Doctors of the World USA’s Post

Every Palestinian child in Gaza has a story of exposure to unimaginable Israeli military violence, including killings, traumatic injuries, mass displacement, hunger, destruction of whole neighborhoods, and separation from family members, which leaves lasting scars and trauma. No child should have to endure such burdens. According to the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF), every child in Gaza--approximately one million children--will require mental health and psychosocial support.  We must persist in demanding an immediate #ceasefirenow. #StoptheGenocide.

The current bombardment of Rafah—a city of displaced persons, over 600,000 of whom are children—is only the latest and most severe evidence that children in Gaza and the West Bank are systematically deprived of their right to have a childhood. An estimated 15,000 children have not survived the genocide so far—an incomprehensible number. The children that do will deeply and forever be impacted by the trauma of violently losing limbs, parents, siblings, friends, neighbors, teachers, personal belongings, homes, and adequate water and nutrition. This cycle of trauma playing on repeat in Gaza and the West Bank is not new. Since Israel’s (and Egypt’s) blockade started in Gaza 17 years ago, “a generation has grown up knowing nothing but cyclical escalation, a dire lack of public services, and next to no freedom of movement.” What this means is that for Palestinian children, there is no “post” traumatic stress. There is, instead, what Dr. Samah Jabr calls “chronic stress disorder,” a result of the constant, cumulative impact of checkpoints, detentions, imprisonment, calorie restriction, surveillance, and physical violence, amongst other racist and dehumanizing experiences. We must recognize, visibilize, talk about, understand, and address the systematic violence against Palestinian children. Nelson Mandela believed “there can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul than the way it treats its children.” We have a lot of soul searching to do because we are only as humane as our treatment of children and people who are suffering the most. https://lnkd.in/g6XFiGc2 #ceasefireingazanow #gazagenocide #savegazachildren #alleyesonRafah #gaza #westbank #Palestine

Every Palestinian child in Gaza has a story of exposure to unimaginable Israeli military violence, including killings, traumatic injuries, mass displacement, hunger, destruction of whole neighborhoods, and separation from family members, which leaves lasting scars and trauma. No child should have to endure such burdens. According to the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF), every child in Gaza--approximately one million children--will require mental health and psychosocial support.  We must persist in demanding an immediate #ceasefirenow. #StoptheGenocide. 

What would you do if someone stole your house and livelihood, killed some of your family members in the process, left the rest of you with nothing, and forced you to live in the squalor of a refugee camp? That is what Israel did to over 750,000 Palestinian in 1948, over 300,000 in 1967, and over 250,000 since then, and more every year. Most of the families in Gaza owned homes and farms where Israeli cities and towns now stand, which Israel literally stole from them. Many still even have the keys, and some homes still stand with Jewish immigrants living in them now. I also cry for the 36 innocent Israeli children killed on October 7th, but this horrible conflict did NOT start on that day. The proof is the nearly 2300 Palestinian children Israeli soldiers and settlers killed between the year 2000 and October 2023, including 43 children during the 9 months just before October 7th (all names & details documented on BTselem.org). Not to mention Israel’s brutal 57 year occupation/apartheid, and the blockade of Gaza since 2005 — both illegal under international law, and simply immoral and inhumane.. And now Israel is committing genocide and our government is helping them do it. Israel has killed over 12,000 Palestinian children in under 5 months, has orphaned over 25,000 more children, and has made over 900,000 children homeless during winter. And Israel is still blocking international aid to these children, increasingly killing them with starvation, dehydration, and disease, in addition to killing them with U.S. supplied bombs and ammunition. They’ve literally been amputating children’s legs without anesthesia. Can you imagine if that happened to your child? Aid agencies have even had to come up with a new acronym: WCNSF, which stands for Wounded Child No Surviving Family. Do you really think Hamas will need to teach the children who survive this hell to hate Israel, or is Israel’s indiscriminate brutality doing it for them, as it has for 75 years? PLEASE WRITE & CALL YOUR REPRESENTATIVES & the White House to demand that they stop helping Israel kill and starve children, commit war crimes, and maintain its brutal and racist apartheid, with our tax dollars. Our government has the power to end this unimaginable cruelty by simply refusing to send more weapons and ammunition to Israel, and by also not vetoing any more UN Security Council resolutions for a ceasefire. This genocide will be a permanent stain on our country’s reputation if we continue enabling this madness. The entire world is watching and outraged, and you should be too. And if you care about Israel, then you should also want to help it end its genocide and apartheid before Israel’s reputation is unsalvageable.

🔴𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐨𝐜𝐢𝐝𝐞 𝐀𝐠𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐭 𝐂𝐡𝐢𝐥𝐝𝐫𝐞𝐧 𝐢𝐧 𝐆𝐚𝐳𝐚🔴 📢This video shares the heartbreaking story of a child in Gaza, showing his life before and after the genocide that took his family members. It is a powerful reminder of the unimaginable suffering children in Gaza are enduring—losing their families, homes, and futures. 📢In Gaza, the systematic targeting and killing of children has reached devastating levels, with the UN reporting that 42,010 𝐏𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐚𝐧𝐬 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐥𝐨𝐬𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐢𝐫 𝐥𝐢𝐯𝐞𝐬, 𝐢𝐧𝐜𝐥𝐮𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠 11,355 𝐢𝐧𝐧𝐨𝐜𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐜𝐡𝐢𝐥𝐝𝐫𝐞𝐧 (27%), 6,297 𝐰𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐧, 𝐚𝐧𝐝 2,955 𝐞𝐥𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐲. 📢Children in Gaza are facing unimaginable violence—losing their lives, families, and homes. The psychological trauma they endure will leave deep scars, shaping not only their futures but also the future of their communities. #Gaza #HumanRights #ProtectChildren #StopTheViolence #SaveTheChildren, #ChildrenInConflict, #ProtectChildren , #ChildrensRights #EndChildSuffering , #NoLostGeneration, #StopViolenceAgainstChildren #ocha #un #ProtectChildrenInWar #ChildProtection #WarChild #ChildrenDeservePeace #HumanitarianAidForChildren #StandWithChildren

Amid the recent genocide and devastating events in Palestine and Lebanon, I watched the tragedies unfold across social media, while mainstream U.S. media failed to represent our narrative. The harrowing images and stories haunted me, leading to sleepless nights filled with fear for our collective future. Rallies across the country were met with indifference and suppression. On university campuses, peaceful demonstrations were confronted with oppressive measures. At my own university, I witnessed a female student unnecessarily tackled by multiple officers during a rally. These moments left me feeling hopeless. I wanted to act but feared backlash and how supporting Palestine could threaten my future career as a medical professional. My turning point came when I saw how deeply this conflict was affecting my mother. Born in Palestine, she had experienced hostility firsthand—violence that drove her family to seek safety in the U.S. Watching videos of war crimes and innocent lives lost drove her into despair. It reached a point where she asked me to delete social media apps from her phone because she could no longer bear to see the suffering. That moment made me realize the enormity of this tragedy’s reach—it wasn’t confined to Gaza; it was deeply impacting us, even from 5,000 miles away. The genocide has profoundly affected the mental health of Arabs in the U.S. For a community that has long stigmatized mental health, I saw an urgent need for change. My research revealed a significant lack of culturally competent mental health resources for Arabs. Rather than accept this reality, I decided to act. I founded the Arab American Mental Health Association (AAMHA) to transform how mental health is addressed in our community. Our mission is to dismantle the stigma, raise awareness, and provide accessible, culturally competent mental health care and education. It’s time to empower one another instead of passing judgment. Together, we can create a future where seeking help is not a source of fear but a step toward healing. Omar Ammari from AAMHA #AAMHA #ArabAmericanMentalHealth #EndTheStigma #MentalHealthMatters

All day long I think about how many children in Gaza are without their parents. And I think about how many parents are without their children. Both insufferable losses, immense pain, deaths that could have been avoided if the US would actually call for a permanent ceasefire and end to the occupation. So many families destroyed, so much trauma, all because some colonizers want to play out their genocidal fantasies on my people. All to keep certain people in power, keep money flowing to certain people’s pockets, get and maintain control of certain areas and certain resources to protect certain interests. Human life is so cheap, people are so absorbed in ridiculous things they don’t want to acknowledge their fellow human’s pain and suffering. It’s ok to not feel ok right now. It’s normal to feel horrible in the midst of a televised genocide. Despite what society (and most therapists) tell you, you should feel hurt and pain right now. This is a massive stain on our collective humanity. Wounds are being slashed open, collective memory, collective trauma, all coming to the surface, bubbling, boiling over. There is no “how to continue to life a normal life during a televised genocide” manual. What I can say is this, do not let go one your humanity. Do not give into the temptation to “tune out the world to protect your own peace.” You’re not protecting anything, you’re avoiding the inevitable that way. Take breaks, nurture your soul, be in community, but don’t tune out, tuning out is how things got so bad. We simply can’t afford it anymore.

Happening this Saturday! - Anar: Addressing Childhood Trauma in Occupied Palestine - **Last chance to register through the link** https://lnkd.in/dJ9H7Sdr An online event to showcase Anar’s work, history, vision and challenges in providing psychosocial support to children who live and witness the genocide in Gaza and political violence in the West Bank. The speakers are members of Anar’s team: 1) Rev. Dr. Munther Isaac, the president of Anar’s board of trustees, who will discuss the political context, settler colonialism, the ongoing genocide in Gaza, and how Anar’s work responds to the needs of the oppressed communities. 2) The second speaker will be Rami Khader, the founder and executive director of Anar, who will highlight human rights violations in the West Bank and Gaza, such as child detention, settler violence, military violence and access difficulties, including the reality of “Un-Childing practices.” Rami will also explain Anar’s programs and methodology, and the mental health and psychosocial impacts of occupation and oppression on Palestinian children. 3) The last speaker will be Dara Rafeedie, the Psychosocial Support Coordinator at Anar, who will share updates and challenges from the field. The event will start at 8 PM Palestine Time (10:00 AM - 11:30 AM PST) via Microsoft Teams. #ِanar #psychosocialsupport #healingtohope #childhoodtrauma #palestine

Let’s End the Indifference: Be Your Brother’s Keeper. When we take a moment to reflect on global and local news, we cannot help but wonder what has brought us to such a state of indifference. By this, I mean the indifference we show towards the deaths of fellow human beings, whether in natural disasters or wars in Sudan, the Congo, Yemen, Martinique, Haiti, Lebanon, Sarajevo, the USA, Palestine, Ukraine, Russia, Isreal and countless parts of the world. We have grown so numb to the loss of life and the struggles of our neighbors, that we no longer pause to offer a prayer or feel outrage. We simply scroll past it and move on. I am guilty of this, too. For years now, I have stopped following the news because I was overwhelmed by the daily horrors humans inflict on one another. Yet, turning away from this reality is another form of cowardice. A smaller but equally troubling example of indifference is how we often overlook victims of domestic violence. The tragic cases in the P-Diddy list highlight how much abuse can unfold in plain sight, without anyone stepping in to report it or protect the victims. As we begin this week, I believe we should strive to become our neighbors’ keepers again, to rekindle our sense of responsibility for one another. These are not just numbers or death tolls; they represent human lives, real people who are affected by these events, whether through death, abuse, kidnapping, or other crimes. Let us be more sensitive to the suffering around us. Let us become our brothers’ keepers once more. #war #peace #congo #middleeast #sudan #palestine #lebanon #israel #haiti #ukraine #conflict #globalnews #violence #domesticviolence #abuse