I am a Palestinian living in London. I am launching this fundraiser on behalf of my beloved cousin Majd in Gaza. I will manage the fundraiser page and any funds raised on her behalf. What follows are my cousin’s words.

EMERGENCY: HELP MY FAMILY LEAVE GAZA

My name is Majd and I am asking for your help to leave Gaza. We are a family of seven and we have been displaced for more than four months. Our home of twenty-three years has been destroyed. We own nothing but one change of clothes and our passports. We eat little and sleep even less. One of us is chronically ill.

Leaving Gaza weighs heavily on us, but there is no life left for us here.

WHAT WE NEED

Crossing into Egypt costs between 5,000 to 9,000 USD per person (between 35,000 to 63,000 USD in total for a family of seven).

We will use any surplus funds to cover the cost of temporary accommodation, food and medicine until we can find employment again.

OUR STORY

Until 10 October 2023 I lived in Gaza City, in a home my parents spent twenty-three years building.

For more than two decades, I watched my mother and father pray five times a day, thanking God for our home and for the life they were able to give their children.

My siblings and I spent our childhood and young adulthood laughing, dancing and building our dreams. Every day, we would come together for my mother’s delicious food. My father’s generous heart always imbued us with support and encouragement.

Even in the hardest of times - and we faced many hard times in Gaza - we never lost our hopes and ambitions. We learned this from our grandparents, who lost everything during the Nakba in 1948 but never lost their faith, hope, warmth or work ethic.

Before October 2023, we were already survivors of four very difficult wars and a suffocating blockade. In times of war, we would sleep in one room, vowing to stay together no matter what happened, until the long-awaited ceasefire would finally come and we would cry tears of joy and relief.

This war – this genocide – is different. We were forcibly displaced from our home on the fourth day of the war, under the thundering sound of bombs. The only thing we were able to take with us were our official papers. It wasn’t until four hours later, when we reached the “evacuation” zone in Deir al-Balah Governorate, that we realized we were still in our pyjamas.

We left intending to return the next day. More than four months have passed since. Our home was destroyed a few weeks after we were forced to leave it. Twenty-three years of carefully nourished memories were reduced to ash and rubble in the blink of an eye.

When we were forced to leave our home, we didn't realize that we would never set foot in it again. If we had, we would have said a better goodbye. We would have tried to take more with us than our tears and the smell of our home. We wish we had taken our photo albums.

I am a medical laboratory scientist working in the humanitarian sector. I am proud and hard-working. I spent more than a decade carefully building my career and working with international organisations to deliver medical programs in Gaza. I want to stay, but there is no life left for me here.

My brother is a software engineer. He is smart and kind-hearted. Before the war, he owned his own business. He doesn’t know how to rebuild in a place that is still crumbling, but he hasn’t lost his love of new beginnings. Still, there is no life left for him here.

My other brother is a medical doctor. He is ambitious and laser-focused. He returned to Gaza a few months before the war to serve the needs of his community and pursue further specialization. But this genocide has eviscerated most of Gaza’s hospitals and universities. There is no life left for him here.

My sister is an architect. She is creative and diligent. In 2021, she was diagnosed with myasthenia gravis, a chronic neuromuscular disease that causes weakness in the voluntary muscles of the body. At its worst, it can cause a person’s lungs to stop functioning. My sister requires daily medication to manage her condition. Her health condition has deteriorated as a result of the stress, lack of sleep, poor diet and scarcity of medication over the last four months. There is no life left for her here.

My other sister was studying to be a computer scientist before the war began. She is cheerful and has a childlike spirit. She was devastated when her university was destroyed and she still wonders how she will be able to finish her degree. She has her whole life ahead of her, yet there is no life left for her here.

The last four months have been the worst of our lives. We have never felt such helplessness and fear. Once we lost our home and the scale of destruction in Gaza became clear, we tried different avenues to leave, but we have been unable to afford the crossing into Egypt.

Leaving Gaza weighs heavily on us, as does asking for your help.

Crossing into Egypt costs between 5,000 to 9,000 USD per person (between 35,000 to 63,000 USD in total). This is not to mention the cost of rebuilding our lives from scratch.

We have faith that we will survive this genocide together. We have faith that we will be able to rebuild our lives somewhere safe. We want to focus on all the life we have yet to live.

Will you help us?

Even the smallest donations will help us. Sharing this fundraiser (privately or publicly) will help us too.

To thank you, we leave you with a picture of the Gazan seaside as we will always remember it: tranquil, beautiful, endless - ours.