Totok Wijayanto – Today, on Monday January 15, the group Indonesian Philanthropy Youth (FMI) held a solidarity action in front of the US Embassy in Central Jakarta to condemn Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip in Palestine.
As of last week, Israeli attacks have killed more than 9,280 children in Gaza. During the action, the FMI laid out 1,500 pairs of school shoes as a form of solidarity with the victims.
According to the initiator of the action, Ahmad Zaki Ali, the thousands of school shoes were used to symbolise the situation in Gaza. There, children have lost the opportunity to go to school because their schools no longer exist after being destroyed by bombing.
In addition to this, thousands of children who should be going to school have been killed in Israeli attacks. As of last week, the number of children killed has reached 9,280, and this week it has risen to more than 10,000.
In order to realise the action in solidarity with the children of Gaza, last week Zaki Ali took the initiative to collect shoes by requesting donations on social media. In a period of around one week, they collected more than 1,500 pairs of shoes donated by netizens.
Following the action, they plan to donate the shoes to underprivileged school-age children spread across various parts of the country such as remote areas in Bogor, Sukabumi, Pandeglang, Garut and even Dompu in West Nusa Tenggara.
Zaki Ali and the FMI hope that the shoes will carry with them the spirit of the Gaza children and inspire the underprivileged children who receive them.
They want Indonesian children to be more appreciative and enthusiastic about attending school because there are many children out there in Gaza who cannot go to school anymore because they have died.
[Translated by James Balowski. The original title of the article was "Aksi Solidaritas untuk Anak-anak Palestina Lewat Ribuan Sepatu".]