Bay Area residents with Israeli, Palestinian family living with fear of an uncertain future
PLEASANTON — Israel and Palestine are two countries torn apart by a conflict, yet in San Francisco, there are common bonds between those who have loved ones in both places: feelings of fear, frustration, helplessness, and a shared desire for peace.
Binyamin Zuckerman is a long way home from Israel, where he was born and raised. He and his family came to the US only two years ago so he could focus on his research.
"I'm trying to develop experiments to understand some basic science questions," said Binyamin Zuckerman, as he worked on his laptop at his home in Pleasanton.
He is a post-doctorate student at UCSF where he runs a lab studying embryonic development.
"We try to understand how these molecular process has an implication on real-life development," he said.
Since the attacks on Saturday, he said it's hard to think about much else besides the conflict.
"We get terrible news every day of another friend who lost a nephew, a cousin, a brother, and it's a really devastating situation," he told KPIX.
As a former member of the Israeli Military, Zuckerman said it's frustrating to be so far away from his homeland during this time of conflict and in a way he feels helpless.
"We are one people. The people that are dying are my family," he said.
On the other side of the bay, San Francisco native Dr. Manal Elkarra is equally concerned for her large extended family in the Gaza strip. She just took her children there a few months ago to meet their cousins for the first time.
A few weeks ago they were wondering when they could go back, but now the question moves to whether there will be family to go back to at all.
"My biggest fear is a fear that I've had for many years — is that I will really never see them again, and that I will never hear from them again, and that they will be killed by an Israeli missile," said. Dr. Elkarra.
She is a family medicine physician and was born and raised in California, but acknowledges her reality is very different from that of her family half a world away.
"I live in this beautiful neighborhood. I have my freedom. I don't have to physically fight for my freedom. But I can tell you from my family, most, many Palestinians are not political. They just want to live. Every time when I talk to my family, and I ask them, 'What message do you want to get to the world, if I could share anything, what would it be?' And they always tell me the same answer. They said, "We just want to live, we want to be treated as humans, and we want our basic human rights. That's it."