News comes out of Gaza in a constant feed of photos and videos: civilians dying of starvation under Israel’s blockade, Palestinians shot dead while rushing to food distribution points, tents housing displaced people engulfed by flames. More than 14,000km away in Sydney, there is an overwhelming sense of grief, frustration and rage, Ziyad Serhan says. The high school teacher who heads Educaid – an organisation focused on increasing mental health literacy among culturally diverse communities – has been hosting events to help people cope, from group healing circles to educational events with guests such as Jewish trauma expert Dr Gabor Mate and British-Australian doctor Mohammed Mustafa, who worked at al-Ahli Arab hospital in Gaza. Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email “We are watching a live-streamed genocide for the last 600 days,” Serhan says. “It is very, very important we have community spaces like this.” People came from all over New South Wales to the Morning Owl Cafe in Auburn to listen to Mustafa talk about his missions to Gaza. “[It was] an opportunity to hear from him about how we can transform those many emotions that we’re feeling into meaningful actions, which is what he’s done,” Serhan says. Across the country, people have been responding to Israel’s bombardment of Gaza in myriad ways: vigils and petitions, charity chocolates, protests and hunger strikes. But as frustration has built over the government’s lack of response, some have tried to take direct action by going to Palestine to work, volunteer and attempt to deliver aid. “No matter how many emails we send, no matter how much we do, [politicians] don’t listen and they don’t act,” says Yossra Aboul-Fadl, a pharmacist who organised a panel of medical professionals from the Illawarra who had been to Gaza. “We’re not going to wait for them to do the right things. We’re going to do it ourselves.” ‘Moral crisis of our time’ There is a waiting list of doctors applying to go to Gaza with some organisations, Dr Ayman Elattar says. “For health professionals worldwide … it’s becoming more and more obvious that we can’t just sit and be complacent,” the emergency specialist says. “Especially [because] we are the only profession that are allowed in.” Elattar spoke on Aboul-Fadl’s panel in Wollongong, alongside Dr Aziz Bhimani, Dr Mohammed Mustafa, the executive director for Illawarra Women’s Health Centre, Sally Stevenson, and activist and social worker Assala Sayara. He went on his medical mission in April, during Israel’s aid blockade of the strip. Everything Elattar believes about humanity has deteriorated after his time there, he says. “Lots of patients, innocent kids and women and teenagers, could have been saved if the right response [had been] allowed to happen.” Bhimani, an orthopaedic surgeon, went to Al-Aqsa hospital in Gaza for two weeks last April, where about 80% of his patients were women and children. “It was difficult because it was injuries on young kids, just over and over again. And these kids were all coming in with either their limbs mangled or completely blown off.” Medical services in Gaza have been “completely depleted”, he says. “When you talk to the surgeons, the staff there, they had everything they needed prior to the war.” Elattar says his work became more than providing an emergency clinical response – it was supplying equipment, offering emotional support, and being a spokesperson to the world. “I managed to get them some handheld machines, ultrasound [equipment] that can help them with trauma scenarios,” Elattar says. “That is like a lifeline to them, because no medicine [has been] allowed [in] … no single truck with food, medicine, equipment, spare parts, anything. “No foreign journalists are allowed in,” he says. “Part of being there, you know that you have to maximise your presence.” Bhimani says the “genocide that we’re seeing in Gaza is the moral crisis of our time”. “My perspective was, how do I not do something about it? ‘Living between hope and despair’ Aboul-Fadl was overwhelmed by how many people showed up on the night of the panel. “People want to know the truth,” she says. “They want to hear from first-hand experiences … It gives them an idea of what’s happening on the ground.” Serhan says people at his event in Auburn “came searching for answers”, many asking Mustafa “what else can we do?” In Wangaratta, rural Victoria, Emily Scott has been organising protests and vigils demanding a free Palestine with the group North East Mums for Peace for a year. “I just don’t know how you can see what’s going on and not care,” she says. Locals gathered in the rain on Sunday, all wearing red. Scott spoke to the crowd: “How many more red lines must be crossed before the world says enough? How many more vigils must we hold before those in power act with courage instead of cowardice?” Petitions have been part of a similar push. “We’ve reached a stage that it’s not just about funding … it’s about sanctions. It’s about consequences,” Aboul-Fadl says. More than 1,000 health professionals signed the open letter she organised in three days. It demands an increase in support for humanitarian organisations to ensure Australian aid reaches civilians in Gaza, sustained diplomatic pressure to lift Israel’s blockade, increased advocacy for a permanent ceasefire, and facilitating emergency relief corridors for aid distribution and evacuation of critically ill patients. And a petition by Jewish Women 4 Peace and Oz Jews Say No calling on community leaders “to recognise, engage respectfully, and properly represent the many people in our community who don’t support what the Netanyahu-led government is doing,” has received almost 700 signatures. They also launched a full-page advertisement in Nine newspapers in February, headlined “Australian Jews say no to ethnic cleansing”, in response to Trump’s proposal for a US takeover of Gaza. “I think that the momentum is building, and hopefully we’re contributing in a small but significant way to that momentum,” Corrine Fagueret, the group’s co-chair, says. Aboul-Fadl sometimes asks herself: “Is what I’m doing enough? “Is what I am doing working? Is it reaching the people in Gaza? Do they know that we are working for them? “I feel like we’re living in a world that the international law gets violated with no consequences … That the government of this country don’t understand how to stand up for the right thing and how to take action. “We’ve actually lost trust in the government.” Bhimani says, “We can talk about this, and almost everyone accepts what’s happening is wrong, but moving on to the next step seems the challenge.” And Elattar says he can no longer listen to politicians. “Whatever they say or talk about, any empty slogans, it’s just cheap talk. “The problem is much more than a money or aid thing, because you can donate, and it will not be allowed in. “People will regret a lot being silent. And once the borders are open … you will find stories after stories of something that humanity should be ashamed of.” Serhan recalls from his event in Auburn that “Dr Mo said … as Palestinians and as human beings we’re at a tipping point in history, and we’re living between hope and despair.” He tries to be hopeful. “We can’t lose our hope, and we need to continue standing up. We can’t do this individually. We have to do this collectively.”
Author: Rafqa Touma