Palestinian ambassador thanks Irish people for help in getting citizens out of Gaza

Egyptian medics stand by with incubators to receive premature Palestinian babies evacuated from Gaza on the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing with the Gaza Strip, on Monday. Picture: AFP via Getty Images

The Palestinian ambassador to Ireland has said those who were evacuated from Gaza this weekend “will be looked after.” 

Dr Jilan Wahba Abdalmajid was in Dublin airport on Sunday night awaiting the arrival of second group of Irish citizens who have fled the war.

There were highly emotional scenes at Terminal 1 when two young children, whose mother was killed in an Israeli airstrike, were reunited with their father.

Khalid el-Estal was working abroad when his wife was killed and his brother brought the children Ali, 4, and Sara, 1, to Dublin with the help of the Irish Government.

As she awaited the flight from Cairo, Dr Wahba Abdalmajid thanked the Irish people for their help.

She said: “I’m here today to welcome them. I know some of them. I know that they have families here but whatever we can do, it will not take any effort to help our Palestinians here. I know they are Irish, but they are Palestinian originally.

“So we will not spare any effort to help.” 

A Palestinian woman reacts as people inspect the damage following Israeli strikes on Rafah, on the southern Gaza Strip, on Monday. Picture: Mohammed Abed/AFP via Getty Images

The ambassador also thanked the Irish Government and said: “I know the effort they put to bring them here I know that wasn’t an easy mission.

“But I know there as well will be some kind of arrangements we didn’t talk about this yet, it was last-minute that we knew they would arrive safe.

“I’m sure Ireland will put more effort to help and I’m sure the Palestinians will too and not spare any effort to help."

A man carries a child injured in an Israeli strike on Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on Monday. Picture: Mahmud Hams/AFP via Getty Images

Dr Wahba Abdalmajid also referenced those who are still in Palestine and said more effort needed to be made from countries around the world to “stop the war”.

“Since October 7, when they attacked the schools and hundreds of civilians, defenceless people were killed in cold blood.

“Yesterday, something exploded in our hearts and minds, and I think the only way I have words to say, it’s enough. I mean you should stop this war. It’s not normal to attack normal civilians.

This is shameful. I’m sorry to say this word but this is failure of international community. This is really a failure of humanity as well. I want to raise my voice from here in Ireland to the whole world. 

"I think it’s enough. It is enough, the killing of the Palestinians, enough killing of innocent people."

One 19-year-old broke down in tears after he arrived in Dublin with his mother and young siblings.

Mazen Haia, 19, a computer engineering student at the Islamic University of Gaza said he would “sleep on the streets” if he had to.

“It is very difficult, now I don’t know how my life will continue,” he said. “We left our father to die and my cousin, I don’t know how our lives will continue after that.

"They bombed our university, they bombed schools, they bombed our houses; we were all praying to get out. We were told to get out of our houses.

“There were dead bodies when we were walking, animals, donkeys. We left everything.

"I only have some clothes, only this, we don’t have any money now, I don’t know how our life will continue. I can’t imagine."