Hope for my ill baby Nadeem and family to survive genocide

I am Nada Fesses from Abasan, Khan Yunis in Gaza Strip. I am a qualified nurse having graduated from University of Palestine in Gaza in 2021. I am also the single mother of a newborn baby boy, Nadeem.

My plea from Gaza, from the land of death and destruction, from the genocide zone, through the siege and ethnic cleansing, to the humane and civilised world, I am sending an SOS to the human inside you!

My baby Nadeem was born on 21 October 2023, days after the breakout of the genocidal war on Gaza/Palestine on 7 October last year.

My baby soon started getting sickly and was not growing well because of the extremely catastrophic living conditions resulting from this genocidal war and deliberate destruction of life in Gaza, where there has been a total blockade and siege imposed for the last 10 months since the breakout of war - no food, no water, no electricity, no medicine, and no humanitarian aid allowed in the whole of Gaza. This led to a starvation and famine and caused all hospitals and clinics to be almost out of service.

Besides my baby and myself, I have my mother Rasmeia, my father Mohammed, two sisters (Wala and Rawan), 4 brothers (including Tariq, Abdel-Wahab, Abdullah), and 5 small children -- my extended family is 17 members including my two sisters husbands.

My eldest brother Tariq was wounded when our house was bombarded and was seriously injured in his eye, and under the circumstances he was given basic treatment and not the properly specialised and advanced treatment he needs. Now he could lose his eye.

I am running this fund raiser to save my baby and my family, the 17 of us. For the last 10 months, we have been through unprecedented genocide, the mass killings and the systematic destruction of Palestinian life all over Gaza. We are on the verge of death and the only hope for us is to evacuate Gaza to safety and then hopefully get our life back.

Before the war, we were people who had lives, hopes and ambitions, but now we are feeling like ghosts who are looking to salvage those lives!

As for me, after graduation, I had big dreams and high hopes just like any young graduate, but I was constantly faced by the reality of brutal occupation in Gaza; many years of total blockade, occupation and unrest which resulted in a collapsed economic situation and very poor living conditions.

Despite the sufferings and lack of opportunities, I was still hoping for a better future, so I had to carry on with my life, I then met a man named Bashar and we got married and together we started building our family life and future.

We had a small, warm, and beautiful home, and soon after that I fell pregnant! Unfortunately my husband and I started having differences and we agreed to separate and file for divorce. However I started seeing my dreams in my little baby developing in my womb with big hopes and so much excitement!

When the war broke out on 7 October last year I was busy opening a small boutique business, but the war destroyed my boutique before opening and destroyed all our dreams!

Days after the breakout of war I gave birth under the very unreal conditions of deadly war which targeted everything including the hospital where I was rushed to give birth, where I had no basic maternity care as the hospital lacked all resources whilst being bombarded, raided and besieged.

My baby did not receive the minimum medical care, vital nutrition and basic hygiene that he needs. Since birth and until now, he has been denied everything that a new born baby should get sufficiently. As a result, my baby suffered serious illness, infection, poisoning etc. causing him to have diarrhoea, vomiting, fever etc. due to having contaminated water and food. He eventually developed malnutrition.

In addition, the occupation forces imposed systematic man-made destruction of civil infrastructure and hospitals, famine and starvation since the war started; there hasn’t been even clean water to drink either.

As the genocidal war intensified, hospitals and clinics were put out of service over and over again. Throughout all of this, my baby’s condition has continued to deteriorate until he became very ill and weak, he is still lacking basic treatment and medical care, hygiene and vital baby nutrition.

We were residing in the east of Abasan just by the borders and at the very beginning of the war my area was getting bombarded heavily from the sky, land and sea nonstop and throughout. We immediately fled Abasan for our life under such bombardments and we sought refuge in the next town of Khan Yunis by some relatives. The nonstop heavy bombardments caused total destruction all over including my house which was completely turned into rubble.

Our journey to the unknown in this genocide continued as the war was spreading and intensifying. Amidst the screams of injured or terrified children and everyone, the fright and the smell of death everywhere and from under the rubble we had to evacuate and flee as refugees due to the indiscriminate random attacks on civilians and military orders to evacuate to so called safety zones, only to be bombarded on our way or when we get there.

This happened to me and my family more than 8 times! Sometimes we had to run back to the area or refugee camp we evacuated from. If we are lucky we might find a tent to accommodate us otherwise we stay on the road or on the rubble of bombarded abandoned buildings with nothing to live on.

The whole of Gaza Strip now is declared by UN and other international organisations as unliveable and has become a graveyard for children and women. Nowhere is safe in the whole of Gaza.

We are dying slowly everyday thousands of times while feeling helpless and just waiting for death by missile or bomb, a drone, artillery shelling, burning, illness or starvation… any of that can knock on our doors any time!

Considering my baby’s deteriorating health and our safety, we have decided to escape death and evacuate Gaza through Rafah Crossing where I can get treatment for my baby and rescue his life and our lives. If we continue staying in Gaza I could lose my baby and lose everything!

The evacuation out of Gaza is extremely costly under the circumstances of war and full siege and considering that the whole of Gaza is the biggest open-air prison / concentration camp ever in history where 2.3 million people are undergoing a genocide and siege, unless you pay about $7000 per person as exit coordination fees at Rafah Crossing to Egypt, you can never leave Gaza!

When we leave Gaza we will need a large sum of money for paying for the exit coordination fees, travelling, treatment and medical care for my baby, accommodation, food and other necessities just to get settled in safely. This will cost about $176,000 (US Dollars) or about £ 138,000 (British Pounds):

During the ongoing war and ethnic cleansing for more than 10 months, we have eventually lost all our savings, income, properties and even personal belongings and completely spent whatever we had on us and we have no funds at all to travel and cover the cost hence.

Dear sisters and brothers of humanity, the good souls of the world out there, this is not a tragic story to enjoy reading compassionately and sympathise with - I am here to ask you to do something to help stop the tragedy and suffering of my family, to donate and/or publish the link and share as widely as you could. Even a donation of as little as one dollar will help to bring us closer to my mission of rescuing my baby and my family and give us all the peace and the hope of our life and future. It is to give us back our life being taken away from us.

I trust we will Insha’Allah (God willing) survive this unprecedented catastrophe with your support and generous donations Amen.

My sincere gratitude and appreciation to all of you, God bless your souls.

Your sister, Nada Fsefes, Gaza.

This fundraiser is for Nada Fsefes and her family and is organised by Tha'er Tarifi.