“I never imagined that creating a safe, independent humanitarian route would become the reason my life might end.”
Those are the words of 30-year-old Sarah Awaidah, in a Fox News interview that took place in a safe house in Israel.
Ms. Awaidah, who lives in the eastern part of expanded Yerushalayim, is the chief operations director of MENA2050, an apolitical organization composed of members from all religions and countries across the Middle East and North Africa (hence “MENA”). It strives to provide means for building a modern, prosperous and peaceful future for the region.
Her fear for her life stems from the fact that, operating as part of the Multifaith Alliance aid group and in coordination with Israeli authorities, she has been feeding Gazans.
To wit, she created a system that bypasses Hamas and local gangs, and has moved hundreds of trucks of food and supplies into Gaza.
The group’s goods are transported from the port of Ashdod to the Kerem Shalom and Zikim crossings. Inside Gaza, a trusted partner handles local deliveries. The renegade humanitarian effort is coordinated in real time with Israel, facilitating the deliveries to local warehouses in ways that—unlike in the case of UN efforts—protect the trucks from looters.
Ms. Awaidah explained that her contacts aim “to deliver everything the same day, and at most within two to three days.”
Ms. Awaidah’s effort relies on verified beneficiary lists, using ID checks to ensure fair and dignified access to food. And people, she notes, “stood in line calmly, organized… That’s something the media rarely shows.”
Hamas and other criminals routinely raid UN and non-governmental organizations’ truck convoys, seizing the supplies they carry and distributing them to their own families and friends—and selling the bulk of the stolen goods to residents at exorbitant prices, reaping exorbitant profits.
According to the UN’s own statistics, almost nine out of every ten UN trucks that entered Gaza with humanitarian aid under its watch over recent months were looted before reaching their distribution destinations.
A video posted by former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett shows armed Hamas men happily riding atop seized food trucks. Social media is rife with Gazan civilians’ complaints about Hamas stealing and obstructing access to aid.
The international “humanitarian” efforts, not wanting to be associated with Israel, refuse offers of Israeli escorts to protect their trucks.
When supplies like those whose transport is facilitated by Ms. Awaidah get through to distribution sites and from there to civilians, the terrorists’ and gangsters’ business operations are undermined. When people get food and other supplies for free, they have no reason to patronize the stolen goods stores.
“If there’s no sugar in Gaza,” she notes, “and we bring it in for free, they can’t keep selling it at outrageous prices. So we became their problem.”
May their problems only increase.
Unfortunately and inevitably, though, the frustrated thieves are not pleased with the competition.
“I began receiving death threats,” says Ms. Awaidah, and “not just from Gaza.” The threats came from Palestinians in Yehudah and Shomron, too, and, she adds, “heartbreakingly, some came from people I once trusted.”
She was betrayed, she revealed, by someone who had been a friend. Unbeknownst to her, this person had been part of a profiteering gang, and he had tried to enlist her in its schemes. But, she says, “I stood firm. I made sure he, and people like him, never got near [her operation].”
“And now,” she laments, “my life is at risk because I refused to let the private sector hijack aid for commercial gain, or let political actors bend it to serve their goals.”
The UN and legacy humanitarian groups blame Israel for the scarcity and expense of goods in Gaza, and they complain about Israeli authorities’ insistence on ensuring that aid trucks are not carrying illicit materials.
But, as Ms. Awaidah’s operation shows, blame for any deprivation in Gaza is rightly laid squarely at the doorstep of Gazan terrorists and criminals—the reasons, for that matter, for the war itself.
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