Palestinian Americans watch as family members in Gaza struggle to stay alive

NEW YORK — For the unforeseeable future, Laila El-Haddad has one mission: to get the voices of her fellow Palestinians, along with their pleas for help, out to the rest of the world. From her home office in Columbia, Maryland, El-Haddad frantically juggled phone calls this week from journalists seeking her expertise on Gaza and Palestinian Americans trying to get the attention of their local elected officials. In between the calls, the 45-year-old mother and author checked WhatsApp, the global messaging application, for updates from her own family members in Gaza during their brief windows of electricity and internet access. Electricity was since cut off by Israel and internet outages have made it difficult for many to keep in touch. “I’m just trying to stay sane by doing what I can to help,” El-Haddad said. For many Palestinian Americans, there’s a sense of helplessness and hopelessness as they struggle to hear from loved ones in Gaza. Amid a fuel and water shortage, no electricity, and now a forced evacuation in the north, administering and sending aid to civilians in Gaza is near impossible. Israel has bombarded Gaza with airstrikes for days and has threatened a ground invasion in response to Hamas’ attack on Israel that killed 1,300 last weekend. The Gaza Health Ministry said Saturday that over 2,200 people have been killed in the besieged territory in the last several days, including 724 children and 458 women. With a looming humanitarian crisis, that number is expected to rise. But even before this week, getting to Gaza to visit family for Palestinian Americans was a lengthy, exhausting and difficult experience, and most people who live Gaza can never leave. Unlike Israeli Americans, Palestinian Americans say they have never been afforded the opportunity to freely help their loved ones in times of crisis. Mohammad AbuLughod, who lives in a suburb of Milwaukee, received fragmented updates from a cell phone his family in Gaza kept charged via a solar panel. His family shared those messages with The Associated Press: An elder in the family died from an airstrike. They tried to seek shelter in a United Nations school, before deciding to stay home. Schools were damaged by airstrikes. Children died. Buildings have been reduced to rubble. They don’t know if the neighbors are alive. They are all gathered now, three generations, in one house. When the bombs come, they will die together. No Read more at: inquirer

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