In this email, Riad Hamad explains how his support of the Hutto families has been necessary and exceptional. It was received at 9:05 pm, Feb. 6, 2007. Two days later, Riad Hamad drove one of the Palestinian families to the Austin airport. They had been set free shortly before a scheduled media tour of the Hutto prison.–gm
Dear Friends,
I hope that all of you are safe and well and enjoying a peaceful week with your families. As you probably heard the . . . family was deported to Jordan on Monday of last week and they are now in Amman, Jordan penny less with no home, no car, no clothes and no jobs which is not very encouraging..
Palestine Children’s Welfare Fund works ONLY inside Palestine and we made an exception for these families due to the severe hardship imposed on them and the fact that children were put in jail which wass unbelievable and moved us to provide help to them.
[The father of the deported family] called me three times from Jordan so far asking for help in shipping their furniture in order for them to have some sort of normalcy back into the lives of the children and to give them some sense of security. PCWF paid for the airlines tickets for the children to accompany their mother as they are U.S citizens and the government would not pay the tickets to deport them. On the other hand, we contributed to their personal expenses and legal fees which is mounting and taking away from funds that we usually send to the children in Palestine who are in dire need these days.
Please let me know if any one from the Arab, Muslim or Palestinian community is willing, able or desire to help in any way to send money for the family to eat and live with dignity till the man finds a job in Amman.
Also, we need some help in finding a shipping company to send their furniture as so far, we can only find companies that charge nothing less than 4000 dollars to pick up the furniture from Dallas to Houston and then to Agaba, Jordan and then to Amman.
Personally, my financial situation is in shambles due to my commitments in Palestine and beyond any means of helping this family anymore. I would greatly appreciate any ideas from you on how to get help for these families and I will be glad to provide you with their account number in order for anyone to put the money directly in their accounts.
It is very important that we live up to our promise to them when they were in jail that we will help them and for the sake of the children who were forced out of their homes, schools and deprived of their dignity for several months. We will be glad to forward the money to them on your behalf and provide you with a tax exemption if you wish and like always, ALL the donations will be posted on the website for transparency and accuracy.
Looking forward to hearing from you and SHUKRAN in advance for your generosity, work and support for the children in Palestine
Salamatz
Riad Hamad
MoPress 