SAN DIEGO (KGTV) — It was an emotional day at the San Diego International Airport, where a nurse practitioner who volunteered at a hospital in Gaza reunited with her family for the first time in a month.
Amanda Nasser's mother and other family and friends waited anxiously for this moment as Amanda came down the escalator, fresh off her flight. Everyone was overwhelmed with emotion, including Amanda's mother, who burst into tears.
"I feel honestly guilty leaving and sad that I left so many people that I became so close with, but I know I have so much love with my family here," Amanda Nasser said.
Nasser was filled with mixed emotions after spending a month volunteering at a hospital in Gaza.
"It's hard to dissociate between just leaving a war zone and arriving back in my city," Nasser said.
She said no training she's had in emergency medicine could have prepared her for what she saw firsthand.
"The same floor that I walk on every day was hit. There's strikes every day. There's people coming in that live in the tents next to the hospital that are coming in with gunshot wounds," Nasser said.
Amanda was volunteering at the Nasser Hospital. She was off-site at a training when the emergency room was bombed at the end of August. She lost a dear friend and colleague in the attack.
Her sister, Fadwa, recalled having sleepless nights when it happened.
"That was really hard because we didn't know if she was there, if she was hurt. All of us were asking her like, 'Are you okay?'" Fadwa Nasser said.
Now that she's home, Fadwa couldn't be more proud of her sister.
"There's a lot of people who talk about what they would do and how they would act and how they would stand up and my sister just embodied actually doing it," Fadwa Nasser said.
Amanda said seeing her family filled her with gratitude.
"It makes my heart ache for Gaza because there's so many people, children, women, children, patients that have lost their lives, have lost their family members, and I just think back and how lucky I am," Amanda Nasser said.
She hopes her trip to Gaza can inspire others to volunteer and learn more about what's happening overseas.
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