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FT editor Roula Khalaf selects her favorite stories in this weekly newsletter.
The first question we considered when thinking about this year’s edition of How to Give was how you can give meaningfully in an environment where war and conflict have prohibited or prevented traditional forms of aid. In October, the Israeli Knesset passed a bill banning the U.N. Palestinian aid agency, UNRWA, from entering Israeli territory, essentially preventing it from delivering aid to Gaza. Israel says UNRWA staff in Gaza were involved in October 7 Hamas attacks; As a result, nine UNRWA staff have been dismissed. However, the fact that an international humanitarian organization can be prevented from operating sums up the challenges of delivering aid to civilians when collapsing infrastructure has already left millions of people in critical need.
Victoria Rose, a plastic surgeon who has been volunteering in Gaza since 2019, has seen the deprivation first-hand. She tells Rosanna Dodds howOn his last trip in August, he was limited to working with rudimentary medical equipment smuggled across the border and scarce supplies. His experience of working primarily with people injured by bomb explosions, and very often children, may seem like a wasted effort. However, Rose speaks unsentimentally about the work of the doctors who continue, describing how many are “better than some of the staff I have in the UK”.
Rose has made a great sacrifice by being on the front line. His bravery puts most of us to shame. Although aid workers are supposed to be protected, the International Rescue Committee estimates that more than 300 of them have died since this war began. Surgeons, nurses, food agencies and workers in general are more vulnerable in Gaza than during any other crisis in recent history.
I am also proud of our special Save Our Skillsfocusing on those people trying to protect endangered industries. When Sarah Watson bought Phoenix Tile Studio in the West Midlands last year, she did so to preserve skills that were becoming extinct in the once-thriving potteries. “We are now one of only three tile makers left in Stoke and I didn’t want it to die,” says Watson of his effort to rejuvenate a limping industry. Nobody knows if the project will be successful. Last year, his equipment’s energy bills doubled, rent tripled, and the cost of materials increased more than 30 percent. What motivates them is the determination to unite the other potteries and save an industry. Similar things are happening for silversmith’s and millineryas we reported here. I take my cap off to all of them.
The philanthropic push is emerging younger than ever. According to US research lab Blackbaud Institute, 59 percent of Generation Z already donate to charity in some way. Young people appear to be more likely to take ethical and environmental considerations into account when investing and are willing to align themselves with causes they identify with. Marion Willingham has analyzed how this is changing the celebrity landscape in which one’s “brand” must increasingly have a cause. She brings together eight names that are making a difference. As our cover attests: these are familiar causes, infused with new attitudes.
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