A Father's Cry from Gaza: Help Ramy Save His Children from the Cold

My name is Ramy. I am a father of three children here in Gaza. Two of them are just babies still. We live now in a tent that is falling apart. It cannot keep out the cold. It cannot keep out the rain. It is not a home. It is just fabric between us and the sky.

Every night my children shake from the cold. They cry and I cannot comfort them because I have nothing to give them. No blankets. No warmth. Nothing. I hold them close but my body is not enough to keep them warm.

We have no clean water to drink. We have no toilet, no sanitation, nothing. When my children get sick I have no medicine to give them. Every single day I go out searching just for water. Just to find something to keep them alive one more day. This is what my life has become.

We had a home once

Before this war we were a normal family. We had a house with walls and a roof. We had beds and blankets. I had work. I could provide for my family. We were not rich but we had dignity. We had a life.

Then the bombs came and took everything from us.

Our house is rubble now. My work is gone. Everything I spent my whole life building was destroyed in one moment. Just like that. Gone.

This is our life now

We have no real shelter. Just this tent that is falling apart around us. We have no clean water and every day is a struggle to find any. My children are sick and I cannot help them because there is no medicine anywhere. There is no electricity. There is no school for my children. There is no work for me. There is nothing except trying to survive until tomorrow.

We have lost family members in this war. We have lost friends. We have lost neighbors. We have lost everything we ever had. The only thing we have not lost is each other. Not yet. And I am trying so hard to keep it that way.

But still we say Alhamdulillah

What amazes me about the people here is their faith. Even after everything. You go to someone who has lost their home. Who has lost their children. Who has lost everything in this world. You ask them how they are doing. And they say Alhamdulillah. Praise be to God. We are patient. We trust in God.

I did not understand what real patience was until I lived it. Until I felt it in my bones on the coldest nights while I watched my babies shaking and crying and I could do nothing for them. That is when I understood.

You hear the news about Gaza. You hear about the bombings and the deaths and the houses falling on families and the tents flooding in the rain. For you these are just headlines. For us this is our life. We are living inside these stories. We are the ones under the rubble. We are the ones in the flooded tents. We are the ones burying our children.

And still we say God is sufficient for us. Hasbunallah wa ni'mal wakeel.

I am begging for help

I cannot watch my children suffer through another freezing night. I cannot look into their eyes and tell them again that there is no medicine. That there is no food. That I do not know what will happen tomorrow.

If you can give anything at all it will help us. Anything.

We need warm blankets so my children can sleep. We need clean water to drink. We need medicine because my children are sick. We need food to survive.

I am not asking for a lot. I am asking for the chance to keep my family alive. That is all.

To anyone reading this anywhere in the world

You are not powerless. Your kindness can reach us here in Gaza. What you give could be the difference between my child living or dying. My children did nothing wrong. They were just born here. That is their only crime.

Please help us. Please.

From the bottom of my heart and from a father who has nothing left except hope and faith in God I thank you. I thank you for reading this. I thank you for sharing it. I thank you for anything you can give. I thank you even for your prayers.

May God bless you all.

Ramy from Gaza