Day Three Without Food: Local Activist Joins Collective Fast for Gaza

The following letter was written by Jewish Voice for Peace of Eastern Nebraska member Scout while they participated in a hunger strike led by the Palestinian Rights Task Force in July 2025.

My name is Scout and today is day three of my hunger strike for Gaza. I am one of 18 other Nebraskans who have committed to going on hunger strike in solidarity with the Palestinians in Gaza who are being deliberately starved by Israel. So far, the 18 hunger strikers have fasted for a collective 671 hours. Unlike the people of Gaza, I have clean water within reach. I am not sheltering in rubble. In northern Gaza, many are surviving on just 250–500 calories a day. According to the IPC, the world’s leading authority on food insecurity, Gaza is now in a state of famine.

We are witnessing, in real time, the slow and systematic starvation of a population. Israel’s blockade and military assault have destroyed food systems, bombed bakeries and greenhouses, and left nearly the entire population at risk of famine. Children are dying from malnutrition. Pregnant women go without nutrients. Children in Gaza tell their parents they are not afraid to die, because at least Heaven has food. 

I refuse to eat while my government funds this horror. PR-driven airdrops do not scratch the surface of meeting the needs of Gaza’s population. The solution is ending the blockade, reopening all aid points, and halting the flow of U.S. weapons and funding to Israel’s military, which has shown no compunction in starving and bombing children.

Our congressional delegation, especially Congressman Don Bacon, must act. He must co-sponsor H.R. 3565, the Block the Bombs Act, and commit to ending U.S. military support for this genocide. Every day of silence is complicity.

I can choose to end my hunger at any time. The people of Gaza have no such choice. The Israeli government is starving them as a weapon of war. And we, as Americans, must do everything in our power to stop funding it.