Asaalam Alaykum,
My dear sisters and brothers I wanted to take this opportunity to send you a message from the sisters in Gaza. Please hear about our situation, and convey it to everyone who you know and do not know.
Our situation is dire but our eman is strong alhamdulillah, even though we have no water to speak of. When we do [have water] it is polluted, and we have no money to buy mineral water. When we obtain money, then those that sell it [the water] tell us that it is too dangerous for them to travel out to get new supplies. We have no gas, and have not had for the last four months. We cook the little food we have on real [wood] fires that we have learned to light.
Our men have lost all their jobs. They spend their days at home now. My husband can end up spending a day just going from place to place in search of the bare necessities, like water. He usually returns empty handed. There are no schools and no banks; hardly any hospitals are open. You are constantly aware that you risk your life when you go out and when you are indoors. We are under a curfew [imposed by the Israeli army-IDF] between 1-4pm. We can go out, they [IDF] say, in safety to get our supplies, but that is a lie. They have often used that opportunity to add more shuhada [martyrs] to their list.
We eat rice one day and bread one day. Meat and milk are luxuries. They are using chemical warfare upon the areas close to the borders.
All this and we are being told that people demonstrate all over the world. Masha Allah. The fact that you go to the embassies, leaving your homes, makes us truly feel that we are not alone in our struggle.
But you go home at night and lock your door. We cannot do that. I have to leave my home on the second floor every night and stay with my sister on the ground floor. Should there be an attack, it’s quicker to leave from the ground floor.
Yes we are tired. When we hear rockets and bombs and see planes that fly too close to our building, I scream with my young son, while my husband feels helpless.
In all this there is no one but Allah (swt) that can save us. But the ummah is asking, “where are the armies?”, “where is the victory?”
Don’t forget us because you are all that we have now. Your kind sadaqaat are not reaching us, and when they open the borders, it only reaches a few. Keep up the work of Allah and pray that the victory will come soon insha Allah.
wasalam
Your sister Umm Taqi
Hat tip to MuslimMatters.org for this.
And then along comes this bit of news from the UN to underscore Umm Taqi’s letter.
ISRAEL deliberately blocked the United Nations from building up vital food supplies in Gaza that feed a million people daily before the launch of its war against Hamas, according to a senior UN official in Jerusalem.
In a scathing critique of Israeli actions leading up to the conflict, the UN’s chief humanitarian co-ordinator in Israel, the former Australian diplomat Maxwell Gaylard, accused Israel of failing to honour its commitments to open its border with Gaza during several months of truce from June 19 last year.
“The Israelis would not let us facilitate a regular and sufficient flow of supplies into the Strip,” Mr Gaylard said.
The chief spokesman for Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Yigal Palmor, said the claims were “unqualified bullshit”.
“At no time was there a shortage of food in Gaza over the past three weeks,” Mr Palmor said.
Mr Gaylard, who is the UN Special Co-ordinator’s Office’s most senior representative in Israel, told the Herald that when Israel launched its surprise attack on Gaza on December 27, the UN’s warehouses in Gaza were nearly empty, with all food and equipment sitting in nearby port facilities. “The food was in Israel but we couldn’t get it in. This is before. The blockade was very tight.”
Finally when there was aid available this is what happened.
Israeli forces shelled areas deep inside Gaza City on Thursday, hitting the headquarters of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency and wounding at least three people among the hundreds taking shelter in the compound, UN officials and witnesses said.
Are these the best allies we, the United States, can come up with in the Middle East?
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