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Anas Al Borno lay on a thin mattress with his wife and children in a Rafah refugee camp in January when a relative sent him a rare piece of good news via text: after months, they were eligible to cross into Egypt.
The primary travel agency facilitating such crossings had changed its rules, now allowing Palestinians without foreign passports to pass through the land border. However, there was a significant obstacle: the cost for Al Borno and his family to leave was at least $18,000, an amount far beyond his means.
"I had no money," explained Al Borno, 36, whose small manufacturing business had been destroyed after being bombed early in the war. "I felt hopeless; how could I survive? How could I feed my family? How could we travel?"
His lifeline came from an unexpected source 8,000 miles away—a Jewish graphic designer from California who started a crowdfunding campaign that raised most of the required funds for Al Borno's wife and children to cross the border a month later.
"This is my only hope in life—to escape this war," Al Borno said, as he continued to raise money for himself and other family members to flee. He spends much of his day in communication with the hundreds of people who have donated, considering them his closest friends.
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After more than six months of Israel's offensive on the Gaza Strip, during which health officials say more than 34,000 Palestinians were killed and the vast majority of buildings were destroyed, many Gazans like Al Borno are desperate to leave. Thousands have turned to crowdfunding platforms to raise money to cross into Egypt, often the only way out, supported by a growing number of strangers abroad helping them overcome financial obstacles.
On GoFundMe alone, the most popular platform, more than 12,000 active campaigns for Palestinians in Gaza, mainly for evacuation, have launched since Oct. 7, raising over $75 million, according to a company spokesperson.
Even for those families who have been successful in their crowdfunding efforts, leaving Gaza is anything but straightforward.
Challenges at the Border
Rafah border, located at the southernmost tip of the Gaza Strip, is the only land crossing out of the enclave that does not lead to Israel, instead opening into a militarized zone of Egypt's Sinai Desert. After Israel imposed a blockade on the territory in 2007, Rafah became Gazans' main access point to the outside world, as Israeli-controlled crossings were much more difficult to cross or were completely sealed. However, entering Egypt was never easy. Before the war, human rights groups documented bureaucratic hurdles such as long delays for crucial visa paperwork and unexplained denials, leaving Palestinians waiting months or even years for permits to cross. Sporadic border closures and mistreatment by border officials were common.
A network of travel agencies and black market middlemen acted as facilitators in a process known as "tanseeq," or coordination. For a fee, they utilized connections with Egyptian authorities to expedite paperwork processes and ensure Palestinians' names were on the approved list of travelers used by border officials.
Prices skyrocketed after Oct. 7, when Egypt further restricted who could cross. While there are no official figures on coordinators' charges, more than a dozen locals familiar with the process reported that pre-war prices typically ranged from $500 to $1,000 per person. Since the war began, many fleeing families have reported paying around $7,000 per person—more than twice the average annual income of a family in Gaza.
As the war continued, the number of Palestinians desperate to flee increased, leading to a fourfold increase in Rafah's population. The cramped bordertown was designated a "safe zone" by the Israeli military in December but has been repeatedly hit by airstrikes in recent months.
To raise funds to cross the border, many Gazans turned to crowdfunding platforms like GoFundMe. Until late January, travel agencies, considered the more reputable coordinators, provided services only to Palestinians with immediate family members holding foreign passports. This left the majority of Gazans with the black market as their only option. Stories of fleeing families being scammed out of thousands circulated widely, leaving many hesitant to use the black market.
Travel agencies opened applications to all Palestinians in late January. Soon after, Israel announced plans for a ground offensive on Rafah, prompting a rush of people like Al Borno to start raising money to pay the soaring fees. But this was no easy task. Most travel agencies and middlemen required payment in U.S. dollars in cash, and fundraising platform rules often required a bank account from the U.S. or Europe to launch a campaign.
GoFundMe, for example, required a bank account from one of 19 supported countries, which did not include Egypt, Israel, or the Palestinian territories. Many Palestinians unable to launch their own campaigns turned to social media, like Instagram and TikTok, to share their experiences and seek help.
Despite limited internet access throughout the territory, their messages resonated. Many were shared widely, prompting a wave of online support from people worldwide.
People from the U.S., Canada, Switzerland, Sweden, the U.K., and other countries began sponsoring campaigns for families they had never met who were stranded in Rafah. Caroline Kuspa, a 35-year-old graphic designer in Santa Cruz, California, was one of them. She connected with Al Borno on Instagram after he started posting videos seeking help.
After exchanging messages for several weeks, Kuspa offered to launch a GoFundMe campaign after meeting Al Borno's family on video calls and reviewing relevant documentation.
Launching the campaign was a "calculated risk," Kuspa said. "I was given a chance to make a life-changing difference for individuals who were part of a group of people I’ve been thinking about and worrying about every day for months."
That risk paid off. She and Al Borno raised more than $46,000, and with the help of relatives abroad, evacuated five of his family members, including his elderly mother and 3-year-old daughter, who has a serious health condition.
Following the expansion of eligibility for travel agencies' services, GoFundMe witnessed a significant increase in campaigns launched.
While many fundraisers remain in Rafah, some venture deeper into the war zone to seek better cell service. Abdullah Alqatrawi, 24, a recent college graduate, has traveled up to 28 miles to more dangerous areas in the Palestinian enclave, dodging airstrikes by hitching rides on trucks, to check his GoFundMe and post more videos seeking donations.
"My way of collecting donations is to shoot films and share them on Instagram, explaining my suffering," he said.
Alqatrawi has raised over $15,000 through a campaign managed by people in Belgium and was able to evacuate his mother and four younger siblings to Egypt last week, while he remained behind with his father and one brother.
As the number of online fundraisers increased, several international groups emerged to collect and amplify the campaigns. Operation Olive Branch, for example, began as an idea in the comments section of a TikTok video in early February, quickly amassing nearly 100,000 followers on TikTok and Instagram. Run by volunteers, the organization accepts submissions for featured fundraisers, vetting campaigns by asking families verifying questions directly and examining their social media to confirm they are still in Gaza, while also tracking suspected fraudulent fundraisers.
Overwhelmed by the submissions, Operation Olive Branch temporarily stopped featuring new campaigns for several weeks in March. As of late April, the group had 820 fundraisers listed