For my 60th birthday, I’m supporting ABCD’s work in the West Bank
published: 25 November 2025
Steve has been supporting our vital work in the West Bank for years, but for 2025, he decided to do a musical fundraiser, recording songs and encouraging friends and family to donate instead of presents for his 60th birthday!
A few years ago, the local theatre group I’m the musical director of, Contemporancient Theatre, began developing a new play about refugees coming to Wales. As I was working on the music, I ended up working with a Palestinian oud player, whose name was Salih Hassan (or Oud Resists). He told me all about how he had to flee his hometown of Nablus because he would have been imprisoned for his activist music. I also worked with a Saudi-Palestinian actress called Sara Masry, who told me how she’d lost two Palestinian cousins – one was killed in the West Bank and the other in Syria a year ago.
There’s a very different sense that you get when you are talking to people who have actually experienced the reality of Palestine. The reality of their stories really brought it all home to me.
Then a few months later, I came across the ABCD stand at Greenbelt Festival, which I’ve been going to since the 80s. I got chatting to Firas, who is ABCD’s deputy chair and project manager. He told me all about the work they’re doing in the West Bank, and I knew I had to get involved. Firas really inspired me – he was so positive and hopeful.
I thought, if I can support ABCD, that’s at least something that I can do as an ageing white bloke from Wales! All this happened within a month or two of each other – it all came together at the same time. And Palestine has very much been on my radar ever since.
“There’s a very different sense that you get when you are talking to people who have actually experienced the reality of Palestine.”
One of the things I really like about ABCD Bethlehem is the fact that it’s a small charity. I’ve found that means they can be more flexible and more personal in the work they do, they can react to things on the ground in a much quicker way.
“We all need to do the little things that we can do to try to make things better in Palestine”
I became a regular donor to ABCD after that, but I realised that I wanted to do something bigger for my 60th birthday, and I knew I wanted to organise a fundraiser for ABCD.
I’ve done many charity concerts over the years, and we had planned to put one on, but it didn’t work out in time. Instead, I teamed up with a singer friend of mine called Rhian, and we just recorded a couple of songs, and said, “If you were going to buy me something for my birthday, or buy a ticket to the concert, please donate it to ABCD instead”.
So far, we’ve recorded three songs together and posted them online. We’ve chosen songs that work for our voices – I particularly like “The Way You Make Me Feel” because I’m a man of a certain age, and that’s one of the ones I liked when I was young!
“If you’re thinking about fundraising for Palestine, ABCD is a wonderful charity to support.”
I’ve already raised over £375, and the fundraiser is still going! And in the spring, I plan to put on a proper fundraising concert in support of ABCD which I think could raise a couple of thousand pounds.
If you’re thinking about fundraising for Palestine, ABCD is a wonderful charity to support. We all need to do the little things that we can do to try to make things better in Palestine.
How you can get involved
If you’d like to support disabled children in the West Bank, please consider making a donation today. Every gift we receive helps us continue our vitally important work delivering world-class support, physio and medical aid to children and their families. Thank you for your generosity.