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“Being a parent in Gaza is a curse”… 3,600 children killed in 3 weeks

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From infants to fetuses to high school teenagers…even children who have lost limbs.
There are 7,000 injured. Refugees in the south are also hit, there is no safe place.
High school senior who wanted to be a reporter dies a few days after reporting video

Hamas’ health ministry in the Gaza Strip announced on the 1st (local time) that more than 3,600 Palestinian babies and children have been killed in the 25 days since the war between Israel and Hamas began.

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Children died from being hit by bombings, being crushed by misfired rockets, being burned by bomb explosions, or being crushed by collapsed buildings. Among them were babies from newborns to toddlers, children who liked books or wanted to be reporters, and churchgoers. The dead included many children who had been taught that it was safe to stay inside.

Of the 2.3 million people living in the small area of ​​the Gaza Strip, half are minors under the age of 18, and 40% of those killed in the war so far are children.

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An Associated Press analysis of statistics released by the Gaza Health Ministry last week found that as of October 26, 2,001 children under the age of 12 had been murdered, of which 615 were infants under the age of three.

Adam al-Madhoun, a writer whom we met on November 1 at the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Hospital in Deir al-Bala, central Gaza, said to his 4-year-old daughter Kenzi, “When the buildings in Gaza were bombed, the buildings were above the children’s heads. “It collapsed,” he said.

Daughter Kenzie survived the air raid, but suffered an amputated right arm, crushed left leg and a fractured skull.

Israel claims that its airstrikes target Hamas’ strongholds and facilities and accuses Hamas of using civilians as human shields. It is also claimed that more than 500 rockets from Hamas militants were misfired and fell into Gaza, killing an unknown number of Palestinians.

In any case, the number of children killed in the war in Gaza in just over three weeks is more than the number of children killed in fighting in conflict areas around the world over the past three years combined, according to the international charity Save the Children.

The organization said that a total of 2,985 children were murdered around the world last year.

James Elder, a spokesman for UNICEF, the United Nations children’s fund, said, “The Gaza Strip has become a graveyard for thousands of children.”

The horrified faces of children being pulled from the ruins of buildings in the Gaza Strip and the images of them being carried on hospital stretchers soaked in blood are now routinely featured in the news, sparking angry protests around the world.

Even after the recent Israeli airstrike, there is a scene where a rescue team is carrying a little baby whose white baby clothes are soaked in blood, a father is screaming while holding his dead little son to his chest, and a little baby covered in blood is staggering alone in the ruins of a building. have been reported

“Being a parent in Gaza is a curse,” Ahmed Modawiq, a 40-year-old carpenter from Gaza City whose life was ruined after losing his 8-year-old daughter in five days of fighting last May, told a reporter.

Israeli children were also killed. Babies and small children were among a total of 1,400 people killed when fighting broke out in the southern region in a surprise attack by Hamas on October 7, the Israeli government said, without giving an exact number.

About 30 children are among the 240 people taken hostage by Hamas.

While Israeli warplanes struck the entire Gaza Strip, Palestinian children hid in apartments with extended families or stayed in UN-run shelters. Israel told residents of northern Gaza to evacuate to the south, but no place was safe from bombing.

Yasmin Judah, who had taken refuge in a four-story building in Deir al-Balah in the south from northern Gaza, but whose entire family and 68 relatives were killed by an Israeli bombing on October 22, said, “These people are running away from death, but they end up dying.” He said.

Her niece, 1-year-old Milissa, was the only survivor, and her mother was found dead in the ruins while giving birth during the air raid. In her womb were the half-heads of twin babies who had died before being born.

Judah asked, “What sin have these little creatures committed that would cause them to lose their entire family?”

Israel says Hamas is responsible for the death toll in Gaza, which has risen to 8,800, because it operates in the most densely populated residential areas. On the other hand, the Palestinians claim that the rapid increase in the number of casualties every day is evidence that Israel continues indiscriminate airstrikes and bombings.

However, the sacrifice of Palestinian children is increasing day by day, and the number of injured reaches 7,000. Doctors say they have suffered fatal injuries that will change their lives forever.

Milisa, who was a toddler and could walk a few steps before the air raid, can now never walk again. When his family was wiped out in an air raid, he was hit by a bomb that left him paralyzed from the chest down.

When 4-year-old Kenji, who was taken to the hospital, came to his senses, he was crying and asking where his right arm had gone and why it was not there.

The child’s father said, “I can’t tell you how much pain and effort it will take to let this child live even half of a normal life.”

Children’s charities, including Children of Gaza, say that for children to be in the Gaza Strip itself is death.

In the meantime, quality of life, living standards, future hopes, employment, health care, and education were issues, but starting from this war, the survival of children also became the top priority. “They are in the midst of life and death,” said Ayed Abu Egtaisi, secretary-general of the Defense Forces for Children of Palestine group.

Al Jazeera TV broadcast a live interview with the station’s Gaza bureau chief, Wael Ahdu, who lost his wife, 6-year-old daughter, and 16-year-old son in an Israeli bombing on October 25.

He could not stop crying as he faced the cameras of reporters flocking to the hospital, saying that his teenage son Mahmoud wanted to become a reporter.

Ahdu said that her son was a third-year student at an American international high school in Gaza City and wanted to become a reporter who reported in English, so he always practiced on-camera appearances and uploaded his articles to YouTube.

News footage taken a few days before Mahmoud’s death showed burned-out cars, black smoke and collapsed houses. Mahmoud and his sister completed the press screen by recording a message with the sound of strong wind in the background of this screen.

“This is the most violent and intense war we have ever had in Gaza,” the siblings shouted, looking straight into the camera at the far end of the sidewalk.

“Please help us survive!”

Israel-Palestine War

[데이르 알-발라(가자지구)= AP/뉴시스]

Source: Donga

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