Parents of Palestinian shooting victims arrive in VT
– After spending 36 hours traveling halfway across the world, the parents of two of the three Palestinian-American shooting victims arrived in Burlington Wednesday afternoon to see their sons in the hospital for the first time.
Ali Awartani and Elizabeth Price, the parents of Hisham Awartani, and Tamara Tamimi, the mother of Kinnan Abdalhamid, touched down at Patrick Leahy Burlington International Airport just after 2:00 p.m. and rushed to the University of Vermont Medical Center to meet their sons. Abdalhamid was released from the hospital Tuesday, while Awartani was still undergoing surgery and receiving care as of Wednesday evening.
“I feel like I’m just so excited to see my son, but also very anxious to see him in his current condition,” Price said moments after getting off her flight.
For Awartani and Price, their son Hisham sustained the most severe injuries of the three young men, having a bullet lodged in his spinal cord. Even if the bullet is removed through surgery, the injury jeopardizes his chance of ever being able to walk again.
“I hope I will not collapse when I see him,” Ali Awartani said, speaking about his son. “I have no words ... I just hope he will walk again.”
Awartani shared some powerful words before walking out of the airport and heading to the hospital, saying what happened to his son and his son’s two friends in Burlington is just a small part of a much bigger problem.
“What happened to our kid is part of a larger crisis, and we hope the world will see it this way,” Awartani said. “Our kid is just one kid. We love him so much, but there are others that die every day and no one even talks about it. So I hope that one day the world will start seeing our kids in Palestine equivalent to others, because the way we see it is a human soul is a human soul, no matter of the color or religion or race. This is how we were raised, and this is what we believe as a family.”
Many Burlington city leaders, including Mayor Miro Weinberger and Police Chief Jon Murad, have said they hope to meet the parents in person to both welcome them and offer their support. In an online newsletter this week, Weinberger shared the link where people can send funding directly to the family. As of Wednesday night, the fundraiser has garnered just under $200,000 dollars. You can find the link to it down below.
