On Tuesday, two Oberlin students went on a hunger strike. College fourth-year Kayleigh Frazer and College first-year Emma Knisbacher were trying to raise $3,000 for an 18-year-old in Gaza named Faisal who they have been in daily contact with since the summer, and they were far short of their goal.
Frazer said that they decided to go on a hunger strike after hearing from Faisal on Monday that he had been unable to find food for his family. She and Knisbacher had previously been trying to raise funds for a month to repair his broken tent before winter, but had had limited success. Concerns over impending winter conditions and the Monday call from Faisal led the two students to decide to take more drastic measures.
“He texted me, and then we FaceTimed right after that,” Frazer explained. “He told me that he had been up all night looking for food and that he wasn’t able to find any, and he sent a couple texts that were just really worrying. Obviously, being in contact with someone in Gaza is always worrying, but … It was just having this communication with Faisal, being really terrified for him, and deciding basically on impulse, very much out of fear, that we needed to do something really big, really immediate, that [made us decide] we should do a hunger strike.”
The $3,000 fundraising goal was intended to cover costs for tent repair, food, warm clothes, and medicine for Faisal’s grandmother. After reaching the goal much faster than expected, they raised the goal amount to $6,000 in order to address urgent needs for other families whom Students for a Free Palestine are fundraising for. They reached this goal late Wednesday night, ending the hunger strike after two days.
“I was genuinely very worried that we wouldn’t even make the initial goal, so to see this outpour of support was so amazing,” Frazer said. “Community solidarity and support of fundraising really goes so far in helping our families stay safe.”
While Israel and Hamas agreed to a ceasefire at the start of October, violence has continued. Much of Gaza remains in widespread famine, and many people lack access to basic resources.
Both Frazer and Knisbacher are part of Students for a Free Palestine’s fundraising team. Over the past two years, SFP has broadly expanded fundraising efforts in order to provide direct aid to Palestinian families in Gaza, with members of SFP currently in contact with about 10 families in Gaza (“Students for a Free Palestine Provide Direct Aid to Gazans Affected by War,” The Oberlin Review, Oct. 10, 2025). Frazer explained that while both she and Knisbacher are part of SFP’s fundraising group, the decision to go on a hunger strike was made independently, without any expectations or pressure from the group to undertake such a measure.
“This type of fundraising is really different than donating to bigger organizations, because we have direct relationships with the people we’re fundraising for,” Knisbacher said.
Frazer also spoke to the importance of direct aid.
“Everyone in Gaza needs money; they need to find a way to survive,” Frazer said. “And since aid stations only provide for a limited percentage of people’s needs in Gaza, a lot of families who lost their jobs need to continue finding money elsewhere to use in the markets and stores that are still operating.”
Frazer mentioned that Faisal graduated high school Thursday, the same day the hunger strike ended.
Knisbacher emphasized that while the hunger strike is over, they are still continuing to fundraise and hope that the community momentum around the hunger strike will persist.
“This was just one of our goals,” they said. “All the families, including Faisal’s, that we’re in touch with are still going to need money — for food each week, to get new clothes, to make sure their tents are okay through the winter.”
Frazer said that updates on the distribution of the funds, including updated photos from the families SFP is fundraising for, will be posted on the organization’s social media in the coming week.
