barely counts as shelter.

This is what he wakes up to every day. This is what he carries on his back at sixteen.

Donate to Obaida

And here’s the part that breaks me every time. Obaida’s story isn’t about some extra tragedy. As if Palestinians need an additional layer of devastation, a murdered family member, a lost limb, a bombing, just to be seen. Survival alone should be enough. The fact that he is trying to get food and clean water should be enough. But Palestinians are forced into a world where even their suffering has to compete for attention.

We all have a responsibility here. I’m not trying to guilt you. I’m not trying to manipulate anyone. But the truth is we all have a hand in what Gaza is right now, willingly or unwillingly. And the bare minimum we can do in this nightmare is simple. When a Palestinian campaign crosses our feed, we either donate if we can, or we share it.

In Obaida’s case, I can’t explain how much this means to me. I’m begging you, if you’re able, help this kid. He is a child. A child trying to feed his siblings. A child trying to keep his family alive. It’s devastating. No child should have this burden. No child in this world. But here we are.

So please. If you can donate, donate. If you can’t, then share it. That’s all I’m asking. The more eyes on this, the more chances Obaida and his family have.

Donate to Obaida

We all say we stand with Gaza. This is what that looks like. Helping. Speaking up. Sharing. Making sure families like his aren’t forgotten.

If you can help this kid, help him. He’s sixteen. Just sixteen.

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Donate to Zikrayat's Family

A Child Injured Twice by Hunger: Why Mays Needs Help Now

Kathy — Tue, 28 Apr 2026 11:48:55 GMT

I have been writing notes and pleading for help for this family for almost a full day. In that time, we have received a little under $35. I am grateful for every donation, but it is far from enough to keep this family stable. I have never seen a case this severe struggle to gain traction, especially when a child is in the hospital.

This is the story of 12-year-old Mays, a girl who has already survived more than most adults ever will.

Months ago, she was struck by a U.S. aid drop. The impact shattered her leg and left her needing metal plates to walk. Now she is back in the hospital because she ate contaminated food. She is feverish, weak, and fighting off poisoning in a place where medical care is scarce and expensive.

Her mother, Zikrayat, is battling brain cancer. She is 30 years old and trying to keep four children alive while living in a torn tent after being displaced more than ten times. Their tent cannot keep out heat, cold, rodents or insects. Their meals are inconsistent. Their children are malnourished.

Their campaign has been running for almost a year and has reached £1,999. They have received some help, but nowhere near enough to meet their basic needs or cover emergencies like this one. They are still living on the edge of survival.

And now this new crisis has pushed them even closer to danger.

“I am living with brain cancer. My daughter can barely walk after being injured by an aid drop. We live in a torn tent. We have nothing left.”

These are Zikrayat’s own words. From the beginning, she has said that her biggest fear is food. Finding it. Keeping it safe. Making sure her children do not starve.

But in Gaza, even food can kill you.

Israel’s genocide has destroyed every system that keeps people alive. Homes, hospitals, water, sanitation, food supply. A family I highlighted previously faced poisoning through their medication. Now here we are again. Another child poisoned. Another family pushed past the limit of what any human being should endure.

This is why I am writing this article.

Because nothing else has worked. Because this family cannot wait. Because a 12-year-old girl is lying in a hospital bed after being injured twice by hunger. First by an aid drop. Now by contaminated food.

Because her siblings are at risk if we do not act.

What this family needs right now is simple.

They need help covering Mays’s hospital bill.

They need safe food so the children do not get poisoned again.

Everything else matters, but food is the difference between life and death for them. Food is what keeps the other children from ending up in the same hospital bed. Food is what keeps this mother alive long enough to continue her cancer treatment. Food is what keeps this family from collapsing under the weight of starvation and illness.

This is not a long-term plan. This is an emergency.

Please donate if you can. Please share if you cannot.

Every share matters. Every dollar matters. This family has been trying to survive for almost a year with limited support. They need more help than they have received.

Help give Mays a chance to heal. Help give her mother one moment of relief. Help keep her siblings safe.

Donate to Zikrayat's Family

Donate here: https://chuffed.org/project/zikrayat

Manufacturing Dissent exists because of you. We’re independent—powered only by readers and listeners. For less than a coffee, you can join us. Annual memberships are 30% off. Stand with us. Fuel citizen journalism. Keep dissent alive.