‘Cemeteries of Memory’ – Childhood Buried beneath Gaza Rubble
By Anwar Haniya
In Gaza, childhood has been shattered by war, turning laughter into silence and schoolbags into burdens of survival, writes Anwar Haniya.
In a small corner of Gaza, 14-year-old Sewar Al-Ejleh hauls heavy water buckets and waits in long lines for charity food.
Her father was killed in an airstrike that destroyed their home. “Life isn’t what it was. We don’t have the luxury to grieve,” she says.
Bissan, 16, survived a horrific fire belt attack that killed her mother, two sisters, and two brothers. She suffered severe injuries and now lives away from her father, undergoing treatment abroad.
“I don’t know whom to mourn first,” she says in a faint voice.
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Elsewhere in a shelter, a four-year-old boy cries out: “I want Baba to carry me!” His grandfather wraps him in his arms, whispering, “Remember, I’m Baba now.” His real father was killed along with the rest of the family in a massacre.
Five-year-old Aisha, who was once her father’s little princess, now stares at his photo, saying, “I want him to see me doing well at school.”
Her younger sister Sewar, only four, mourns their baby brother Youssef, who was martyred in their father’s arms. “I just want to see Baba for a few minutes… then he can go back to being dead,” she laments.
Their mother, trying to hold herself together, says, “Consoling them feels like decoding a complex chemical equation… one I don’t have the answers to.”
‘Forced Maturity’
Dr. Youssef Awadallah, a clinical psychologist in Gaza, paints a grim picture: “Children here are not just grieving — they’re aging before their time. They carry cemeteries of memory within them.”
He says many children have stopped speaking. Some cannot play anymore. Young girls as young as six carry infants and manage entire households.
“This forced maturity causes deep psychological fractures,” Dr Awadallah explains.
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He stresses that “Trauma compounds daily — loss, displacement, fear, lack of safety, all accumulate in young bodies that were never meant to bear such weight.
“Some children suffer from mutism, bed-wetting, or emotional withdrawal. Others ask terrifying questions like: ‘Why are we alive? Why were our families taken?’”
What these children need, he emphasizes, is not just food or medicine, but “an emotionally safe space to cry, to ask, to mourn — without shame or suppression.”
Most Vulnerable
According to Aziza Al-Kahlout, spokesperson for Gaza’s Ministry of Social Development, the number of orphans jumped from 24,000 before October 7 to nearly 40,000 currently. This includes 2,000 children who lost both parents, and 500 children who are the only survivors of their entire families.
“The most vulnerable are orphans with disabilities — they lack basic health and emotional care,” she adds.
The war has paralyzed the orphan sponsorship system. International aid has halted due to the closure of banks, while local support is only partially reaching the newly orphaned.
In a play activity at a UNICEF-supported temporary space in Gaza, Yamen, 7, drew a wish: a sky without drones and warplanes.
A long-lasting ceasefire is vital for children’s survival. Share Yamen’s wish to show your support. pic.twitter.com/MQ7wATeqGA
— UNICEF (@UNICEF) July 3, 2025
“We now have over 1,400 orphaned infants under the age of one,” she says. “They started life without a mother, without a father — and without even milk or a bed.”
Each figure tells the story of a child who lost a parent, a home, or an entire world. Gaza’s orphan crisis is not just a humanitarian statistic — it’s a bleeding wound in the conscience of humanity.
These children don’t just need aid — they need safety, dignity, love, and a future free from the nightmare of war.
(The Palestine Chronicle)
– Anwar Haniya is a journalist in Gaza committed to amplifying the Palestinian narrative and sharing untold stories from within the besieged enclave.
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