Help Ziead & Brothers Survive & Escape Gaza War

Hi My name is Nina Christine Gorman, (D.O.B. 11-18-57) psychotherapist and psychology teacher in Philadelphia, Pa. USA. I am doing this campaign for my dear friend from Deir Al Balah, in Gaza of the Palestinian Territories, Ziead Abdalmenaem Mohammed Abu Ziead (D.O.B. 7-24-2003) and his brothers (Mohammed Abu Ziead (1-15-2002), Rami (age 13). Ahmed Abu (age 12) and Fadi (age 10) to survive and escape the current terrible war. I have known Ziead from before the war started via many conversations on social media. I have come to know him as an kind ambitious young man who is dedicated to supporting his family before and during the war. Like many young adults in Gaza the pressure is enormous to have to endure the incessant explosions, be displaced over and over, striving to survive to get water to drink and enough to eat and roasting in a hot tent in summer and freezing in winter. The Gaza strip has been destroyed with 85 percent of buildings demolished including homes, schools, mosques, universities, farms and water infrastructure. The crossings to allow aid in continue to be blocked with the exception of minimal fuel and minimal medicines for what hospitals remain and some meager imported food for sale that most cannot afford. Therefore, prices have become exorbitant with most families not able to afford sufficient food, especially vegetables or get clean water to drink.

Ziead and his brothers have to carry large containers of water long distances after waiting in line for hours, water suitable for washing that is not fit for drinking. The ocean and sand are contaminated by lack of collection of sewage that is dumped into the ocean with trash everywhere and bodies and body parts trapped in the rubble, dead that are not counted. Even the injured and maimed in hospitals cannot get sufficient medicines for surgeries. Most of the people of the strip are sick over and over and the children prone to respiratory illnesses, and rashes some from parasites in the contaminated sand on which tents are pitched, tents that have temperatures that rise to 120 degrees in the summer and dip to 20 degrees in the winter.

Until the war ends, there is no alternative for most to survive except to rely on the goodness of strangers and to escape the nightmare to start a new life elsewhere. Thus, I am doing this campaign for Ziead who bears responsibility at his young age of 21 along with his brother Mohammed to support themselves and their family during the war and to evacuate him and his brothers to Egypt so they can then go to another country to start a new life.

Here is my friend, Ziead Abu Ziead in his own words.

My friends my name is Ziead Abu Ziead from Deir Al-Balah, Gaza. My family and I struggled before the war to have just enough to pay our bills and housing costs and food ( could secure only meager wages while attending university) but now we are really struggling to be free from daily fear and hunger. (I have other family members who I help also besides my brothers but due to our proud culture and Islamic conditions, they cannot share their pictures or ask for help especially the women but they choose to remain in Gaza while my brothers and I want to evacuate.

It is not easy to see my brothers Rami, Ahmed and Fadi shake and sometimes break down in tears when the explosions come especially at night and to hear the children and babies of the camp crying all night. It is not easy to see my brothers lose weight and get sick when there is not enough food especially vegetables to eat. It is not easy to see them get allergic parasitic rashes when we can afford no soap or cleaners for the tent. It is not easy for me, my parents and my oldest brother to go without food and medicines for ourselves so the children can avoid malnourishment and survive.

Like most in Gaza, we are tired, very tired. I do not think we can bear one more day of it especially with having to move over and over to avoid the bombings and each time losing possessions and struggling to find a safe place and water to drink or a morsel of food to eat. I tried to start a little business project selling some grocery items a couple months ago after saving what little i could but I cannot afford to do it anymore since prices have become too high. This is very embarrassing for me since I take pride in my independence and want to go back to university (but my university was destroyed). My brother Mohammed and I want to marry some day and have happy lives but now we cannot even support our brothers or older parents and our dreams for the future are crushed. Therefore, I humbly ask you to help our family survive and get a foot up so we can at least eat, drink and not be sick and so we can get out of Gaza and start a new life at least until Gaza can be rebuilt.

It breaks my heart to leave our land but I feel there is no other choice. All people want to survive, live free of the horror of war, and have dreams and my brothers and I are no exception. Please give what you can today even if only five dollars and we will be eternally grateful for your standing by us in the hell that has become our lives so that we can live and have dreams again. In advance, I thank you. May you be blessed and happy and may the angels protect you. Ziad Abu Ziyad.

Here is the Budget for the Campaign:

Survival in Gaza for 2 months (800 per month) $ 1600 for food of flour, lentils, fish, milk, vegetables of potatoes, tomatoes and greens, drinkable bottled water, medicines for rashes and illnesses as needed , and a change of clothes for each member of family and nylon cover for tent

Survival in Egypt for 2 months (800 per month) $1600 for food of chicken, fish, vegetables, juice drink, milk medicines for any illnesses, and changes of clothes for each member of family

Rent in Egypt for two months for a small one or two bedroom apartment (600 per month) $1200

Evacuation with Egyptian corporation the Hala Company 5000 each for for Ziad and Mohammed 10,000

2500 a piece for Rami, Ahmed and Fadi 7,500 for total evacuation fees of $17,500

Campaign Total 21,900

All funds will be delivered to Ziad via his secure paypal from my bank account