Help Ahmad And Family Evacuate Gaza, Rebuild Lives

We are raising funds for Ahmad and his family who have been displaced multiple times as a result of the ongoing and devastating 2023-2024 israeli Genocide of Palestinians in Gaza.

Please read their story below.

From Ahmad:

"Hello, I am Ahmad Khaled Baloni and I am 22 years old. My parents came to Gaza in 1994 for my father’s work. Since arriving to Gaza City, my father bought a very warm and comfortable apartment for our family and turned it into a sweet home for us. My father is Khaled, my mother is Aynas, my oldest sister is Heba, second sister is Abeer, my brother is Mohammed, and my youngest sister is Loajin, who is only 5 years old.

We were living in peace and having dreams until the non-stop Israeli bombardment happening now.

Since the 7th of October, the IOF has called me (and every Gazan) many times with a recorded message that stated, “ Hamas is the reason of this destruction and you must evacuate Gaza city to the north of Gaza Strip.” We suffered from these calls because it is psychological torture. It makes us nervous and they call at night, disturbing our sleep.

On Friday the 13th of October 2023, I had a day off from the work I do for the Palestinian Red Crescent as a first responder volunteer. I was out of my house to see the situation in the streets when suddenly a drone dropped many newsletters stating that we must evacuate Gaza city now.

So my family decided to evacuate to Rafah and it was a very difficult day.

We (my family and my sister’s family in law) lived in North Rafah at our friend’s house for 30 days. It was very hard there because the house is far away from any markets or shops to get what we needed. We even had to buy water for washing and it was very expensive. After this, we had to leave because our friend’s family needed to stay at the house. We left and went to Hamad City in Khanyounis. We stayed at my mother’s cousin’s apartment for one week.

On the 21st of November, a relative who lives in Turkey called us saying there was a bombed house in Hamad City, asking if it was near us and if we were okay. We responded to him by saying that we did not hear anything. I told my mother that I wanted to go help because I’m a first responder. She refused at first because she wanted me to be safe, but allowed me to go after I insisted.

I ran 2 miles to see our relative’s house destroyed.

I started crying when I saw the bodies and I tried to help the rest of the people buried under the rubble, but the neighbours stopped me, saying that I won’t be any help in the psychological state I was in. I saw death before my eyes. I insisted to help and pulled the martyrs and parts of people’s bodies out of the rubble with my bare hands.

My family evacuated 4 times. The third time was when we left Hamad City to Rafah and stayed on the street for more than 5 hours with no food or water until I found a school to sleep in. We went to the school and it was one of the most difficult nights ever because we had no tent. Someone gave us an extra tent the second night, so my family slept in it except for me because it was too small. I slept outside on the ground and froze. I couldn’t sleep well because of the noise of constant IOF airstrikes, the noises of people and the bombs.

Finally, we went to South Rafah and we built a camp on the street. Beside our camp, the street was filled with sewage and waste. So if I won’t die from the bombs, I will perhaps die from disease.

Our routine here is to wake up at 6 am or earlier because of the noise of air strikes and explosions, try to find a bathroom to relieve ourselves and to wash our faces. After this, I go to look for water to wash dishes and to find safe water for drinking. Unfortunately, we cannot shower here because there is no facility or water for it. Around 9 am, I go to anyone who has solar panels so that I can charge a battery for our light to use at night and my phone battery. After this, I go to look for food. All of the food is overpriced and difficult to come by as there are so many people here. There are more than 1.5 million people now. We have all lost weight. It is nearly impossible to find any chicken or beef and the price of food changes all the time.

Fuel is also very expensive and hard to come by.

The cost of us evacuating at this point cost my family about $500. My father has not been receiving his salary since the Israeli attacks started.

Sorry for our scattered thoughts. We are all lost and have not been normal since all of the chaos. We don’t know what to do, especially now since people have been leaving Rafah due to more threats from the IOF. We do not know if they will invade Rafah or not. We don’t know if we should leave because maybe it will be worse where we go, or to stay here and we will maybe regret it.

We really miss our home. We loved it so much and we were so comfortable there, but it is now just rubble. We could not even retrieve any of our belongings from the rubble. So even if the war ends soon, where shall we live? We have nothing left except for each other.

Living in the camp is very difficult and unsanitary. It is freezing cold and you are constantly around so many people, noise, sewage and rubbish. It is very crowded, so you can never relax or have any peace.

We are looking for a safe way to get out of Gaza, but it is very difficult and very expensive. It costs more than $5000 for each person to go to Egypt! Unfortunately, we cannot afford that. We witnessed four wars and survived. Will we survive the fifth?

I will tell you more about myself. Since I graduated from high school I dreamed to be in USA and to study medicine there! Unfortunately, I couldn’t get out of Gaza because of the expensive tuition fees, so I have been studying English translation for 3 years and this year was supposed to be my graduation year with honors.

On 13 oct I left my home, clothes and memories there in Gaza city. I have described you the suffering here but it’s just a drop in the sea. I used to be a giver but this my first time ever to request you to help me and my family to evacuate Gaza and to live a new safe and comfortable life."

Please help us raise funds to evacuate Ahmad and his family and to help them establish a new life. A contribution of any amount will help us immensely.

Thank you all so much

Salam