Voices for Obama resound from afar (Gaza phone bank calls Americans!)
NUSSEIRAT REFUGEE CAMP, GAZA STRIP — For every point that U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama gains ahead of the Nov. 4 election, a young student in a sparsely furnished room an ocean away is taking enormous satisfaction.
For months, Ibrahim Abu Jayyab has been working through the night, telephoning American voters at random to plead in broken English that they support his favourite candidate.
Never mind that most of the people Mr. Abu Jayyab calls don’t even know where the Gaza Strip is, much less understand why this man with heavily accented English crackling down the phone line should care about the U.S. presidential race.
“Obama is the best candidate. He has leadership qualities, he is charismatic. Once he said the Palestinian people are suffering most in the world,” Mr. Abu Jayyab says, his eyes heavy after another late night, already back at the computer that is his pride and joy in a life otherwise dominated by poverty.