Children in Gaza are living through a new chapter of displacement, hunger, homelessness and loss of safety, signifying how the Palestinian tragedy persists from grandparents to grandchildren .
Seventy-eight years after the Palestinian Nakba , children in the Gaza Strip are experiencing a tragedy strikingly similar to what their grandparents endured in 1948, finding themselves forced to flee their homes and seek shelter in tents and displacement centres lacking even the bare necessities of life because of the ongoing Israeli war since October 2023.
In a displacement camp in the city of Khan Younis in southern Gaza, 13-year-old Mohammed al-Siqli sits in front of his torn tent holding an old school notebook that survived the bombing while trying to grasp a bitter reality after ending up displaced with his family following the destruction of their home in the Shujaiya neighbourhood east of Gaza City.
Mohammed told The New Arab that his grandfather always spoke to him about the occupied city of al-Majdal, from which the family was displaced in 1948, and about life inside tents after the Nakba. Still, he never imagined living through the same experience himself.
"I used to hear about refugee tents in my grandfather's stories, and today we are living in them exactly like they did," he added quietly.
The 13-year-old pointed out that what frightens him most is the sound of aircraft at night, as well as his constant hunger and thirst. He described how his life had completely changed after losing his school , toys, room and every detail of his ordinary day.
As displacement expands across the Gaza Strip, tents have become a constant environment haunting children in different areas, where thousands sleep on sand, roads or inside overcrowded schools lacking basic services.
Palestinian children are living under harsh humanitarian conditions amid shortages of food, water, healthcare and education, alongside the deep psychological effects left by scenes of Israeli bombing, killing and the loss of relatives and homes.
In Gaza City, 12-year-old Layan Abu Shamala is trying to protect her younger siblings inside a small tent erected on sandy ground after the family fled al-Shati refugee camp west of Gaza City following the destruction of their home.
The child said her grandmother always told them how the family lived inside simple tents after being displaced from the occupied village of Hamama and that she believed those stories belonged to a distant past that ended many years ago.
Layan told The New Arab that life inside tents closely resembles what she heard from her grandmother in terms of overcrowding , extreme heat, shortages of water and food, alongside the constant fear of bombardment.
She described how she can no longer sleep properly, especially with the sounds of explosions and children crying at night inside these centres.
Meanwhile, 15-year-old Yazan Hamdan was forced to flee with his family from Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza to the south after the war destroyed large parts of the area.
He said his father always kept the key to the family's old home in the occupied village of Yibna and spoke to them about the return the family had long awaited.
Yazan told The New Arab that the current war made him feel that the Nakba never truly ended, explaining that children today are living through the same circumstances experienced by their grandparents, including displacement, tents, loss of homes and constant fear.
"We used to hear about displacement at school and at home, but now we are living it ourselves," he said.
In the evening, when children gather inside tents around elderly relatives, old Nakba stories mix with the sounds of aircraft and bombardment. At the same time, grandparents continue recounting the names of displaced Palestinian villages and towns to grandchildren.
In one of the displacement camps near the city of Rafah, 14-year-old Mariam Abu Salmiya sits beside her mother trying to prepare food over a simple fire in front of the tent.
She told The New Arab that what she misses most is her home, school and toys and that she constantly asks her mother when they will return home.
Her mother, Suhair Abu Salmiya, explained that the family originates from the occupied town of al-Sawafir and that the grandmother had kept the key to the old house since the first Nakba before the grandchildren found themselves today inside new tents because of the genocide war committed recently by Israeli occupation forces over the course of two years.
She pointed out that children are living in a constant state of fear and anxiety after losing any sense of safety and stability.
Specialists believe the most dangerous aspect of what Gaza's children are experiencing today is the repetition of the same refugee experience endured by grandparents more than seven decades ago, with all the long-term psychological and social effects this carries.
Children born inside camps and hoping for a more stable life have once again found themselves inside displacement tents, living through the same fear and deprivation experienced by previous generations.
In this context, Palestinian psychologist Aya Nassar said what children in the Gaza Strip are experiencing represents a collective reproduction of the Nakba's trauma, but in a harsher and more complex form amid the continuation of the Israeli war, displacement and loss of safety.
She explained that children are not only living through the effects of current bombardment and displacement but also carry the collective memory passed down from grandparents and parents about the first displacement in 1948.
Nassar told The New Arab that the repetition of scenes of tents, loss of homes and forced movement creates in children the feeling that fear and refuge are an endless fate, leaving strong psychological effects that could continue for many years, such as chronic anxiety, sleep disorders, constant fear, isolation and loss of a sense of future.
Nassar pointed out that the most dangerous issue facing Palestinian children currently is growing up in an environment lacking stability, education and normal life, which threatens their psychological and social development and makes them more vulnerable to repeated trauma. Article translated from Arabic by Afrah Almatwari. To read the original, click here .