This fundraiser effort originated in Philly. We are an autonomous group of parents who, through our organizing for a free Palestine, have connected with families in Gaza. Below is a note from one of us, Emily:

The past two years have been the most devastating of my life. And being Jewish during this moment — watching a genocide carried out in our name — has been shattering. But it’s also pushed me into the world of mutual aid, where strangers become kin, and care becomes resistance.

Like many of you, when I first started speaking out about Gaza on social media, messages began coming in from people inside Gaza. At first it felt impossible — what could I actually do?

Then came one voice — Jihad. Twenty years old, relentless, calling again and again until one day I answered. And there they were: Jihad, his 12-year-old sister Dhi Al Qamar, and 9-year-old brother Badr — shocked that someone on the other side of the phone actually picked up.

That moment began a friendship that’s now a lifeline and if I don’t hear from them, I panic. And then the messages kept coming — DMs, voice notes, FaceTimes — from people asking for help. At first, I tried to respond to everyone. But after building real relationships with a few families, I had to slow down. I couldn’t keep up. So I focused on what I could do — showing up for the families I first met, and connecting others, like you, to those still reaching out.

I’ve learned this: it’s inhumane to make people perform their suffering just to deserve survival. No one should have to show us rubble or bodies or proof to be seen as human. You deserve care because you are alive.

What we are doing isn’t charity. It’s solidarity. Every dollar we send is a refusal of starvation as policy, of occupation as normal, of cruelty as governance. Every dollar breaks the blockade.

And what’s happening there isn’t separate from what’s happening here, in the U.S. Here, our government funds those bombs.
Here, people are evicted, starved, stripped of healthcare. It’s the same logic — that some lives are disposable — just waving a different flag.

So we are not asking for charity. We are asking for a commitment to keep giving, keep connecting, keep refusing to let empathy have borders. Because care — real care — is resistance.

Free Palestine.