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osodecanelaYesterday afternoon, as I pulled up to the hospital to round of patients, the local public radio station was broadcasting a feed from the BBC. The story focused of to families, one Palestinian, the other Jewish who had each lost a son to the sectarian violence of the region, and who had each chosen to have that child's organs given for transplant.
Twelve year-old Achmed was shot by an Israeli soldier in the Jenin refugee camp on the West Bank. It was Eid, and the child was holding a toy gun while on his way to the market, when a he was fatally wounded. Airlifted to a medical facility in Haifa, the boy died less than 24 hours later, his parents at his bedside. The boy's father watched as two mothers prayed at their children's side, one his wife who read from the Qu'ran, the other an Israeli, who prayed with a copy of the Pentateuch. "These women were the same, good mothers praying for the welfare of their children. There is no difference between them," he told the interviewer reporting this story. As his own son died, the man made the courageous decision to donate Achmed's organs, that something good might come of this tragedy. That decision sent his son's organs to 8 different individuals, both Arab and Israeli, Muslim, Druze and Jewish, now alive with a part of his child, a gift out of sacrifice and tragedy.
Yoni, a 19 year old Jewish teen from the UK was visiting family when he died last year, victim of a bolt that lodged in his brain when a suicide bomber attacked a bus in Jerusalem. His mother flew from his native Scotland, and like Achmed's father made the ultimate gift of Yoni's organs, that something good might come of his death. Like Achmed, his organs had gone to both Arab and Jew, a kidney now giving new live to a young Palestinian girl. Recently, his mother returned to Israel, and visited the child who received her son's kidney, to find a child who sleeps with a picture of her son above her bed, and who now calls Yoni, her brother.
I sat in my car and listened, as tears flowed slowly down my cheeks, grateful there are still people in this world like Ishmael Hatib and Marcia Gladstone, who as parents in their hour of grief, still had both the clarity and charity to make such a gift, bringing life out of death, and perhaps a step towards peace in a climate of conflict. My heart breaks for each of their losses, but sings praise for their uncommon humanity.
Twelve year-old Achmed was shot by an Israeli soldier in the Jenin refugee camp on the West Bank. It was Eid, and the child was holding a toy gun while on his way to the market, when a he was fatally wounded. Airlifted to a medical facility in Haifa, the boy died less than 24 hours later, his parents at his bedside. The boy's father watched as two mothers prayed at their children's side, one his wife who read from the Qu'ran, the other an Israeli, who prayed with a copy of the Pentateuch. "These women were the same, good mothers praying for the welfare of their children. There is no difference between them," he told the interviewer reporting this story. As his own son died, the man made the courageous decision to donate Achmed's organs, that something good might come of this tragedy. That decision sent his son's organs to 8 different individuals, both Arab and Israeli, Muslim, Druze and Jewish, now alive with a part of his child, a gift out of sacrifice and tragedy.
Yoni, a 19 year old Jewish teen from the UK was visiting family when he died last year, victim of a bolt that lodged in his brain when a suicide bomber attacked a bus in Jerusalem. His mother flew from his native Scotland, and like Achmed's father made the ultimate gift of Yoni's organs, that something good might come of his death. Like Achmed, his organs had gone to both Arab and Jew, a kidney now giving new live to a young Palestinian girl. Recently, his mother returned to Israel, and visited the child who received her son's kidney, to find a child who sleeps with a picture of her son above her bed, and who now calls Yoni, her brother.
I sat in my car and listened, as tears flowed slowly down my cheeks, grateful there are still people in this world like Ishmael Hatib and Marcia Gladstone, who as parents in their hour of grief, still had both the clarity and charity to make such a gift, bringing life out of death, and perhaps a step towards peace in a climate of conflict. My heart breaks for each of their losses, but sings praise for their uncommon humanity.
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Date: 2008-03-02 04:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-02 05:19 pm (UTC)Unfortunately it is still too uncommon. If it was more common, maybe these kind of conflicts could be resolved.
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Date: 2008-03-02 05:30 pm (UTC)It was the sort of question I thought Fox News capable of, but apparently there are cretins in the press world wide.
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Date: 2008-03-03 04:55 am (UTC)AMAZING!