The campaigner
l Dmitri Krasik had never put up a poster before October 7. Now, with the Bring Them Home Now posters, he is spearheading efforts to remind Londoners that Hamas still holds hostages in Gaza.
Dmitri says he “couldn’t sit at home knowing what happened”. Desperate to help, he found an online poster download and printed out a batch. He spent the next two weeks putting them up. “It was quite risky because I was doing it alone.”
Now Dmitri works with a group of volunteers, with all activity coordinated via Whats-App. “We’re part of the war effort here.”
As the posters have become more ubiquitous, Dmitri and the other volunteers have often been confronted with abuse.“Some people see the posters as propaganda. They don’t see the 14-year-old who has been taken hostage. They just see something Zionist.”
Dmitri Krasik putting up hostage posters (Photo: Dmitri Krasik)[Missing Credit]
But Dmitri and the rest of the team are not perturbed. “It is not political. Women, children and civilians being taken hostage and killed should never be about what side you’re on.”
With a full-time job in software, some weeks, Dmitri spends all his spare time working on the campaign in London, coordinating poster distribution and planning demonstrations.
In one night, Dmitri helped to coordinate 20 teams across London, putting up 10,000 posters.
“The hostages aren’t like the Hamas leadership in Qatar. They cannot talk. We must talk for them and be a reminder to the world that these hostages are still there, and they need our help.”
Passers-by looking at hostage posters (Photo: Dmitiri Krasik)[Missing Credit]
Anecdotally, Dmitri says 20 to 30 per cent of passers-by are oblivious to the news and, for some, the posters are the first they have heard about the hostages.
The volunteers are sometimes joined by people who happen to walk past them while they are putting up posters. Recently, a French family visiting London joined Dmitri, spending a day of their holiday with the team.
Another time, a Russian couple asked Dmitri why they weren’t putting up posters of Palestinian children. When the volunteers explained that they were looking after people who felt like their own family in Israel, the couple started to understand, says Dmitri.
“We thought a lot about what our message is. To our allies, we thank them for stopping and looking. To the ones that are against us, we’re not going to engage with them because we don’t want a screaming match. But if they’re in the middle, we’ll talk to them, ask them questions and get them to think about new things.”
The team is changing hearts and minds and their efforts have gone viral. But beyond that, the team has become a group of friends, sharing in a collective grief over what happened on October 7 and the need to do something to help.
The collector
l Just days after October 7, Alyson Martin was already collecting goods in her London driveway. It was only natural for the woman who has a reputation for helping those in need.
This time, it wasn’t for Ukraine or Afghanistan, but for Israel.
Alyson says: “We couldn’t be there, but we wanted to help.”
She soon discovered that displaced citizens urgently needed towels and bedding and, before long, her driveway was bulging with boxes.
Alyson Martin (second from right) and her team, collecting items for Israel[Missing Credit]
“Everything had to be new, so we set up an Amazon gift list. People went out and bought kids’ duvets and sleeping bags. We had hundreds of donations. We did it all via word of mouth. School WhatsApp groups are amazing.”
With the help of a volunteer who came to the rescue with a 40ft lorry, Alyson filled a shipping container with £110,000 worth of items collected on her driveway.
“The whole community came together,” says Alyson, who sent the shipping container off to Haifa.
Soon after Alyson’s collection, her friend Lara Akka had the idea to mobilise those in the entertainment industry. Neasden Studios in north-west London was offered up as a space to host a packing day.
Collecting goods for Israelis displaced on October 7 at Neasden film studio (Photo: Alyson Martin)[Missing Credit]
Alyson enlisted the help of a committee, who arranged talks from those impacted by the war. Pizza ovens were brought in to feed the packers and entertainment for children was arranged, which meant whole families could join in with the mammoth boxing up.
“Over 250 people came to pack 1100 boxes. It was a community event. Some were just going to stay for an hour, but they ended up spending the day with us.”
“Logistically, it was quite militaristic. We had to pack things into different boxes. Clothing was separated by age, gender, and size.”
A displaced Israeli family collecting items sent over by Alyson Martin and her team[Missing Credit]
As well as packing up clothes, volunteers wrote letters to IDF soldiers and filmed supportive videos.
Packers heard from the mother of a British IDF soldier, and several social media influencers. Alyson says it allowed volunteers “to bear witness”.
With one shipping container already in Israel helping those in need and another one on its way, Alyson’s collecting will continue.
The war is “constant and heartbreaking” but, says Alyson, the collections are “our way of helping and coming together. It is amazing how Jewish people get together in times of need.”
Displaced Israelis collecting items sent over by Alyson Martin and her team[Missing Credit]
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