Abuse of Power. Gaza ambulance driver puts patients at risk

Why Israel uses checkpoints.

In 2016, over 30,000 people from the Gaza received medical treatment in Israel.  Over 7,000 tons of medical supplies were transferred to hospitals and clinics in the Gaza Strip.  Emergency ambulances were on-call 24 hours, 7 days a week at the Erez Crossing.  Israel takes its humanitarian obligations  to the people of Gaza very seriously.  Even when rockets targeting  Israeli civilians are launched from Gaza, the humanitarian aid continues to flow to Gaza.

Leave it to Hamas to take advantage of Israel's largese.

According to COGAT ( Israel's Coordination of Government activiities in the territories):

Marwan Abu Rida, an ambulance driver for the Red Crescent, has been using his position to exploit patients seeking medical treatment in Israel for terrorist organizations.

Abu Rida had illegally transferred equipment and funds from the Gaza Strip to various terror groups in Judea and Samaria multiple times over the past year. This was done while risking the lives of patients he was transferring from the Gaza Strip.

Beside the fact that his actions are criminal, they go directly against the Red Crescent’s commitment to neutrality and cynically exploits patients who seek to enter Israel for life-saving treatments.

Israel has demanded that Marwan abu Rida be removed  from his position  in the Red Crescent immediately.

Bar mitzvah boy donates ambulance to Israel

In spite of heavy  pressure from the anti-Israel lobby, in August the Sacramento City Council voted unanimously  to designate Ashkelon as Sacramento's 10th sister city. Ashkelon sits about eight miles from Israel's border with Gaza.and has been the  target of rockets from the Gaza  for years.

In a gesture that truly defines the people to people nature of the sister city relationship, a 13 year old boy Robert Leeds, asked his bar mitzvah guests to donate money to buy an ambulance for Ashkelon, in lieu of gifts.

 The ambulance was presented at a  press conference  held today in Sacramento.  Watch it here

Instead of bar mitzvah gifts, boy buys ambulance | News - KCRA Home

Passing it Forward: An Ambulance for Israel

The story begins with a random act of kindness and generosity from a 13 year old bar mitzvah boy, Robert Leeds.  When the invitations to Roberts' bar mitzvah were mailed, the return card stated, “In lieu of gifts, let’s come together and do a very special act of kindness in our holy land. Join hands and put a lifesaving ambulance on the ground in Israel. Please send your tax-deductible contribution in Robert’s honor to MDA.”

The guests responded, and enough money was raised to donate two ambulances to Israel.


On January 8, one of those ambulances will be dedicated to the City of Ashkelon by members of the Sacramento city council, the American Friends of Magen David Adom (Israeli Red Cross) and  StandWithUs  in honor of the newly created sister-city relationship with Sacramento.

From Algemeiner:

“The ambulance dedication is a thank you to the city of Sacramento for approving the newest sister city resolution with Ashkelon last August despite opposition from the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement in their on-going attempts to pariah the state of Israel,” Gail Rubin, representing the Sacramento-Davis area chapter of SWU, told JNS.org.

Rubin said Leeds “understands the true meaning of doing good deeds for others, as this ambulance will help save lives.”

“This is a great story of a young man seeing a need and making a difference,” Sacramento Councilmember Steve Cohn, who was one of the councilmembers behind the initiative, said in a statement.
Leeds said in a statement that it is his hope to show Israel and the City of Ashkelon that I stand with them and that’s what becoming a man means to me.”

 Yossi Mentz  Western Regional Director of the American Friends of Magen David declared “Robert’s bar mitzvah had both the bar and a mitzvah. There’s no greater mitzvah than saving a life.”