He Talks About It Towards The End Of Stream

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no offense but if i exit out of a program that program should close. none of that running in the background shit.

Shout out to all the tumblr users dealing with daily fatigue and severe depression.

Respect to those who have medium and high support needs who need assistance with bodily functions.

Love to those who cannot safely leave their bedrooms or home due to the pandemic and lack of societal support.

Care to those who spend the majority of their life online because this is the only way they can socialize with the outside world

There are so many of us trying to make it day to day. I love you and you're not alone in this.

I love you people who have to be carried, lifted, or escorted in mobility aids to do daily living tasks

I love you people who depend entirely on your cariers and personal aids for every function

I love you people who haven't been able to shower in over a week and therefore have tangled or matted hair and body odour

I love you people who have been wearing the same clothes for over a week

I love you people who dont have the energy to get out of bed to use the bathroom and need to use diapers or a bed pan

I love you people who havent been able to cook their own meal in months

I love you people who have piles of dirty clothes and trash scattered around their room

I love you people who uncontrollably drool on yourself and your property

I love you people who have slowly lost mobility and function over time and are adjusting to their new life

i feel obligated to talk about this bc i am egyptian and one of the central reasons people from gaza have been fundraising is because of egypt's border policy, which is no longer active since the rafah border was destroyed

i know nothing gets people more heated or self-righteous than the idea that they might be getting scammed, and i know the gofundmes here can be overwhelming in your inboxes and i know for many people in the west who want some kind of reliable process this can seem sketchy but palestinian bloggers on here (and palestinians across platforms including on gazafunds.com) don't want you to be scammed any more than you want to be scammed, and they have put in an extraordinary effort to verify information literally in the middle of a warzone

the truth is you all have no idea how difficult this entire process is from top to bottom, tech companies and fintech companies literally hate anything that passes through this area. i'm banned from uber and doordash because i used an egyptian credit card while travelling and it flagged their automated fraud systems and they never reinstated it lol like that's how arbitrary it is. and egypt is one of the better-connected countries in the area.

the entire reason people in gaza are relying on gofundmes is because the barriers to entry and exit are not accidental—they're deliberate! this is literally what being occupied and middle-eastern means. it means you don't have easy access to bank accounts, you don't have easy access to fundraising, you don't have easy access to your own records, and you are automatically mistrusted by the world at large of how thoroughly dehumanized your language and your people have been during a genocide where you are being bombed and living in a tent. this is also part of what it means to be a refugee from the global south or to be a refugee from the global north, where these processes are expedited (as they were for ukrainian refugees, for example) precisely because they are part of the structure of a war.

like just to explain to you guys how difficult it was for me (someone with access to networks across the world) to get money to a friend in gaza, because egypt's also going through an economic crisis and transferring usd here is close to impossible: to get 15k usd (enough to get 3 people out of gaza) to the office in egypt that registers people for evacuation, that family needed

a stable internet connection to communicate with us (they were only able to get in touch briefly every other day)

first-degree relatives in egypt to register for them

people from abroad who could raise the money for them (which they did; they were family friends who knew them)

an egyptian with a usd bank account and a foreigner coming to egypt who could carry usd in cash to divide it among themselves because there is no other way to receive that amount of money here at once

we managed to get the money to their relatives here, they managed to register them, and then the rafah border was destroyed. so now the are just waiting while being bombed and displaced from one area to another. and this is a family who had every connection needed. imagine how it is for people where only one of these links are dropped?

that's why the work the palestinian bloggers do here to support palestinians in gaza is necessary, because they fill in for people who don't have good language skills, who don't have friends abroad to fundraise or vouch for them, who don't have relatives in egypt who can receive money for them, etc

does this mean every fundraiser is 100% reliable? no. this is why the verification list exists! the things i would be wary of would be if someone sends you a false or phishing link, or if someone who is running the campaign from abroad decides to scam the palestinians they're raising it for and refuse to send the money, both of which i've witnessed personally

but the likelihood of someone faking being from gaza and getting onto the verified list is much smaller because the verification process is rigorous and like i said, palestinians themselves don't want to be promoting scams. but also most of these gofundmes protect your donation, meaning if someone disputes it you get your donation back. they are paranoid to the extent that they will sometimes refuse to pay out people in gaza even after the campaign goal is reached for no reason except that anything from the middle east is generally regarded with suspicion. i've seen paypal also refuse to do the same

as a matter of fact from a tech standpoint it's so, so much easier for someone located in the west to create a fake gofundme/phishing scam than for a palestinian to do so, but by that token it's more difficult for someone in the west to convincingly fake being from gaza. which is why the verification list and other initiatives (like again, gazafunds.com) are so important

i have tried to get gofundmes on gazafunds before and i can promise you their process is rigorous. you might not see a lot of the paperwork behind a specific campaign but i know they don't add campaigns unless they verify their IDs personally or through a network of trusted references. the bloggers on here are a volunteer network working independently, of their own effort, and they are doing their best in what is a genuinely horrible situation. the border is closed now but people in gaza have worked out alternate ways to receive money raised online (again, often via relatives transferring to each other outside gaza or other means) and aid hasn't been coming in for months and those regulating the aid were killed, which means extremely limited supplies and high inflation, so money raised and received now is literally survival money that goes wherever it can, and people are very desperate to raise as much as possible as things get more dire. there is no employment in gaza right now. people have been living off their savings for ten months.

is that simple to convey to some blogger on tumblr donating 5$ to a gofundme? is it simple to understand? no. and that's part of the structure of genocide. you aren't going to be able to venmo someone and get a receipt like you do if you're donating to an org, so volunteers are doing their best to fill in the gaps for that by making sure you know how your money is helping real human beings while relieving the pressure on these humans, in a genocide with limited internet, to constantly post about themselves.

the fact of the matter is that your risk of being scammed by a gofundme from the verified list or gazafunds dot com is extremely low, but the damage of of assuming (and even worse, claiming) these campaigns are a scam is extremely high

if you don't trust a campaign, don't donate to it. if you notice a red flag you feel like the bloggers verifying might have missed, alert them to it. if you notice someone impersonating one of the verified campaigns on here (also common) alert people to it. i often have difficulty identifying which blogs are legitimate because they are deleted and remade so frequently, so i just try to reblog posts from the verified list or promoted by palestinians bloggers as i donate to them.

don't cast doubt on the process if you don't understand it, and don't be cruel about a situation you should pray you never experience—and odds are, if you have a US passport and a US bank account, you never will.

okay guys but in all seriousness the trump attempted assassination is going to rally the right like crazy. voter turnout will be going up. it is more crucial than ever that you SHOW UP AND VOTE IN THIS YEARS PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION.

It's with a heavy but hopeful heart that I watch Palestinian families fundraiser on here, slowly accumulating the precious little money to go around that they need to survive. However, not everyone is so lucky. A lot of Palestinians that have not had that kind of luck, that did not get early verification, that did not get massive platforms behind them from large bloggers, have approached me in my inbox, asking me kindly to do what I can for them. It kills me that I have so little to give myself, but I've seen this platform collectively raise enough to change someone's life. I've made a list of Palestinian fundraisers that are extremely low on funds, in the hope that drawing attention to people who have not been lucky at all can help turn that luck around. I know most of us can't possibly give enough to get all of these families safe in one go. But please, reblog this list. Pick one or two fundraisers, give what you can, and then keep track of it. Slowly, collectively, we can make a difference in these people's lives. Share and donate as much as you can. https://docs.google.com/document/d/178EGDFKkHlh3y4TMVX82kqgITHsqtoMdNccI2f_94Os/edit?usp=sharing

Update on Nour and her family

I am close friends with the Al-Habil family, whose situation I have discussed under our “#ibtisam al habil” tag. There is still a lot of concern for the youngest child Nour, who is a disabled teen about whose situation you can learn more under our “#Nour Al habil” tag.

Torrential rains have flooded the streets of Gaza and all but destroyed the family’s tent. They are inundated with freezing, extremely contaminated water, which is extremely dangerous for 15 y/o Nour.

Nour is immunocompromised due to her heart condition. These flood waters carry gangrene, cholera, and polio bacteria among numerous others, as well as many viruses and pollutants.

We were about halfway through raising the funds for the tent when Nour’s mother, Ibtisam, suffered a herniated disc after sustaining an injury while moving a barrel of water. She is in severe pain, and can barely move. This is not only miserable and unhealthy for her, it also prevents her from caring for Nour.

In addition to the ongoing $2,000 USD needed for shelter, the family now needs $300 USD (about $433 CAD) to help Ibtisam manage her pain and be able to move.

New temporary goal: $52,971 CAD

Currently: $50,804 CAD

Need to raise: $2,167 CAD (about $1,500 USD)

gofundme.com

Donate to Help a family from Gaza, organized by Yaser Matar

Hello, I am Ibtisam Al-Habil. My suffering began in 2014 when my husband was martyred, and I was … Yaser Matar needs your support for Help

📣🚨Urgent Appeal🚨📣

I appeal to you with all the pain and suffering we have endured after 11 months of war in Gaza. Our homes have been destroyed, our dreams have vanished, and my family lives in constant fear. We are facing an endless nightmare, and I need your help to protect my family and restore hope to our hearts.

Our words may not end our suffering, but we hope our voices reach you. We kindly ask for your support and assistance during this crisis. Every little help you provide means a lot to us.

Please donate and share.

My campaign link:

gofundme.com

Donate to Help Ahmed Jehad and his newborn survive!, organized by Ashika Jaffar

Ahmed Jehad (28 years old) is living in a never-ending nightmare. He got marri… Ashika Jaffar needs your support for Help Ahmed Jehad and hi

Verified by Bees and Watermelons #171.

My campaign was shared by northgazaupdates.

Verified by association by @a-shade-of-blue.

Vetted by @gazavetters , my number verified on the list is ( #84 ).

Thank you for listening and helping me.

i got to thinking about something i said... going to turn these into prints, stickers, shirts, buttons, etc. soon. thought folks might like this, i'm way more pleased with the design than i thought i would be (: consider adding more flags too!

happy pride to everyone who refuses to be cisgender (or cissexual!) in the face of a world that demands we bow to their needs. we do not owe anyone cisgenderism or cissexuality- we owe it to ourselves to be who we are instead.

The Red Lines Policy

Israel controls all food that enters the Gaza Strip. In 2007, Israeli authorities mandated that Palestinians in Gaza should receive only the minimum of food to avoid malnutrition, featuring 37% fewer fruits and veggies than the average Israeli. Though Israel claims to have ended this policy, as of 2017, 40% of Gaza’s households suffered from severe food insecurity, largely as a result of Israel’s blockade.