Help us save our family in Gaza

Hi. We, Suleiman and Mohammed Sharkh, are two brothers who have lived in the UK for over 30 years - working as a University Professor and a software developer respectively. We have been supporting our family in Gaza since October but we have exhausted most of our personal funds. Friends have encouraged us to reach out to our wider circle of friends and contacts to seek support.

Our family lived in northern Gaza, but were forced to move to Rafah in October. Our relatives (20 individuals including 7 children under 10) currently live in a flat and tents in Rafah. Our brothers Mustafa and Adnan, sisters Maryam and Manal, and their families considered this a safe haven, although recently that has changed. You have probably read about how difficult it is to get food and water – we have been trying to provide money to make sure they have something to eat and drink.

* Our sister- in law Wafa has cancer. Having had surgery on her neck, she used to travel to the West Bank regularly for radiotherapy. Sadly, this hasn’t been possible for months. Wafa is in urgent need of medical care and the only solution is to get her to Egypt.

* We hope that we will be able to pay the travel fees of the rest of the family ($5000 each) to enable them to exit temporarily to Egypt or other safe countries, where some of our younger nieces and nephews may be able to find jobs.

* These are temporary measures to help our family reach safety. They yearn to go back to Northern Gaza but we fear their homes have been heavily damaged and the cost of re-building will be enormous.

We desperately want to help our family members survive this crisis and get some help to them to live safely and have enough food. Beyond that we would hope to:

* Get Wafa the medical care that she needs, helping her and her family reach the safety of Egypt,

* Help the rest of the family to travel to a safer place,

* Provide resources to rebuild the damage that has been done to their properties and livelihoods.

All this will require lots of financial resources that we do not have. We are therefore reluctantly reaching out to friends and kind people who care about the people of Gaza for donations. We set the target to be as close to the required funds as possible and every penny will help us provide some safety for our family and help them secure a better future.

Thank you

Suleiman and Mohammed