(Please forward comments to Belinda Allan, Community
Mental Healthcare Palestine Ltd, at [log in to unmask])
Rough precis of two telephone calls with Dr Eyad el
Sarraj, Chairman of the Gaza Community Mental Health
Programme, in Gaza on February 20 and 21, 2001 during
meetings in London of NGO Platform for Palestine, and
Community Mental Healthcare Palestine Ltd
Q: Eyad, we are wondering whether you might be able to
give us a summary of what the situation is there?
What the implications are for GCMHP and therefore what
you feel are the implications are in relation to our
work here in the UK?
Eyad: Well, the general situation is very bad. The
past five months now of violence has led to serious
deterioration of the economic situation and the mental
state of people in the sense that everybody now looks
and feels traumatised to different degrees,
particularly the children. There is a mood of
mourning and grieving and a heavy atmosphere of
sadness, and a sense of hopelessness. Gaza is a big
prison. But if in a prison, at least usually there is
some shelter and protection, here everyone is exposed,
and vulnerable, they are human targets. There are
helicopters, massive bombing and shooting. The sea is
not allowed, neither is air nor land.
The violence is unbelievable. 95 houses have been
demolished, 8,000 trees uprooted, land has been
bulldozed. 8 sq kms (of the 32 sq kms of green land
allocated to Palestinians) has been destroyed. People
are terrified.
As you know now, Gaza has been under siege for the
last four months on and off and in the last ten days
at least Gaza has been totally sealed off, no body is
allowed in or out. Only today we started to get
newspapers. There are very frequent power cuts and
there has been a shortage of fuel and gas and things
like that.
A most important factor is the disillusionment with
the peace; for the last seven years there was some
hope, but this has gone, particularly with the rise of
Sharon as Prime Minister of Israel. With Sharon our
hope is now devastated, people are gripped by fear.
The immediate future is not promising. Israelis need
a Palestinian Gandhi, and Palestinians need an Israeli
Sadat!
People also feel that we do not know where we are
heading, there is no sense of leadership in the
Palestinian community, that the Authority is so
fractured and does not seem to have any sense of
direction. The local parties are also in a state of
paralysis and people are really overwhelmed with
anxiety, thinking about the future. Some people are
already starting to think about leaving; I have met
people who are applying for immigration visas and so
on and many are the best. We cannot afford to lose
them. We don’t have layers of managers in the
community to plan the functions of society.
We need training in different skills. We are still
totally dependent on the Israelis, who are now talking
about a forced separation. We need help in building
the infrastructure and the community. Of course the
unemployment is very high now, not only those who
worked in Israel, but also those whose work was in
Gaza. Local business has been badly damaged and many
companies and firms have laid off their staff, so it
is really a complex picture.
So the situation is very bad and as far as GCMHP is
concerned, we try to manage. We have some funding for
our emergency programmes; we do of course have some
deficiencies, but people are coming to our help.
Children are the ultimate victims of the shooting and
bombing; apart from being killed and injured, they see
the signs of fear in the eyes of their parents. We
have the highest incidence of bedwetting, I believe,
in the world, even in the early teens. 50% of the
population are children under 14. Schools are
overcrowded. According to Terre des Hommes, 14% have
chronic malnutrition. There is massive trauma in
children, families need counselling and social
support. In the latest crisis, it is thought that the
Israelis are using a new form of tear gas: functional
symptoms have been seen by our staff in schools.
Our clinics and centres are continuing to function,
despite everything. We have started a Crisis
Intervention Project in which we send teams to
different areas where people have been subjected to
different violent treatment like bombing or killing or
shooting or siege. We also have a telephone hotline,
12 hours a day, for people unable to travel through
the roadblocks. We advertise this in the newspapers
and receive calls; a counsellor listens and decides
the best advice for each case.
Q: Eyad what about the safety of GCMHP staff? How is
everyone?
Eyad: On the whole, they are fine, we always meet and
I think in a way not allowing us to leave has helped
us come together and, particularly for me, given us a
chance to meet with people every day and we try always
to support each other. But of course we also have
people who have been overworked and some have symptoms
of burn out, but we are trying our best.
Of course there were times when we could not meet
because the Gaza Strip itself was divided into areas
and Israeli tanks were not allowing people to move
from the north to the south of Gaza and vice versa.
That had an affect on the work of our staff who would
normally move between places, and also affected the
arrival of our clients to the clinics. This is where
the telephone hotline helped so much.
Q: What can we be doing, what should we be doing in
terms of the present situation?
Eyad: Well, I know that you are giving time and
support, and I know that so many friends of justice
for Palestine are asking the same question perhaps.
What is important I think for us in the political
area is moral support. I think also we Palestinians
have the responsibility to clarify our objectives: we
badly need some political leadership that can address
this issue before we can ask the world to support us.
We cannot give a message of war and a message of
peace at the same time, as we have been doing. I
think the minute we have this clear, we will have more
support.
Now we need moral support more than anything from
people everywhere, and I think that people from abroad
who come and see the situation here is very important
to get a sense of solidarity and understanding and
sympathy. Send volunteers to witness and support. Also
please send support for families. People can adopt
families here, not necessariy financially but also to
have communication between them, and to express
solidarity and so on.
Of course, on the financial level there is so much
need in Gaza now. You know that unemployment, as I
told you, is very high. The economic situation is
very bad and life is unbearable for the majority of
the population. I can give you a graphic example of
this. Yesterday I met the brother of the man who was
responsible for the bus attack in Tel Aviv. He had
been unemployed for the last 5 months, has 5 children
for whom he used to bring back little treats, and was
very humiliated that he was unable to provide for his
children, as well as being provoked by the continual
Israeli brutality and atrocities in Gaza. Therefore,
when he resumed work, his terrible revenge was
triggered by the sight of Israeli soldiers. The
background was partly one of economics, when you
become so desperate.
There is a so much need in that area, the economic
situation. There is need for volunteers to come and
help with anything they can. And for GCMHP, you know
I told you that there are some deficiencies in our
budget for this year but also we have to think from
now on of next year and the year after and again. Our
urgent priority is also to build up some kind of a
Trust Fund which will give us some security in the
future.
Q: It does seem that income generation is something
that donors are really trying to support. Can you
comment on this?
Eyad: We need income generation urgently, and a
general needs assessment for jobs. About 50% of the
working population is out of work. Gaza business is
not functioning, is at a standstill. Agriculture and
fishing are also at a standstill, there is no money in
circulation. The Palestinian Authority is suffering,
revenue from VAT has not been paid by the Israelis,
and Arab pledges are not coming. Therefore the PA is
not able to protect, and is damaged morally. The
situation is so bad, anything will be of help. People
must be helped to have work for wages, create jobs to
help their self-esteem.
It would be fantastic if donors can help with income
generation projects. Look, we have always been
thinking about this, but I believe to begin with you
have to have some experienced, business-oriented
people who can study the situation in reality and
translate it into figures and prospects for the
future: study the feasibility of making,
manufacturing, whatever, and then marketing. I am not
sure what can be done really. To begin with you need
some experts to come here and assess the situation and
then tell us what is the best way to handle this.
You know we have the women’s project; they have been
doing a lot of vocational work in the last years.
None of the projects were really successful in income
generation, because marketing was very bad and locally
people are fed up with ceramics and tapestry and all
this, and you cannot sell them outside because the
finishing is not as good as it should be, and of
course you need people who can handle it. This is
only an example, of course, and I am sure that we can
have so many other ideas.
One of the ideas, for instance, that we discussed in
London is the idea of having a software development
project here in Gaza, in which people can design and
develop software; in fact people here have told me
that the minute we have such a project they will
guarantee us contracts with IBM and other computer
companies, including Microsoft.
That proposal is very good but you see to start with
you have to spend and invest some money in experts who
can come and train people, you have to get ten to
fifteen people for at least one year, give them
contracts, and then wait for them to start producing.
I know that Israel now is one of the most successful
countries in the world in this field, I think after
America it is number two for software development.
Last year this business generated 16 billion dollars
in India.
What is needed is immediate support since there is no
money circulating in Gaza; in this respect, we might
try to get help for an expanded training programme
within the womens’ centres which would support people
while they are learning. Hopefully, by the time they
have learnt their skills they would be in a position,
I mean Palestine might be in a better position, to
move forward on marketing these skills.
I come back to the point that there is virtually no
money circulating in Gaza. Therefore, when you design
a project, you have to support people’s needs. You
have to give them money so they can live, so they can
come to the training without thinking of their
starving children, or whatever. You have to give them
some money, otherwise nobody will come. Nobody can
pay for training courses or can afford it, so you must
allow in the budget subsistence money as well as
trainers and experts.
Q: What is the Israeli attitude to foreigners? Are
they allowing foreigners to come in to Gaza?
Eyad: Foreigners can come and go with no
restrictions, including journalists. Palestinians of
course are not allowed out at all, even Palestinians
who have foreign passports. Sometimes, last week they
had total closure, even foreigners were not allowed
but normally they are allowed.
Q: What are the prospects of your being able to get
out?
Eyad: Ah, I do not know honestly. Nobody can tell
what is going to happen tomorrow. Sharon has said
that, or indicated that, this kind of siege will
continue for one hundred days but we do not know if
this is only a threat or a real intention. I am glad
that Barak is not now part of the government because
he is really a terrible man and if he were in the
government he would be on the right of Sharon. We have
enough, one Sharon. We do not know what will happen
really but you see the Likud policies usually try to
make life easier for people, allow them to work, allow
them to travel but at the same time do not give any
political rights and are very harsh on people who try
to use arms. So we will just have to wait and see.
Q: What is the PA, Palestine Authority, doing about
all this?
Eyad: in the last four months the Authority was in
chaos. We have never understood exactly what the
Authority is standing for and in the last seven years,
as you know, they failed completely to enter the house
of both the Israelis and the Palestinians. At present
we have a common enemy outside that we have to fight
against, but if there were no common enemy outside I
feel that much of the violence would be directed
against the Authority. Today the feeling of people
here is that it has definitely been misled and let
down by the Authorities over the last seven years of
the so called ‘peace’, and that this process all was
the for the benefit of some persons who were in the
elite. We do not know how the Authority will handle
the political situation from now on and there is so
much pressure on ourselves now to do something
internally, to ‘clean’ the Authority and to form a
National Unity Government. However I really do not
know if we will ever attain this.
Q: Eyad, one last question for you. What is the
International Human Rights Movement doing. Are there
any missions planned for investigating what has been
going on in Palestine in relation to the Israelis?
Eyad: Oh yes, Mary Robinson came here a few weeks ago.
She was herself attacked by settlers and her car was
shot at. She was lucky that she was given an armoured
car so she was not hit herself. She gave a very good
report and she has recommended that there should be a
form of international protection of the Palestinians.
After that there was a United Nations Commission of
Enquiry that arrived in Gaza about ten days ago, and
we actually gave them a two hour briefing of the
situation; we concentrated on the mental health issues
and the trauma and the violence, and I think they
found the report we gave them helpful. They also met
different NGOs who deal with human rights. They should
report back to Kofi Annan and the Commission for Human
Rights and the Security Council, I think, and we are
still hoping for the report to come later. So many
reports have been produced, internationally and
locally. So the human rights fields is well covered.
The question is, what action will there be?
The cases of home demolishing, assassination, killing
of children all have been well documented. In Europe I
think this is fairly well reported, but not in the
States. And generally speaking the peace activists
and human rights activists in Israel have been really
frightened by the shooting and the violence.
Q: That was very very helpful Eyad. It gives a more
detailed brief of what is happening there. Our hearts
are with you.
Eyad: Thank you very much. I know that and I wish you
all luck. I hope that we will be able to see you soon,
if not in London then here in Palestine.
For further information:
Belinda Allan
Community Mental Healthcare Palestine Ltd
46 Southmoor Road
Oxford, OX2 6RD
+44 1865 554397 / fax 435930
Email: [log in to unmask]
Website: www.gcmhp.net
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