The Hope Cycle: solidarity bike ride for aid to Gaza
Hello everyone! I’m Tareq Al-Qazzaz, a Palestinian living in London. I’m embarking on a grueling physical challenge in direct partnership and sponsorship with UK Friends of Standing Together (FoST). Throughout this 11-day, 1,000+-mile route shown on the map, I am incredibly grateful to be hosted by FoST supporters who are opening their homes to me all across the UK.
Click here for more info, and to donate.
Who is this fund for?
Separated by war: Wasim and Abdalrahman are currently in London, their families are still trapped in Gaza.
Wasim’s Story
My name is Wasim. I am Palestinian from Gaza City, a husband to Halima and a father to two beautiful daughters, Watim and Mira, and a son, Amer. Life in Gaza was always hard, but my family made me feel like the most fortunate man alive. On October 7th, everything changed. Death visited every street, and the famine that followed left us without even a loaf of bread.
Eventually, the situation became so desperate that my wife begged me to leave and find a way to get them out. I travelled to Türkiye and made the dangerous journey to the UK to seek asylum in the UK. During my crossing, I received a call that haunts me still: my wife screaming that our son Amer was dead after their shelter was attacked. For four agonizing days, I believed I had lost him, by some miracle the information was wrong – he had survived his injuries. My family is has been displaced multiple times, from tents to the streets, to schools and I am working with every ounce of my being to reunite with them and bring them to the safety they deserve.
Abdalrahman’s Story
I am Abdalrahman. I was an English teacher in Gaza, where I fell in love with my wife, Zahra, and raised our eight sons. Before the war, we had dreams for our children – we imagined Bader becoming a doctor, Mahmoud a carpenter, and Ahmed a teacher like me. Those dreams were shattered when our third son, Mohamed, was killed in an airstrike. The pain of losing a child is pain I would not wish on anyone.
Now, my family is living in a tent, and their lives are reduced to struggling to survive. My sons spend their entire day searching for clean water and wood for fire, while my youngest, Bader, tries to learn on a phone because there are no schools left. They look to me as their only hope for rescue. I am desperate to get them out of this nightmare and into a life where they don’t have to fear for their lives every single day.
Your donations will go directly toward purchasing and distributing heavily subsidized or free essential livelihood support—including clean water delivery, food parcels, medical supplies, and basic hygiene kits—to help these families survive both the brutal summer heat and the crushing economic blockade.
Supporters in north London are hosting a fundraising potluck for the Hope Cycle prior to Tareq’s departure, at 12pm on 13 June. Click here for more details and to register to attend.
This fundraising campaign is organised and managed by GSN – Gaza Support Network, a registered Canadian NGO. All donations are collected by GSN and administered through their established systems. The funds raised through this campaign are designated entirely for the aforementioned families in Gaza and are transferred to them in full (minus automatic platform and transaction fees), in accordance with GSN’s humanitarian procedures and local transfer mechanisms. For more info visit Gaza Support Network’s website.