Growing sorrows and broken hearts in the besieged Strip Harsh scenes that wound every onlooker in steadfast Gaza

In the corridors of Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, a small child stood silently staring at the bodies passing before him, wrapped in white shrouds, just hours after Israeli airstrikes turned the city’s morning into a scene of loss and shock. He did not know the victims’ names, but his trembling features said that fear had become greater than his age, and that death had come closer to him than any toy he was supposed to be holding at that moment.

The exhausted footsteps of paramedics raced against time as bodies piled up in the corridors, and the sounds of crying rose above whispered prayers. Pale faces and eyes fixed on the doors waited for news that might be the last about a son, a father, or a brother. At Al-Shifa Hospital, the halls were no longer only places of treatment, but had become open farewell stations for all those suddenly taken by the airstrikes.

The child standing near the bodies did not cry much. He remained silent, watching the white coverings pass one after another. His small hands were pressed tightly to his chest, as if trying to protect his heart from an image that would haunt him for a long time. In that moment, it seemed as though his childhood was being slowly pulled away from him, without him understanding why he was destined to grow up amid such overwhelming loss.

Outside, civil defence teams said that several people were killed in the airstrikes that hit the city that day, while the Israeli army justified the bombardment by saying it came after its forces were targeted by gunfire and one of its officers was wounded. Between the two narratives, the victims remained mere numbers in breaking statements, while their families turned into stories of pain that find no one to hear them.

Inside Al-Shifa Hospital, the child stayed standing where he was, following with his eyes the last body leaving the corridor. He did not ask who they were, nor did he need an answer. It was enough for him to see how death was carried on shoulders to know that Gaza, on that day, had lost more than could ever be replaced… and that he, with it, had lost a part of his innocence forever.