What it’s like to be in Gaza right now

Make Me Smart February 14, 2024 Transcript

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Kimberly Adams 

Hey everyone. I’m Kimberly Adams. Welcome back to Make Me Smart, where we make today make sense. Kai is out today, but joining me is the wonderful Reema Khrais, host of the Marketplace podcast, This Is Uncomfortable.

Reema Khrais 

Hi, everyone. It’s good to be back. Thanks for joining us on this Wednesday. It is February 14. Happy Valentine’s Day to those celebrating.

Kimberly Adams 

Yes, it’s a continuous thing whether or not you celebrate that or not. I love Valentine’s Day. I like all things love. I get it’s superficial.

Reema Khrais 

If you love love.

Kimberly Adams 

I think it’s nice. You know, on the way in here, one of my colleagues was like, “I’m going to take this moment to just say that I appreciate you on Valentine’s Day”. Yeah.

Reema Khraid

And you should do that every day.

Kimberly Adams

Yeah, just expressions of love and care and acknowledgement. Here for it. I love you and care about you, Reema. You’re wonderful.

Reema Khrais 

Aw, Kimberly, I love you, and I care about you.

Kimberly Adams 

All right. Yes. All right. So, we’re going to do some news. And we’re going to get some smiles, which by the end of this conversation, we’re really going to need because Reema, the last time we were on together, we had a really heavy conversation.

Reema Khrais 

It was heavy, and it’s going to be heavy again today. I was on back in October, when everything first happened in Gaza and with Israel. So that was back when I think at that point, Israel’s military campaign in Gaza had just started in response to the attack from Hamas that killed 1,200 people. And yeah, we were just processing. You know, I shared with listeners that my family’s from Gaza. And I should also say, just really appreciated all of the messages I got afterwards. Your listeners are the best. And yeah, so it’s been, wow, four months. And I want to talk about, you know, what’s happening right now and also link it to the new season of This Is Uncomfortable, which came out a couple of weeks ago, and the first two episodes are about Gaza. So, before I talk about that more, though, I figured I would just take a step back, and again, just chat about the news for a minute. So, Israel’s attacks have killed more than 28,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza Health Ministry, about 40% of them are reported to be children. And, you know, we know. I know a lot of our listeners know all of this, but just to run through, you know, Israel’s complete siege on Gaza has meant very limited electricity, shortages of food and water. And, you know, Gaza, as Palestinians knew it before last October, pretty much gone. Every university has been bombed. Hundreds of schools. There are no fully functional hospitals left in Gaza. More than I believe 70% of the homes are destroyed. So again, just, yeah, feels like sometimes there aren’t words to describe it. But it’s been a personally just really challenging time. And most of our relatives are currently there, including my grandparents, most of my aunts, uncles, dozens of cousins. And so, you know, the first couple of months, I was just, I mean, we talked a bit about this, Kimberly. I was just trying my best to like process this as a human, and to be present with my family, especially because like most people.

Kimberly Adams

And as a journalist.

Reema Khrais

And as a journalist. It was just a lot. And it’s been a lot in general. But yeah, and like, you know, most people from Gaza, we’ve lost a lot of family members. And so, it’s been a relentless string of tragedies. And so, I’ve been spending a lot of time with my family in North Carolina. And on one of my recent trips, I decided to sit down with my dad and interview him about his life in Gaza and how he’s processing this moment. And to be honest, I wasn’t sure initially if I was even going to publish it. It was just a personally important thing for me to do. But I ended up working with my team and with our producer, Alice Wilder, to turn that conversation into an episode. And, you know, my dad and I. We ended up talking about a lot of things that day. But I focused mostly on his relationship to this one hospital in Gaza. It’s called Al-Ahli Hospital. And you might remember, Kimberly. It was the first hospital during the war to make a lot of headlines because there was a huge explosion that led to hundreds of people getting killed and injured. And it’s the hospital where my dad worked for 10 years as a nurse. And so, if you hear this story, you’ll discover that it’s also the reason why we ended up in the US. The hospital, which is this Christian hospital, it had a sister hospital based in North Carolina, which is where they sent my dad to work. But with everything that’s unfolded, I just had all these new questions for my dad. And I wanted to not just capture his immigration, his economic story, but also in this piece, we reflect on everything, you know, like, we reflect on that family members we’ve lost and how we’ve been coping. It’s really heavy, and it’s the most intimate thing I’ve shared. Yeah.

Kimberly Adams 

And I have to say what I was really struck by because you shared that you’d lost some family, including, you know, one of your cousins, the entire family at once. But I was really struck by a moment in that episode, where you and your family kind of tabulated just how many people in the extended family had been killed so far. And I was shocked by that number.

Reema Khrais 

Yeah, honestly, I was shocked when we tallied it, as well, because yeah, we have been getting a lot of reports from our family of people who’ve been killed, but to see that number was 156. It’s yeah, it doesn’t feel real. And a lot of them are extended family that and I talked about this in the piece of just never having the opportunity to even know so many of them, right? Is its own kind of grief. And then to your point, yeah, we talked about my cousin who. Yeah, my cousin and her family, her husband was an OBGYN and so, he stayed behind to take care of his patients. And Israel struck the hospital, and they lived in an apartment above this small hospital. So that yeah, it’s hard for me to even talk about it right now. But, yeah, it’s a very. It’s a very special episode. And I’m just grateful for my dad for being so open and vulnerable with me. It was a really meaningful way for us to connect to channel a lot of our grief while also, you know, sharing our small human connection to this massive global story that can, I think, sometimes feel faceless or distant.

Kimberly Adams 

I really appreciate the fact that you, that you did that, because I know you wrestled with that quite a bit.

Reema Khrais

I did.

Kimberly Adams

And it was incredibly powerful to hear. And I know it must have been hard. So, thank you for sharing that.

Reema Khrais 

I appreciate you saying that, Kimberly. It was, and yeah, we had conversations about this too. And I appreciate you supporting me and making this thing because it was not, wasn’t easy. And so yeah, that was the first episode. And then we did a second episode that was produced by Hana Harris Green. And for that, we wanted to do a story about what it’s like to be in Gaza right now. And so, we found this one woman, Hana, who’s in her early 30s. She works for a humanitarian organization, and we talked with her about her difficult upbringing in Gaza. And how, despite that, she worked hard. She achieved financial freedom. She created a life she was proud of, and now everything in her in her orbit is unrecognizable, uncertain. And so, we touched on a lot in that episode. But the relevant news item is that she like most people. Well, it’s all relevant. But she like, what’s happening right now. She, like most people in Gaza, fled her home, she’s relocated several times, and now she’s in Rafah, which is the southernmost major city in Gaza. It’s right by Egypt’s border. It’s been referred to as the last refuge for civilians. It’s where most people have fled to following Israel’s instructions. It’s where our remaining family members currently are sheltering. And so now, the latest news is that Israel authorities say they plan to expand their offensive there and continue their goal to you know, continue their, what they’re saying their goal is to eradicating Hamas. And so, what’s happened really is that Gazans have been pushed more and more south for the last several months to avoid Israel’s bombardment. And so, you know, even though it is the last so-called sanctuary, it’s not safe and it hasn’t been safe for a while, you know, we saw airstrikes in the last week, including one the other day. And so, Hana and I talked about how, you know, everyone there is just is terrified, they don’t know where to go. Egypt isn’t allowing people in. And there have been some reports. We talked about this in the episode of like of Palestinians, coordinating with brokers in Egypt to leave Gaza, but Hana told me, it can cost up to 10,000 dollars just for one person. So, you know.

Kimberly Adams

That was wild to me.

Reema Khrais

Yeah, it is. And that’s like, if you’re even able to do it, right? Like, there’s still so much coordination and logistics. And so, if they were to do that it would, you know, wipe out their savings, and most people in Gaza can’t afford to do something like that. So, and there’s also this larger fear of like, you know, if they leave, would they be able to return? And I think a lot of people, yeah, link it to what happened during the creation of Israel when there was a mass exodus and people weren’t able to return to their homes. So, you know, it feels like an impossible situation. And recently, there’s been a lot of intense international pressure, including from Biden, from Washington to prevent this ground invasion. Biden, as I’m sure you saw, Kimberly, has been more direct lately saying that, you know, Israel’s operation is over the top. But Israel hasn’t presented any plans for evacuation or just stop its campaign. So that’s where things stand right now. And we’ll see what happens.

Kimberly Adams 

How’s your dad been doing and your family doing since the episode dropped and seeing all the response to it?

Reema Khrais 

You know, that’s been one of the best parts of making this. My dad is just, I feel like it was a good release, and a very helpful release for him. And, you know, he immediately shared it with his friends from Gaza, and with our family members. And I think, you know, he’s been overwhelmed with the support, and just how much it resonated with people. So, I feel like it’s, yeah, it’s been this really special way for us to connect and to, like I said earlier, just channel a lot of these difficult feelings. And so yeah, I’ve just. It’s been really special.

Kimberly Adams 

That’s good to hear. I mean, it’s such an awful time. It’s nice that, yeah, at least can be some kindness and empathy shared in these moments. Yeah, you were talking about Biden’s reaction, and it’s been interesting to watch the shifting public perception. When Hamas first launched the attack, I remember talking to Kai on the show, and highlighting polling that younger generations were not as pro-Israel as older generations in the United States, and that that was going to be a problem for Biden, and that has really shown up and it’s getting more and more intense. I’m hearing from more and more people in my life and even from strangers, who are avout Democrats who are telling me that they feel deeply uncomfortable to the point where they don’t know if they will vote in November, because they don’t feel like they can, in good conscience, support Biden, again given his lack of intervention as they see it in this crisis. And the administration is clearly feeling the pressure. I mean, we’re seeing there was a memo that the administration put out about sort of laying out the White House standards on foreign aid. And so, this memo, and we’ll have an article about it in the show notes. So, this was a memo, listing out the foreign aid requirements, and the White House is denying that it changes anything. But people especially Democrats in Congress who’ve been pushing for a ceasefire and pushing for more conditional aid to Israel say that it actually is a big deal because I’m going to read here from the independent; “The memo outlines existing laws stating that countries receiving US aid must follow humanitarian guidelines, such as providing ‘credible and reliable written assurances’ that they are complying with international law and humanitarian standards.” And a lot of people are reading this as being about Israel without actually saying Israel. But at the same time, the White House is also strongly advocating for this piece of legislation that just passed in the Senate. It’s got a tough road in the house, but it’s the foreign aid bill. It’s a $95 billion foreign aid package that includes $14 billion for Israel, including for more weapons, but it also includes $10 billion for humanitarian aid for civilians in various conflict zones, including the Palestinians in Gaza, and we’ll have an article on that. But there is, you know, growing condemnation, not just here in the United States, but globally. I saw the story where a court in the Netherlands on Monday told the Dutch government it had to stop exporting F-35 fighter jet parts to Israel, and this is from CNN, “citing a ‘clear risk’ that Israel’s fleet was being used to commit serious violations of international law. And the European Union’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell on Monday suggested that the US cut arm supplies to Israel amid mounting concerns about the civilian toll of the war.” His quote was kind of cutting. “‘If you believe the death toll is too high, maybe you can do something to make it lower,’ Borrell told reporters in Brussels. ‘The European Union is not providing arms to Israel. Others do.’” And the arms sales are I think, you know, the White House has said that they don’t want to stop sending arms to Israel because they say that those arms sales give Israel leverage. But I was fascinated by the $14 billion number, and it made me want to go and look at how much aid Israel usually gets from the United States. And the Council of Foreign Relations has a really good piece, it’s the “US Aid to Israel in Four Charts.” And the aid is, I’ll just read this here; “Israel has been the largest cumulative recipient of US foreign aid since its founding, receiving about $300 billion (adjusted for inflation) in total economic and military assistance. The United States has also provided large foreign aid packages to other Middle Eastern countries, particularly Egypt and Iraq, but Israel stands apart”. And there’s a chart. But usually, it’s about $4 billion a year because the United States has provisionally agreed via memorandum of understanding to provide Israel with nearly $4 billion a year through 2028. Although the supplemental has more than $14 billion in it. So, it’s a lot.

Reema Khrais 

It’s a lot more. Yeah, a lot of money. From what I understand, I read that article, most of that aid goes to support Israel’s military, and specifically to purchasing US military equipment and services. And there was another point that article made that I found interesting, which is that, you know, there are a lot of arguments for why we should continue to send aid, I think people, you know, say that it cultivates sort of this ongoing partnership that’s important, and that it would threaten, you know, their arguments that it would threaten the security. And then other people argue that withholding it isn’t necessarily a punishment, but rather an acknowledgement that the US has achieved its goal of providing assistance. And that, you know, initially when the systems began, the financial picture looked a lot different.

Kimberly Adams 

And Israel was actively at war with the people, with the countries around it. And so, its defense was a very different picture.

Reema Khrais 

Yeah. And so, this article was making the point that Israel as you know, it’s a very wealthy country. It’s the 14th richest per capita. And so, it has one of the most advanced militaries in the world. So, yeah, it’s just a different context today. But yeah, we should definitely share that article with folks. Lots of interesting stats in there.

Kimberly Adams 

All of its going to be in the show notes, but we have, huh, now that we’ve done that, we should probably find some kind of way to smile.

Reema Khrais 

Okay, yeah, let’s shift. It feels like a difficult task. But let’s do that.

Kimberly Adams

Hard pivot. That’s why we haven’t used it for it.

Reema Khrais

You want to go first?

Kimberly Adams 

Well, I will say though, what I really appreciate about your episode with Hana is all the laughter that you were able to get in there. And how she emphasized that, you know, there are moments of joy that she has and that everyone has. I think that’s important to remember.

Reema Khrais 

I think that’s important, too. I really appreciated that point that she made, how she doesn’t want to be defined by her struggles. And yeah, that there’s still ways in which you can access like small moments of joy or comfort. But yeah, I was also surprised if you listened back to that episode, just how much levity there is in there despite how grim everything is.

Kimberly Adams 

So, speaking of moments of joy, I had this super joyful piece that I came across in the Washington Post about friendship. And it says “How to stay friends for 50 years? Ask the women of Sugar Hill.” Since the early 1970s, a group of 16 women have met up every December to celebrate their friendship. And basically, these women all went to the University of Maryland, College Park at the same time, and it was, you know, when these are Black woman, and the this is when Black students only made up 4% of the student body. And so, they really connected with each other and built a support network. And then they made a point to keep it going. And what I found really interesting about this article is the sort of textbook for how you invest in friendships to keep them going. In terms of the group chats, and the planning activities, and how they support each other video calls, video chats, phone calls, and fitness challenges that they do together. And it was really, yeah, it’s really lovely. And you know, these women have really taken care of each other. And I think that’s absolutely beautiful. And they seem to have such a good time together. They’ve traveled to all these different countries. And I mean, maintaining adult friendships is hard.

Reema Khrais 

I’m smiling.

Kimberly Adams

Good, I’m glad you’re smiling.

Reema Khrias

I’m smiling so much right now. Yeah, just thought of that.

Kimberly Adams 

Because the pictures are great. I mean, it’s hard to maintain adult friendships. But can you imagine like a group of 16 and not having like infighting, and subgroups, and like side chats and things like that, which made it hard. But anyway, it’s super fun.

Reema Khrais 

That is my goal in life. Like I’m part of a group chat of 10 women and we call ourselves sisters abroad. And yeah, and I also sometimes marvel at the fact that I mean, yeah, there’s drama that might happen every now and then. But we’re still consistently all in touch. We’re all friends. And my dream is that when we’re 80 we’re still hanging out, still renting Airbnb’s and, you know, staying up too late talking. And that would be amazing.

Kimberly Adams 

I love it.

Reema Khrais 

Yeah, thanks for sharing that.

Kimberly Adams 

Another article in The Post that made me smile. And then I want to hear yours was Valentine’s Day themed one about whether or not you can tell a breakup text as it is, whether it’s from AI or real human and there was a quiz where they basically. Some people sent in their own breakup text chats, and then they generated some with chat GPT or some other AI who knows? No, it was written by chat GPT-4 specifically, and there’s a quiz to see if you can spot the difference between whether the combos are humans or robots. I did terribly on this quiz. We’ll have a link to that.

Reema Khrais 

Wait, Kimberly. We have to roleplay at least one of these conversations. Can we please do the first one?

Kimberly Adams 

Oh, yes. Yes. Okay, let’s do it. Okay, here we go.

Reema Khrais 

You go first. So, you’re one person and I’m the other.

Kimberly Adams 

Okay. Been thinking about our future, I really want to travel the world.

Reema Khrais 

I’m more of a settle down and build a home type.

Kimberly Adams 

Seems like we want different things.

Reema Khrais 

Looks like it. Maybe we’re not right for each other.

Kimberly Adams 

Sad to say, but I agree. Goodbye, Jaime.

Reema Khrais 

That is a robot. You’re going to tell me that’s a human.

Kimberly Adams 

You think? Well, let’s see. I clicked robot. You’re right. AI wrote this. That was one that I got right too, but they get harder than that. They definitely do. I only got two out of nine correct. Okay, now what’s your smile?

Reema Khrais 

All right. My smile. Just came across this in Business Insider. I thought it was cute. It’s about this woman who goes to strangers’ weddings for fun. So, it’s like a real life wedding crasher. She well, I guess she’s not crushed. She gets invited. With permission. Yeah, she gets invited through these Facebook groups where brides are like, “Hey, we have some empty seats. Like let me know if you want to spot,” and so she’ll go to these weddings. She’ll see, you know, her name on the table chart and she’ll dance. She’ll tear up at the speeches and she still apparently gives them a gift. And by the end of the night, she’s made friends, and I thought it was interesting. Apparently, there’s also there’s another tidbit in this article where there’s they mentioned there’s this Facebook group called “Sisterhood of the Traveling Wedding Guest Bridesmaid.” So, it’s like for people who want, who don’t have people in their lives who can help them go dress shopping or do wedding errands. So, I thought that was kind of sweet. And yeah, so we’ll share that cute little story.

Kimberly Adams 

I feel like we have given a good dose of smiles to end the show. So, let’s end on our up notes. So that is it for us today. We are going to be back tomorrow. Until then you can send your thoughts, questions and comments to makemesmart@marketplace.org You can also leave us a voicemail at 508-U-B-Smart.

Reema Khrais 

No, I think that’s you Kimberly, right?

Kimberly Adams 

Yep. Make Me Smart is produced by Courtney Bergsieker. Ellen Rolfes writes our newsletter. Today’s program was engineered by Jayk Cherry, and Thalia Menchaca is our intern.

Reema Khrais 

Ben Tolliday and Daniel Ramirez composed our theme music. Our senior producer is Marissa Cabrera. Bridget Bodnar is the director of podcasts. Francesca Levy is the Executive Director of Digital. And that is the show.

Kimberly Adams 

That is the show.