| Topic: | Re:Re:Reply | |
| Posted by: | Gerry Boyce | |
| Date/Time: | 11/04/26 00:57:00 |
| I think I can see why you, Steve, hate Fergal Keane, however, thanks for the opportunity to remind everyone of the quality of his reporting. This is from December 2025. 'Abdelrahman aged 11 is a little boy from Gaza who travelled to Jordan to get a new leg - and found that playing a stringed instrument called the oud helped calm him. He'd been helicoptered into Jordan from Gaza for medical treatment, and told the nurse who’d travelled with him he’d come to get a new leg - so he could run with his friends again. Abdelrahman’s father was killed in an Israeli bombing, during the war in Gaza. Abdelrahman was maimed by another Israeli airstrike, next to the school where he was sheltering with his mother and sister. He'd been selling tea at a small stall to raise money for his family. He was taken to hospital, where doctors decided to amputate his leg. Afterwards, his mental state deteriorated, his mum Asma said: “He started pulling his hair and hitting himself hard,” she said. “He became like someone who has depression; seeing his friends playing and running around…and he’s sitting alone.” But the next time (Fergal) met Abdelrahman, he'd had his new prosthetic leg fitted, and he was practising playing an oud. A Jordanian colleague had given him the lute-like instrument, in the hope it might calm his trauma. It made him smile. A few weeks later the family returned to Gaza, but the Israeli Defence Forces searched their vehicle and confiscated the oud. Israel’s Ministry of Defence said, “individuals returning to the Gaza Strip are not permitted to bring in their personal luggage equipment that has not been approved as essential humanitarian aid, without prior coordination.” Sometimes the enormity of the inhumanity is too much to grasp, Fergal is excellent at finding the small details that resonate so powerfully. |
| Topic | Date Posted | Posted By |
| The biggest danger to Western civilisation - Iran, 'Trumpism' or Islamism ? | 10/04/26 17:27:00 | John Hawkes |
| Re:The biggest danger to Western civilisation - Iran, 'Trumpism' or Islamism ? | 10/04/26 21:41:00 | Michael Brigo |
| Re:The biggest danger to Western civilisation - Iran, 'Trumpism' or Islamism ? | 10/04/26 21:58:00 | Gerry Boyce |
| Re:Re:The biggest danger to Western civilisation - Iran, 'Trumpism' or Islamism ? | 10/04/26 22:59:00 | Philippa Bond |
| Reply | 10/04/26 23:08:00 | Michael Ixer |
| Re:Reply | 10/04/26 23:49:00 | Steven Rose |
| Reply | 11/04/26 00:09:00 | Michael Ixer |
| Re:Reply | 11/04/26 00:37:00 | Steven Rose |
| Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 00:57:00 | Gerry Boyce |
| Re:Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 08:28:00 | Jonathan Callaway |
| Reply | 11/04/26 08:36:00 | Michael Ixer |
| Re:Reply | 11/04/26 09:16:00 | Steven Rose |
| Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 09:26:00 | Jonathan Callaway |
| Re:Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 09:27:00 | Jonathan Callaway |
| Re:Re:Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 10:21:00 | Gerry Boyce |
| Re:Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 11:04:00 | John Hawkes |
| Re:Re:Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 11:10:00 | Jonathan Callaway |
| Re:Re:Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 11:13:00 | Steven Rose |
| Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 11:49:00 | Jonathan Callaway |
| Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 12:43:00 | Gerry Boyce |
| Reply | 11/04/26 12:50:00 | Michael Ixer |
| Re:Reply | 11/04/26 13:51:00 | Gerry Boyce |
| Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 18:19:00 | Jonathan Callaway |
| Re:Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 18:20:00 | Jonathan Callaway |
| Re:Re:Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 18:51:00 | Steven Rose |
| Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 21:30:00 | Gerry Boyce |
| Reply | 11/04/26 23:32:00 | Michael Ixer |
| Reply | 11/04/26 23:43:00 | Michael Ixer |
| Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 21:02:00 | Lucille Grant |
| Re:Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 21:17:00 | Gerry Boyce |
| Re:Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 21:42:00 | Steven Rose |
| Re:Re:Re:Re:Reply | 11/04/26 23:52:00 | Jonathan Callaway |
| Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Reply | 12/04/26 01:10:00 | Steven Rose |
| Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Reply | 12/04/26 10:19:00 | Gerry Boyce |