© 2024 FdR / THE ELKHOLI FAMILY IN GAZA
President of the Swiss Confederation Mrs. Viola Amherd, Federal Councillors Mr. Ignazio Cassis and Mr. Beat Jans,
in the Gaza Strip tens of thousands of families are asking for help. I am in contact with one in particular, whom I met years ago in the course of my work as a reporter: the Elkholi family. Hussam, the father, in 2009 (the year of another war) was invited to Switzerland, to Lugano (Ticino), where he was given a prosthetic replacement for a leg that had been severed by shrapnel from an Israeli missile while Hussam was bringing help, in his role as a rescue fireman, to civilians left inside a bombed building in Gaza City.
After 44 days in Ticino, Hussam - together with his brother Nabil who accompanied him - returned to Gaza with Switzerland in his heart and made a decent living thanks to this help offered by people from civil society (their names can be found on page 47 of my new book GAZA. DISPACCI DAL DIMENTICATOIO, published by Redea). On that occasion, Switzerland played its humanitarian role by authorising Hussam's entry into the Confederation. A gesture for which Hussam and his brother Nabil have been grateful ever since: they brought and continue to bring the name of Switzerland as a generous and humane country to the Gaza Strip.
Today, this family has lost everything. Everything. I am in contact with Hussam's wife, Fatima (also spelled Fatma), who speaks perfect English and has taught it to her children. All she asks is for someone to help them get out of Gaza, where they have nothing left: not a home, not a school, not a job. Zero future. This is not journalistic rhetoric: it is, on the contrary, a faithful description of reality.
I am in no position to help Hussam's family. The only thing a war reporter can do is to write what war does to the human beings who are its victims. This is what I am doing. I turn to you, kind Mrs Amherd and kind Mr Cassis and Mr Jans, urging you to make a gesture of humanity.
What a word, indeed, humanity.... It seems to have been consigned to the dictionary of archaisms, of words no longer in use, which no longer have any meaning. It even sounds like a dirty word.
It is not. It is what History will remember us for. History will judge us. It will judge you.
Why should we help this family and not others?
We should help them all, no doubt. From someone, however, it is appropriate to begin.
Peace, which for another conflict seems to be close to your heart, also passes through the Gaza Strip, through a convinced militancy for humanity.
Thank you for the help you will give to the Elkholi family in Gaza.
Best regards,
Gianluca Grossi
Pictured are, from left to right: Sondos, Hussam, Obaida, Fatma, Baraa, Jori, Farah.