from Gaza to Larnaka and then Manchester -Uk
".......It has been very difficult for me to leave Gaza. I tried to leave several times to reach my youngest daughter who was not allowed re-entry to Gaza. She is now at one of the British schools trying hard to adjust to the educational, cultural, and social system here.
I am very busy trying to support my daughter, but at the same time I am anxious to go back home to continue my work. I cannot rest knowing of the difficulties and ordeals people face daily. I know exactly how inhumane life can be without electricity, gas, petrol, or a way out. And on top of that the daily military operations against Gaza.
With a torn heart, I sailed last week on board of one of the Free Gaza Movement boats and watched Gaza's beach slowly disappear. On the way to Larnaka I sobbed a lot. It was hard for me to be on board a small boat in the midst of a dangerous hostile sea and harder still was to think about the unpredictable future. Even though I was on my way to see my children I did not feel the normal, natural human feelings. You see, everything in Palestinian psychology is mixed with sadness, uncertainty, and great suffering.
When the captain announced that we had reached international waters, I threw fifteen bouquets of wild flowers from my garden in loving memory of the 15 fishermen who were killed by the Israeli naval forces in last five years. Their only crime was accidentally fishing farther out than the Israeli army permits, though they were still within Gazan waters according to international treaties. They were killed while trying to secure some sort of living for their families amidst the cruel, unjustified occupation and collective punishment that are imposed on all of us under the slogan of security. Their executions go against all humanitarian values.
I am looking forward to hearing from you. Please pass my warm regards to all the friends who support us in Gaza. It is with their solidarity that we can continue and show resilience during the most difficult times, while we face the occupation and the world's shameful silence.
Yours sincerely,
Mona El Farra"
The siege -closure- and my personal story
"This time I’m writing my own very personal story. But it is also the story of 1.6 million Palestinians in Gaza who are living under the siege and the hurtful cruel occupation and collective punishment......
As for me, I was invited by the Palestine Solidarity Committee, Liverpool Friends of Palestine, and others to give talks about my life in Gaza. So I tell audiences about the Gazans who died because they weren’t allowed to travel abroad for treatment and we didn’t have the necessary medicines or equipment to treat them in Gaza. I explain what it’s like to live in the dark because the power supply is cut off most of the days and nights. I give voice to the hundreds of newborn and premature babies in our hospitals who are dying slowly , because we cannot accurately measure the gas system in their tiny bodies due to the interrupted power supply.
The numbers are staggering. Eighteen percent of children under the age of 15 in Gaza have stunted growth and forty-five percent have iron deficiency anemia due to lack of proper nutrition. Eighty percent of the population is now living in poverty and two thirds are refugees that were ethnically cleansed from their villages 60 years ago. More than 650,000 children under the age of 16 suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder.
But the stories are worse. I explain what it PTSD means for these children, how they suffer from all sorts of nightmares, anxiety, and inability to focus at school, phobias, bedwetting, stress, and depression.
But the worst feeling of all is our feeling of abandonment. Enduring the hardships of daily life in Gaza under the siege and occupation is less harmful than having to live day after day without hope. We are losing of faith in the outside world for not taking serious actions against Israel’s crimes against humanity in Gaza.
I'm determined to go back to Gaza, to continue my responsibilities, in the Red Crescent Society ,as well as my responsibilities as MECA Projects director, where I coordinate cultural and health projects , for children community centers and the relief work I coordinate for hundreds of families ,
. My life will be torn between the two things I love most: my children and my work for my people in Gaza."
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