#x-files

Meet the Balousha Family

My friend Mahmoud (@palestinian95) has lived through five wars in his life. On November 4, 2006 his older brother was killed in Beit Hanoun by the Israeli army.

My friend Mahrah (@mahrahpalestine) is Mahmoud's sister. She is an engineering student at Al-Azhar University, but no longer has money for university fees. She is brilliant and speaks with a clarity of analysis and thoughtfulness (even in a second language, even while living in crisis), that is profoundly impressive and humbling to me. She holds hope that Palestine will be free, and when it is, she will use her knowledge and skill to help rebuild.

Their Fundraiser is Vetted

Their family fundraiser has been vetted by 90-ghost and shared by fairuzfan. They have been fundraising on tumblr for a long while now just to survive, and to provide food for their nephews and elderly parents.

Their Family is Starving

The Balousha family is suffering from food shortages and have run out of food. Donations will be used to buy whatever food is left in the markets so they may avoid the "aid" distributions as much as possible, since they're really just death traps for starving civilians.

In one update, Mahmoud describes the intensity of their hunger:

"You feel as if your stomach wall is stuck together, and you feel a bitter taste in your throat as if the stomach acid has reached your mouth. You'll start to get a severe headache or a feeling of emptiness surrounding your brain. When you try to stand up, you feel dizzy and unsteady. You quickly try to support yourself with something and close your eyes for a while, and the blood then tries to reach your brain again... Over time, our bodies begin to digest themselves, and muscle mass disappears, leaving us severely emaciated. If time goes on, our vital organs begin to collapse, some of us suffer from functional failure and the body begins to suffer from diseases that gradually lead to death. Hunger is indeed a deadly weapon that we are exposed to at every hour."

You Can Help

Donate any amount you can to their campaign. I cannot stress enough that this family is surviving week to week on the donations that come through this fundraiser. Any donation offers immediate and vital relief from nightmarish starvation and famine.

Make a post about the Balousha family and encourage others to donate. It makes a difference when you put your own blog's name behind a campaign. When you're writing tumblr polls, add a call for donations underneath.

Share this post with your followers. It makes a difference if you add a comment or some tags encouraging others to donate. It also makes a difference if you schedule it several times throughout the day so that followers see it who might live in different time zones or have different work schedules.