OP-ED A sad tale from overseas

Author: Nate Blumenshine

For many of us, reading the news the past couple of weeks about the invasion of Gaza stimulates energetic debate, academic interest, and the occasional emotional twinge of guilt. We have no way to really understand the numbers that are reported: 1,300 Palestinians killed, 13 Israelis killed, 50,000 Palestinians homeless, 400,000 without running water … Instead, we like to talk about things like "just war" and "proportionality" or remember other tragedies like the Holocaust and the genocide of Native Americans. But when the bombs drop a little bit closer to home and the bullets start to hit people we know, the way we talk about war really changes. This is exactly what happened to me when I heard from my friend, Amer Shurrab '08, that his father's car was attacked by Israeli soldiers last Friday afternoon.

Amer lived across the hall from me as a first-year in Battell. I remember he showed up a week late because he had trouble crossing the border and getting out of Gaza, despite being a Seeds of Peace participant and Middlebury student. At the time, I did not pay as much attention to the struggles he must have gone through as I did to the fact that his Arabic and patience were what got me through my first year of Arabic classes. I cannot imagine what he is going through now. Here is what happened.

At about 1 p.m. Friday afternoon, Amer's father, Mohammed Shurrab, decided that there was a sufficient lull in the Israeli offensive to leave his farm (southeast of Khan Yunis) and dash for relative safety in the urban area. Tragically, he and his two sons that were with him in the car did not get far. As they were driving, they were attacked by a group of Israeli soldiers. As Mr. Shurrab ducked he saw his son Kassab, a 28-year-old engineer, get hit in the chest with a bullet. Kassab panicked and staggered out of the car as bullets continued to fly. Ibrahim, Amer's 18-year-old brother, tried to duck for safety outside of the car as well but was shot in the leg. When the bullets stopped, Mr. Shurrab tried to call for help on his cell phone but was ordered not to do so by the Israeli soldiers. 10 yards away, Kassab was dead on the ground and Ibrahim was bleeding severely in the back seat.

Eventually Mr. Shurrab was able to make calls to the local ambulance service and to family. The problem was that the Israeli soldiers who had attacked the car were not allowing ambulances through. Under customary international humanitarian law, the wounded are protected persons. The denial of medical treatment to protected persons is a war crime based on the Fourth Geneva Convention. Amer knows this and he did his Middlebury best to save his family.

Amer spent hours calling, emailing and calling again everyone he knows in the Middlebury community that might have some connections in Israel and some way to save his family. Allison West '08, who is currently working for a human rights organization in the West Bank called Al-Haq, pulled out all the stops to try to get the military clearance necessary to get to Amer's family. Physicians for Human Rights-Israel and other medical services also tried to get to Amer's family.

It took 24 hours before any relief agencies got clearance to go onto the scene. Ibrahim had died from bleeding several hours before, so Mr. Shurrab and the bodies of his two sons were transported one and a half kilometers to the Gaza European hospital where he is being treated for his wounds.

Thankfully, the political situation is changing in the Israel and the U.S. By killing 1,300 Palestinians and putting many of their own soldiers at physical and psychological risk, the Israeli politicians have shown that they are tough. In the U.S. we are inaugurating a new president that might actually have better foreign policy ideas for both Israel and Palestine. The problem is that Amer's brothers are still dead. Let's be more compassionate next time we hear about some numbers.

Amer, my thoughts, prayers and actions go out to you.

For more on this story check out the LA times article at: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-gaza-sons18-2009jan18,0,2355988.story