I'm Niccolò, a 26 yrs old Italian guy and I met Alaa on Instagram.

A few weeks ago, I received a message from his IG profile with the following text written in my directs:

"Hi brother, how are you?

I'm Alaa from Gaza and I found your profile because I saw that you liked some posts on Gaza.

[...]

I am truly devastated. My house was destroyed and I left it.

I am now displaced and I cannot even get food. Can you help me?"

This is the desperate cry for help of a young man of only 20 years who simply wants to support his family, who are experiencing a deep period of suffering. A family that has lost everything it had since October 7, the day human brutality was staged in Gaza.

I had no idea how I could help Alaa and the only solution was to create this gofundme campaign in order to raise a share of money to send to Alaa to face his basic needs and those of his family.

After all, why not believe a 20-year-old guy who, in the middle of a terrible war, had no choice but to stubbornly ask a stranger for help on Instagram?

Why not believe a 20-year-old guy who sacrifices part of his young dignity to ask for help and not see his life stop?

People are dying of hunger in Gaza,

People die under bombs in Gaza,

In Gaza people just die,

but those who live resist.

And if we can do something for those who resist,

why not try to help them?

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Here is Alaa's message:

"My name is Alaa, I am 20 years old and I lived in the Al-Shuja'iya neighborhood in Gaza with my family, consisting of my parents and my five siblings.

I was studying programming and databases at Al-Azhar University, which has now been completely destroyed, and I dreamed of becoming a programmer, helping my family, buying a car, a house, and maybe getting married and having my own family.

All my dreams have been taken away by this war.

The arrival of this war has turned our lives, our ambitions and our desires upside down.

The only desire now is to be able to survive day after day even with the hope of being able to find some food.

We have been transferred to the Deir al-Balah area in a school used as a shelter for displaced people and we live in a tent in difficult and precarious conditions.

The last dream that survives in me?

It is the dream that this war will end and that I will soon be able to regain possession of my life and my future.

Thank you for your support."