News From Gaza
Our friend Tariq Abu Shukair, an entertainer on the PTC (UK) Days of Joy programme, was injured on the ground in Gaza in the last week. A juggler and stilts walker, part of the team of entertainers and performers who work with the clinical support team provided by Palestine Trauma Centre (UK). A film recently sent to PTC (UK) and too distressing to post online shows Tariq lying in the road with a clearly visible wound in his thigh. Despite this, Tariq can still be heard joking, resilient as ever as he attempts to reassure those around him inspite of his own injuries.
Tariq Abu Shukair (taken 2022)
Palestine Trauma Centre (UK) is increasingly unable to contact members of our team on the ground in Gaza. With few of the team able to contact us via phone or any other electronic means due to the communications and power blackouts.
Where we have managed to establish brief contact, it is clear that while many have been attempting to distribute aid and blankets, the shops are all but empty and any resource that they had have run out.
Aid and blanket distribution during a lull in the fighting
Our team members are now forced to concentrate on finding food and water for themselves and their families in amongst the chaos that surrounds them.
Four members of our team have now had their homes destroyed, with generations of single families now forced to sleep sleep outside in the cold and wet beneath salvaged or donated blankets and makeshift tents.
We have been busy answering messages from new donors and well-wishers, doing interviews and presentations – all in response to the present extreme crisis.
We joined the UK-Palestine Mental Health Network on recent London demonstrations calling for peace and aid to be distributed to the people of Gaza.
It’s not just People…
About three years ago, the PTC(UK) therapy team took children to see the historic sights of Gaza. One, shown here, was the Great Omari Mosque (also known as the Great Mosque of Gaza), one of Gaza’s architectural treasures.
The Great Omari Mosque, which has stood in its current form in al-Daraj since the 14th Century, has now been destroyed by bombing. The loss of the building is a painful reminder that war exacts a toll not only on people, but on culture and beauty - a beauty that we sincerely hope will soon be restored.
Yet at this time, all we can do is offer a memory of the Gaza that is being lost and ask for your support in helping to empower the people of Gaza to rebuild.
Palestine Trauma Centre (UK) is a UK based charity that works to provide adults and children living within the Gaza strip with access to psychological support and mental health services.
Funds donated to our emergency appeal will be used to provide direct relief to the population of the Gaza strip, to support the reconstruction and restoration of our services within the Gaza strip or to provide staff training and remuneration to our team on the ground in Gaza.
Palestine Trauma Centre (UK) is a registered UK charity (1133560) with the Charities Commission of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and is registered with the Fundraising Regulator.
