Orphans in Gaza.. 49,000 orphans in need of care and support

Um Salim never imagined she would become a mother to a child she had never carried in her womb, but fate led her to a "war orphan" whose name and family were unknown. The girl, who was not yet 3 years old, emerged from the rubble of her home in Gaza, the sole survivor of a bombing that wiped her entire family from the civil registry.

In the orphanage, they did not know her name, as only small features drenched in sadness and shock remained from her past. Um Salim and her husband, burdened by displacement and poverty, took a step forward and registered themselves on the list of families wishing to adopt an orphaned child.

After long months of waiting, they received a call saying, "There is a girl who has lost her entire family." The couple returned from their displacement in the south and stood before the girl for the first time; words were unnecessary, it was enough for their eyes to meet to form a bond of love deeper than blood.

Nine months have passed since the girl entered their home, preceded by four months of meetings at the orphanage for them to get used to her and for her to get used to them. Now, Ilaf is uttering her first words, "Mama" and "Baba," and when her foster mother is absent from the house to buy some supplies, the girl cries bitterly.

Ilaf represents one face of a larger collective tragedy. In another house in Khan Younis, Samar (9 years old) sits staring at an old photo of herself with her parents, who were martyred in a bombing at the beach camp. Since that day, she has moved to her uncle's house, who supports a large family.

Her uncle tries to compensate her with affection, but he admits that the absence of parents cannot be easily filled, especially when the child is old enough to understand the tragedy of her family. As for the child Ala'a (5 years old), he has been moving between his uncle and other relatives after losing his mother in one of the recent airstrikes.

The Ministry of Health's figures reveal the extent of the disaster, as thousands of children in Gaza have lost both parents or one of them, and others have become completely without family support, with 49,000 children orphaned in the sector since the onset of the genocide in October 2023.

Engineer Zahir Al-Wahidi warns of the consequences of raising an entire generation of children in Gaza without families. He says that children who have lost their relatives do not only suffer from a lack of care but also face the danger of psychological and social loss.

Al-Wahidi appeals to the international community to pressure the occupation to end the war on Gaza, "before the whole world pays the price for the loss of Gazans in the corridors of orphanhood and deprivation."