How did the occupation divide Gaza’s children and their families between north and south? | policy

Israel did not leave any means of genocide without committing it in the Gaza Strip, including tearing apart Palestinian families, as many children were separated from their families due to the Israeli occupation army’s insistence on separating the north of the Strip from its south and its policy of forced displacement.

International organizations estimate that about 20,000 Palestinian children are no longer accompanied by their parents or one of them, in addition to the fact that 40% of the 15,000 missing children are unknown if they were killed or are being cared for by other families.

The United Nations warned that Israel’s issuance of repeated orders to families in the northern Gaza Strip to move to the south may lead to an increase in cases of separation of children from their families.

Through the Netzarim Corridor, Israel separates the northern and southern Gaza Strip, while satellite images showed that Tel Aviv expanded it, according to what the Hebrew newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth published on August 26.

I miss my father’s hug

The child, Mira Hassan (9 years old), resides in a camp for the displaced inside Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir Al-Balah (center) with her mother, grandfather, and grandmother, while her father remained in the northern Gaza Strip, accompanied by his elderly parents, to care for them.

In the language of innocent childhood, the girl tells Anadolu Agency, “I am very longing to see my father and sit in his arms.”

She asked, “When will the war end so I can meet my father and relatives?”

Her situation is no different from that of her sister Camelia, who is one year older than her. She tells Anadolu Agency, “My father decided to stay in the northern Gaza Strip with my grandfather and grandmother to take care of them, and we fled from the house with my grandfather and grandmother (my mother’s parents) to Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza.”

The family of Mira and Camelia moved to Al-Shifa Medical Complex in search of safety and security after repeated displacement within Gaza City, before the occupation army stormed the complex in November 2023 and forced the displaced people inside to leave towards the south and center of the Strip.

The child, Camelia, added in a sad voice, “We left and did not take anything with us. We thought it would be a few days and then we would return to our home.”

She points out the family’s suffering after their displacement, the lack of blankets and winter clothes at the time, and their being forced to use hospital bed covers stained with blood to resist the extreme cold.

Repeated displacement

As for the Palestinian mother Fatima, the occupation army forced her to move repeatedly, from the north of the Gaza Strip to the Shifa complex, and when it stormed, she was displaced again to the south, accompanied by her father, mother, and siblings, but she was unable to take her infant son and young daughter, who remained with her husband in their grandfather’s house in the city. .

The mother told Anadolu Agency, “I fled with my father, mother, and siblings to the southern Gaza Strip after the Israeli army forced us to do so.”

She adds with deep sadness, “I miss them very much. A whole year I was not able to see them or hug them. The Israeli siege separated us and separated us. I was not able to return to them, and they are now in their grandfather’s house in the northern Gaza Strip.”

She continued, “When I was displaced, my son Muhammad was only 3 months old, and now, after a full year has passed, he is 1 year and 3 months old, and my daughter is now 2 and a half years old. A whole year has passed while they are growing up far from me.”

Fatima dreams of the end of the Israeli war on Gaza or the declaration of a ceasefire that will enable her to return to her home and family in the northern Gaza Strip.

On October 5, the occupation army began unprecedented bombing operations on the camp and town of Jabalia and large areas in the northern Gaza Strip, before announcing the next day the start of its invasion under the pretext of “preventing the Hamas movement from regaining its power in the region,” while the Palestinians say that Israel wants In occupying the region and displacing its residents.

Separated families

On October 9, the American newspaper “The New York Times” said that the war on Gaza tore apart many families, and many of the population of about two million people were forced to flee repeatedly, which led to the dispersion of those families.

She attributed the reason to the fact that simply moving within a small area in the Gaza Strip entails a great risk that may sometimes lead to death.

On August 24, UNICEF spokesman Kazem Abu Khalaf said in a statement that the Israeli war of extermination had raised the number of unaccompanied children in the Gaza Strip to 19,000 children.

“Unaccompanied children” are those who have been separated from both parents and other relatives, and are not being cared for by an adult under law or custom, as defined by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

In reference to the astonishing increase in statistics, posters and pictures have recently spread among the tents of displaced people in the Gaza Strip searching for children who went missing during the genocide war or during the displacement journey that the people of the Strip are experiencing, according to the United Nations.

On October 10, UNICEF Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa, Adele Khader, said in a statement that the continued Israeli displacement orders for Palestinians in northern Gaza may increase the rates of separation of children from their families.

Khader explained that the intensification of Israeli military operations in northern Gaza exposes children to serious risks of being killed, maimed, arrested, or separated from their parents and caregivers, amid ongoing danger and chaos.

She pointed out that having to flee several times in Gaza amid repeated military operations with no end in sight deprives children of what little safety and stability they have left.

About two million displaced Palestinians live in various shelter centers in the Gaza Strip in difficult conditions in which they lack the means for a decent living, while infectious diseases spread among them due to overcrowding, lack of water and food, and low tools and the level of hygiene.

With American support, since October 7, 2023, Israel has been waging a war on Gaza that has left more than 143,000 Palestinian martyrs and wounded – most of them children and women – and more than 10,000 missing, amid massive destruction and famine that killed dozens of children and the elderly, in one of the worst humanitarian disasters in the world. .