Gaza welcomes Ramadan with sadness, pain, hunger, and loss. The children of Gaza welcome the holy month carrying the sorrows of the past.

While the capitals, markets, and streets of the world are busy preparing to welcome the blessed month of Ramadan—decorations are hung, lanterns are lit, and shops fill with the scents of dates and spices—Gaza stands on the other side of the story… where preparations here resemble nothing more than a simple attempt to grasp a life that once was, or to restore a spirit that refuses to die.

In Gaza, children do not wait for Ramadan as their peers around the world do. They wait for it while repairing their small dreams between one tent and another, between a broken street and a home that no longer stands. Yet, they manage to create wonder every time—turning the remnants of pain into a smile, pieces of fabric into simple lanterns, and ground weighed down by rubble into a space for play and hope.

Amid this harsh scene, Gaza regains a small glimmer of hope through its children, who create miracles with their strength alone. Children who have not yet learned the meaning of surrender, but quickly learned what patience is, how joy can be built from very little, and how reassurance can be planted in the heart of fear—as if they are telling the world that life here is still capable of standing.

Ramadan will come again this year… and it will come while they are in their tents. It will arrive at simple tables, with prayers rising from hearts made heavy by loss, and with eyes searching the sky for a long-awaited sense of safety. It will come as they gather around their small lanterns—not to decorate the place, but to say that light does not need an entire city in order to be born.

Between the rubble and the sorrow, between the memory of absent homes and the images of loved ones, Gaza insists on welcoming Ramadan in its own way—not with decorations or celebrations, but with deep faith that tomorrow is possible, and that its children, despite everything they have been through, are still capable of creating hope… and of writing a different story—one that begins in a tent and does not end with pain.