What Is It Like Being a Child in Gaza?

They are looking at their empty cups, wondering if their next meal will come. Or will it be another loss? This is the daily struggle for children in Gaza. They wake up to the sounds of explosions and go to bed with the echoes of gunfire in the distance. Their world is a place where fear and hunger are constant companions, where the innocence of childhood has been stripped away by the harsh realities of a genocide. The simple joys of playing outside, laughing with friends, and dreaming of the future have been replaced by the need to survive, to find enough food to eat, and to stay alive for another day.

As they walk through streets filled with rubble, they hold their mother’s hand tightly, not knowing if this will be the last time they’ll be together. Every day is a fight against the uncertainty that surrounds them, a fight to hold onto hope when everything around them is falling apart. They see their homes reduced to dust, their schools turned into shelters, and their neighborhoods transformed into battlefields. The dreams they once had of becoming doctors, teachers, or simply growing up in peace seem like distant memories, replaced by the harsh reality of survival.

And in the silence of the night as the darkness closes in, they wonder what tomorrow will bring. Will they have water to drink? Will they find food to eat? Will they see their friends again? These are not the thoughts that should occupy the mind of a child, but in Gaza, they are all too real.

And the diseases that spread through the overcrowded shelters? Those are just another enemy they must face, an invisible threat that takes their strength and their hope. They have seen too much, lost too much, and yet they continue to hold on, because what else is there to do?

The world outside watches, but does it really see? Do they understand what it’s like to be a child in Gaza, where every breath is a battle, and every day is a question of survival? They are not just numbers in a report or faces on the news, they are children with dreams, with hearts that long for peace, with lives that matter. But in Gaza, those dreams are often crushed before they can even take root, and those lives are cut short by the relentless grip of this genocide.

The children of Gaza deserve more than this. They deserve a chance to grow up in a world where they don’t have to fear for their lives, where they don’t have to wonder if they’ll have food to eat or water to drink. They deserve a childhood filled with laughter, not tears, a childhood with hope, not despair. And it is up to all of us to make sure they get it. Because every child, no matter where they are, deserves to dream, to hope, To LIVE, and not just living, but living without fear.