Jonathan Crickx, chief of comms at Unicef Palestine, last week visited a centre in the south of the Strip that hosts and cares for unaccompanied children in the besieged enclave.
He said he met two young cousins, a six-year-old boy and a four-year-old girl, who are the only survivors of their family.
They were pulled from underneath the rubble, their bodies covered with burns, and brought to Al-Aqsa hospital after their separate family homes in the Al-Bureij area were destroyed by a strike in the first half of December.
“They were traumatised. When they arrived at the centre, the little girl wanted to stay with the doctor who had taken care of her. She was non-stop crying, it was a panicked cry,” said Crickx.
“They are experiencing a very high level of anxiety. The girl has difficulties socialising, she is very closed… Every time they hear the bombing and shelling they panic. It’s a very difficult situation.”
Many of the children in the centre started to panic whenever they felt reverberations from the shelling, added Crickx. Some were exhibiting negative coping mechanisms, such as scratching at their ankles and their arms.
“We fear that the situation of children who have lost their parents is much worse in the north and the centre,” he said.
Echoes from the past
War orphans can become symbolic of a conflict, defining and sometimes distorting historical narratives.
For example, it is estimated that the Armenian Genocide, that began in 1915, created up to 200,000 orphans. Many were murdered and others were forcibly converted to Islam, creating a stain on the Turkish that tests diplomatic relations even today.
In contrast, the ‘Kindertransport’ of the Second World War, which saw up to 10,000 Jewish children rescued from Nazi Germany and surrounding countries and rehomed in the UK, has become emblematic of humanity and hope.
Dr Filippo Dionigi, Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Relations at the University of Bristol, says that there isn’t another conflict in modern times that compares to the intensity of the Israeli-Gaza war, calling it “unprecedented.”
“These are children that will have trouble accessing any kind of service that can effectively address their situation in the long term. An adoption programme will not work for these big numbers in the short or medium term,” he said.
He added that “uprooting” them would add another level of trauma. “These children need substantial support there, and they need to be able to rebuild some sort of network to support them at a relational level.”
