85 year old Holocaust Survivor Hedy Epstein Begins Hunger Strike to Open Gaza Borders #GFM

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 
Monday, December 28, 2009 

85 year old Holocaust Survivor Hedy Epstein Begins Hunger Strike to 
Open Gaza Borders 

Hedy Epstein, the 85 year old Holocaust survivor and peace activist, 
announced that she will begin a hunger strike today as a response to 
the Egyptian government’s refusal to allow the Gaza Freedom March 
participants into Gaza. 

Ms. Epstein was part of a delegation with participants from 43 
countries that were to join Palestinians in a non-violent march from 
Northern Gaza towards the Erez border with Israel calling for the end 
of the illegal siege. Egypt is preventing the marchers from leaving 
Cairo, forcing them to search for alternative ways to make their 
voices heard. 

Ms. Epstein will remain outside the UN building at the World Trade 
Center (Cairo) - 1191 Cornish al-Nil, throughout today, accompanied 
by other hunger strikers. "It is important to let the besieged Gazan 
people know they are not alone. I want to tell the people I meet in 
Gaza that I am a representative of many people in my city and in other 
places in the US who are outraged at what the US, Israeli and European 
governments are doing to the Palestinians and that our numbers are 
growing," Epstein said. 

In 1939, when Epstein was just 14, her parents found a way for her to 
escape the persecution, sending her on the Kindertransport to England. 
Epstein never saw her parents again; they perished in Auschwitz in 
1942. After World War II, Epstein worked as a research analyst at the 
Nuremberg Trials of Nazi doctors who performed medical experiments on 
concentration camp inmates. 

After moving to the US, Epstein became an activist for peace and 
social justice causes. Unlike most Holocaust survivors, one of the 
causes she has taken up is that of the Palestinian people. She has 
traveled to the West Bank, collected material aid and now she hopes to 
enter Gaza.

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