Charity Gall

It appears that Holy Land Foundation planners have assigned only two women the task of supervising some 30 kids, and those odds favor the kids and mayhem. "When are we going to get food--the kids are starved?" one woman finally asks a Holy Land Foundation administrator who is working the door of the banquet.

On tables near the entrance to the banquet room, Holy Land Foundation has displayed its promotional materials, including pictures of orphans in the occupied territories who receive aid from the organization.

Select souvenirs are for sale, including pictures of the gold-domed mosque in Jerusalem where a Jewish zealot massacred numerous Palestinians while they prayed. There are also khaffiyas--headdresses like the one Yasir Arafat always dons--and 5-inch wooden statues of what the rest of the world recognizes as the state of Israel, with an Arabic message written in blood red.

"The public is invited but the media isn't," explains a young man in a suit and tie who identifies himself as the Holy Land Foundation's public-relations specialist but refuses to give his name. The young man blocks the door to the dining room, threatening to call security, when an Observer reporter tries to enter the banquet with a purchased ticket.

The rest of the crowd moves inside the banquet room. Abubakr, Sosebee, and Harkins each speak, but the main attraction is the children, and they are trotted out before the crowd.

The children do not speak themselves, Sosebee later recounts. Rather, they stand by as their horrible stories are laid out before the crowd. Envelopes are passed, and Abubakr reads out the names of those who have donated money.

It is a good night's take to round out the weekend of events.
The fund raisers have collected $64,000 in pledges. Of course, $6,000 in expenses comes off the top. And Holy Land Foundation has exclusive rights to the T-shirt sales, which account for about $10,000 of the total. That means the pot is down to $48,000 before Sosebee's PCRF gets its 40 percent cut.

Sosebee gets $19,200 for his kids.
Holy Land Foundation gets $28,800 for setting up the show.
And the day which began at St. Luke ends for the children in their bedrooms at the Clarion. They finally get some sleep.