8 January 2009
While I was writing this diary entry I received news that a Palestinian family had been killed in the northern Jabalia camp after their house was bombed. A father, mother and son from the Aljaro family. Other members of the family had been injured. But the news got worse; the father was the brother of my Islamic Relief colleague Alaa. I tried to reach Alaa to check he was OK but couldn’t get through. I finally received news that he was OK. But what do I say to him when I see him?
The news gets worse and worse each day. One minute we will be told that five people have been killed in a certain neighbourhood, then a few minutes later we will receive more news that other people have been killed in a different area.
It seems like Gazans are just becoming numbers. Gazans are not just numbers, Gazans are very kind people who love life and love others. Every child that has died enjoyed playing like other children across the world.
We also learnt today that the fathers of three of the children in our Psychosocial Support program had been killed. This is a project we run with Gazan children who have been traumatised by conflict, it is funded by the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development (CAFOD). Two thousand children are involved in the project. I wonder what effect this will have on those three children. One thing is for sure, when the bombing ends, and we pray it is soon – this project will need to be one of our priorities.
The state of the shelters which people are staying in is dire. There is no electricity, and no fuel for cooking. Neither is there any kind of heating to keep them warm in these cold winter nights.
We continued with our distribution to three UN shelters, supplying them with hygiene kits and blankets. We also prepared a list of medicines desperately needed by Gazan hospitals.