Seven
Hours at Erez
By Jonathan Miles
Three children were invited this morning from the Gaza Strip into Israel for heart treatment. I escorted them and it was an eye-opening experience. Shortly after arriving at the Erez crossing at 7:15 am, homemade rockets were fired from nearby orange groves toward Israeli targets. There was a whooshing sound and we saw a rocket spinning crazily through the sky like a child’s experimental model. (The inferiority of their arms is one way that Palestinians attempt to justify suicide bombings).
All of this led to a seven hour delay until, after dozens of phone calls, we were even allowed to approach the first Israeli checkpoint. Here we encountered a barrier of bars and barbed wire recently erected in response to suicide bombings at the crossing. So great is the suspicion that even we foreigners were only allowed to approach in groups of four at a time. Israeli soldiers sheltered behind barricades while we entered a caged-in area, put down our bags, and then retreated. Only after a bomb-sniffing dog went through our bags and our passports were inspected were we allowed to come near the soldiers.
By this time it was too late in the day for the hospital to accept the children, and despite the mothers’ impassioned pleas I had to shout instructions through the barbed wire for them to return to their homes. The mother of one-year-old Maha, pictured above at left, shouted back that the road to her home was closed and she had nowhere to go. Finally the hospital agreed to accept this one case, as Maha is scheduled for surgery this week. The other two mothers returned home after our long day of waiting together.
Virtually every Palestinian I spoke with in Gaza is losing hope as they feel their situation getting worse and worse. Can we do anything to release God’s grace and truth into their lives? Praying for little Maha this week in one place to start. And the doctors in Israel are asking us to find $2500 to help underwrite the costs of her surgery.
Doctors will also decide tomorrow how to go forward in treating the Iraqi baby Thafir. His father reports significant improvement today, and Thafir has again come off the high-frequency ventilator. I’ll keep you updated.
God bless,
Jonathan
