2023-11-04 15:21:00
“I don’t want prosthetics, I want them to reattach my legs, they can do it“, protests Layan on her bed in the pediatric wing. Every time she opens her eyes, when the effect of the sedatives wears off, she sees her stumps covered in bandages.
Her mother, Lamia al-Baz, explains that Layan was injured last week in a bombing in the al-Qarara neighborhood of Khan Yunis.
Nearly 10,000 dead (mostly civilians) in the Gaza Strip
Israel, determined to “annihilate“Hamas relentlessly bombs the Gaza Strip in retaliation for the deadly attacks carried out by the Palestinian Islamist movement on its territory on October 7, which left more than 1,400 dead, mostly civilians. These Israeli bombings caused nearly 9,500 dead, mainly civilians, according to the Hamas government.
“How am I going to go back to school when my friends are walking and I’m not?“, Layan laments, his face and arms larded with wounds. “I will be by your side. Everything will be fine, the future is still ahead of you“, her mother tries to reassure her.
According to this 47-year-old woman, the bombing killed two of her daughters, Ikhlas and Khitam, and two of her grandchildren, including a baby a few days old. They were all in the house of Ikhlas, who had just given birth. She had to identify her daughters at the morgue. “Their bodies were torn to pieces. I recognized Khitam by his earrings and Ikhlas by his toes“, she says.
I will have a prosthesis fitted and will continue my studies to make my dream come true
In the burns treatment department, Lama al-Agha, 14, and her sister Sara, 15, hospitalized following an attack on October 12, occupy two beds side by side. Their mother, who is struggling to hold back her tears, is sitting in the middle. The bombing killed Sara’s twin sister, Sama, and their younger brother, Yehya, 12, the mother said.
Stitches and burn scars are visible on Lama’s partly shaved head and forehead. “When they transferred me here, I asked the nurses to help me sit up and found out my leg had been amputated“, she says. “I felt a lot of pain but I thank God that I am still alive. I will have a prosthesis fitted and will continue my studies to realize my dream of becoming a doctor. I will be strong for myself and for my family“, adds Lama al-Agha with astonishing courage.
Doctor Nahed Abou Taaema, director of the Nasser hospital, explains that faced with the large number of injured and lack of resources, doctors often have no other choice than to perform an amputation to prevent complications. “We must choose between saving the patient’s life or putting it in danger by trying to save his injured leg“, he explains.
I won’t be able to walk or play football anymore
Wearing a green football jersey and matching shorts, Ahmad Abou Shahmah, 14, surrounded by cousins, walks on crutches in the courtyard of his house, now in ruins, in eastern Khan Younes , where he was used to kicking a ball.
His right leg was amputated following a bombing destroyed his family’s building, killing six of his cousins and an aunt, he said. “When I woke up (following the operation) I asked my brother ‘where is my leg’. He lied to me by telling me that it was there and that I mightn’t feel it because of the anesthesia before my cousin told me the truth the next day“, he remembers. “I cried a lot. The first thing I thought was that I wouldn’t be able to walk or play soccer like I did every day. I even enrolled in an academy a week before the war“, adds the boy.
Ahmad is a supporter of the Spanish giant FC Barcelona while his cousins are die-hard fans of Real Madrid. “If it might turn back the clock and give Ahmad his leg once more, I’d be willing to ditch Real Madrid to become a Barcelona fan like him“, said one of them, Farid Abou Shahmah.
Israel war between Israel and Hamas Gaza Dossier Israel
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