A Personal Fight for Justice: Remembering Amer Fakhoury
Today, September 12, 2023, marks the fourth anniversary of the day Amer Fakhoury, was unjustly taken from us; the day his rights were violated, and our lives changed forever. As his daughter, Zoya Fakhoury, I write this with a heavy heart, reflecting on the journey we've been through since that fateful day in 2019. We arrived in Lebanon on September 5th to kickstart our very first family vacation. Prior to that, my parents were working pretty much every day to make ends meet and get my three sisters and I through college. When we arrived in Lebanon, they took my dad’s passport under the guise of a “routine background check” and told him to come back the following week to pick it up.
On September 12, 2019, he visited the Lebanese General Security to pick up his passport, but he never came back home. Instead, he was detained, tortured, and forced to sign false documents. He became a pawn in a political game controlled by the terrorist regime, Hezbollah. The injustice that befell my father was not something that my family could stand by and accept. We opened up this foundation in honor of him to advocate for others being illegally detained. I recently made the decision to leave my full-time engineering job to devote my time to the foundation.
My family founded the Amer Foundation in Amer Fakhoury’s honor to draw attention to the issue of illegal detentions and to fight for the rights of hostages worldwide. This foundation is not just an organization, each day at the Amer Foundation, we strive to give a voice to those who have been silenced by the injustice of illegal detention. We work tirelessly to ensure that the atrocities my father had to endure are not repeated. We advocate, we inform, we support, and, most importantly, we fight for justice. In memory of Amer Fakhoury, and in honor of all those who have been unjustly detained, we continue to press forward. This fight is personal for us. It's for my father, for the countless others who have experienced similar injustices, and for those who are yet to be heard.
Today, as we remember Amer Fakhoury, I implore you to join us in this fight. Stand with the Amer Foundation as we strive to shed light on the hidden world of illegal detention, to ensure that no one else has to suffer as my father did. As we mark this solemn anniversary, I choose to remember my father not just as a victim, but as a beacon of resilience that has sparked a global call to action. Through the Amer Foundation, his spirit and dedication to justice continue to inspire and drive our mission. The pain of losing my father in such a cruel manner will never fade, but his memory fuels our determination to fight. On behalf of Amer Fakhoury, I ask you to stand with us, to raise your voice against illegal detention and to demand justice for all. Together, we can ensure that my father's ordeal was not in vain, and that his legacy will forever be a symbol of resistance against injustice.