US Mom Is Trapped in Gaza With No Food, No Clean Water and Nursing a Child: ‘She’s Lost Hope’

An American mom stuck in Gaza with her three young children is losing hope for a safe evacuation after bombings at a border crossing in the south have kept her trapped without food and clean water, her husband told The Messenger.

Haneen Okal, 31, has traveled with her kids to Gaza's border with Egypt three times since the U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem advised her to make their way to the Rafah Crossing to be evacuated amid a war in Israel that began Oct. 7.

The crossing, which sits along an 8-mile fence that separates Gaza and Egypt's Sinai desert, has been bombed twice while Okal and her children waited for the gate to open.

"My wife is telling me, 'I want to die where I'm at. I don't want to go back and almost die there again,'" Abdulla Okal, Haneen's husband who lives in Union County, N.J., said Tuesday. 

"She's very down and she's saying, 'I don't think we're gonna see you again.' From what she's seeing and from what she's hearing, she's lost hope," he also said, adding that conditions in Gaza are worsening.

Okal and her children — Iyab, 8, Nadine, 2, and Elias, 2 months — have been stuck in Gaza since August when she gave birth there due to a medical emergency that happened during her first visit to see family in nine years.

Before the war erupted, she was waiting for her newborn's American passport, which was delayed by the U.S. Embassy.

Abdulla eventually had to return home to New Jersey for work, leaving Okal and their children behind with family.

After being shuffled around from home to home as Israeli airstrikes intensified, she and the kids are currently in Rafah, staying in a three-bedroom apartment with 50 other people, he said.

"There is no food left, and she has no clean water, and she is nursing a newborn," Abdulla said.

The U.S. State Department estimates that there are 600 Americans currently in Gaza, and the Embassy has advised citizens to go to Rafah for evacuation.

But after lengthy discussions — and what appeared to be the announcement of a deal by U.S. Sec. of State Antony Blinken — Gaza's only option for relief remained closed as international organizations warned of a humanitarian catastrophe.

Israel apparently bombed the Palestinian side of the border not far from the crossing on Monday.

Following Hamas' horrific attack which killed 1,400 inside Israel, a “complete siege” on Gaza began.

The narrow strip of land along the Mediterranean Sea is home to more than 2.3 million people, nearly half of whom are children, according to the United Nations.

More than 2,800 people have been killed in Gaza since the war began. Another 10,000 are injured. Sources of food, fuel, drinking water and electricity have been cut off to residents.

As resources dwindle, so does Okal's faith in U.S. officials' ability to provide safe passage home via the Rafah Crossing during the war.

"Even if they announce an opening again, nobody's going to go through the border because they don't trust them anymore," her husband said. "I don't know if the American government cares anymore about the Americans in Palestine."

When contacted about Okal's situation last week, a State Department spokesperson told The Messenger that it has "no higher priority than the safety and security of U.S. citizens overseas" and that they "continue to closely monitor the dynamic security situation and have a team communicating 24/7 with U.S. citizens and providing them assistance through phone calls and the online form."