Dear Doha Diary

It was a quiet, star filled January night in 2017 and  8 year old Nawar Al Awlaki was asleep with her mother in her Uncle's house in Yakla, a rural village in the mountains of Al Bayda, a region of South Yemen.  Suddenly she was woken by the sound of gunfire and she instinctively went to hide. Her neighbours were under attack and were being killed as they fled their homes, including the Ameri family with three children -   Aisha, 4, Hussein, 5 and  Khadija, 7.   Nawar's home then came under attack and she was shot in the neck by a bullet that came through the window.  Despite her own assurances to her mother not to worry, she died two hours later from a loss of blood.   25 civilians died that night, including 9 children under the age of 13, one of them a 3 month old boy and a pregnant woman who was shot in the stomach. The photo below shows some of the children who survived that terrible night, haunted by the loss of their family members and the horr

I will make the assumption that most of you reading this are also regular social media users and that somewhere among the videos of tennis-playing dogs and cute little kittens, you’ll be familiar with the often posted stories of human rights issues and abuses around the world, whether in Myanmar, Syria, Yemen or elsewhere. I am more guilty than most for constantly posting on social media about such humanitarian issues, including the oppression of the Palestinian people, the killing and imprisoning of journalists and activists, the attack on freedom of the press in the USA and particularly the horrific and heartbreaking war in Yemen.  I do it, in the full knowledge that it will do little for the people who suffer the abuse.   I simply post about these issues because I care and I want to keep these stories front and centre in my mind and in the minds of others who care.   And I care, not only because I hold values such as honesty, decency, fairness, respect and compassion at t

As the end of Ramadan approached, with only 5 days to go until Eid, I decided to step up my fasting regime to see what it would feel like to echo the diet of the desert nomad, the Bedouin, who famously could survive for months on only dates and camels milk.    Sadly, unable to easily get hold of camels milk, I decided to swap it out for labeneh.... a thick strained yoghurt.  But of course, dates are available aplenty so no issue there. As is the custom during Ramadan, I'm fasting completely throughout daylight hours, having only 3 dates and a couple of table spoons of labeneh for Iftar  (the Muslim meal to break the fast) and the same before bed, accompanied only by water or black coffee and nothing else.  Muslims will usually eat their last meal, Suhoor, at dawn.... which is around 3am here in Qatar, but having experimented, I felt better having my final sustenance at around 10pm and sleeping through the night. I had already been fasting during Ramadan, so the daily fast w