Dear Friend,

As the holiday season approaches, we appreciate our blessings and enjoy the bountiful food that we often take for granted. We also become aware of the hunger of others. In Palestine today, fathers feel helpless to put a loaf of bread on the table, mothers are worried about the worsening health of their sons and daughters, and innocent children sleep side by side with hunger and pain. More and more families wait for a meal that may never come.

Here in Palestine, the impact of the Israeli occupation and embargo has created a hunger crisis of unprecedented proportions. Unemployment is now approaching a record level of 40%, and 75% of the households in Gaza are living in poverty.

Ironically, while families go unfed because they cannot afford groceries, Palestinian farmers are becoming impoverished because they cannot sell their produce. Even with the razing of their land and the appropriation of their water, Palestinian farmers have been remarkably successful at harvesting crops – but the fruits of their labor often go uneaten. The local population cannot afford to buy these basic goods, and Israeli restrictions prevent the export of this produce out of Gaza. At the crucial Karni crossing from Gaza into Israel, for example, farmers’ produce often sits in trucks for several hours, rotting in the sun.

Poor Palestinian families increasingly have nowhere else to turn except to their generous friends and supporters abroad. UPA is teaming up with the Welfare Association in Palestine to provide immediate assistance to them with an Emergency Food Drive. This will not just provide the basic necessity of food for those going hungry in Palestine; it will also benefit a starving economy by supporting local Palestinian farmers.

Your generous contribution to this Food Drive will make a difference to a struggling farmer and a hungry child in Palestine.

Your gift will bring new hope to those most desperately in need.

With gratitude and compassion,

Dr. Haidar Abdel Shafi, Trustee

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