Palestinians in Gaza share stories of loss and suffering after 2 years of war

Amna Nawaz:

All this week, we're marking the anniversary of the October 7 Hamas terror attack on Israel and the subsequent two years of war in Gaza.

Today, we examine the toll on Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. Palestinian health authorities say more than 67,000 people have been killed. More than 40,000 children have lost one or both parents.

Nick Schifrin reports, with the help of our producer in Gaza, Shams Odeh, on the stories beyond the numbers of sacrifice and suffering.

Nick Schifrin:

The grief of a 6-year-old is like endless waves.

Ahmed Abu Maamar (ph) plays like other boys, even inside the displacement camp that's now home, and the cat tolerates his clutch, for she makes him smile. But in the makeshift tent where he lives with his cousin, aunt, and grandmother, most times, his face is stamped by sorrow. He's lost his father, Rames (ph), his sister Sally (ph), his mother, his grandfather, his aunt, and his uncle.

The day Sally died, their aunt Inas held Sally's 5-year-old body and cried. That was October the 17, 2023. Ahmed's father, Inas' brother, died this past June.

Inas Abu Maamar, Displaced Palestinian (through translator):

Where did he go?

Ahmed Abu Maamar, Displaced Palestinian (through translator):

To heaven.

Inas Abu Maamar (through translator):

To whom in heaven did he go?

Ahmed Abu Maamar (through translator):

Sally.

Nick Schifrin:

Inas says Ahmed has only memories like this one, two years ago, a sleeping Ahmed in the arms of his father still alive to hold him, remembering his big sister, who in death still managed to send her brother her love. And when he looks at her now, he is older than she will ever be.

Inas Abu Maamar (through translator):

The war destroyed us all. It destroyed our family, destroyed our homes. It left pain and loss in our hearts. We cannot forget anything.

Nick Schifrin:

The U.N. says, in the last two years, Israeli strikes have damaged or destroyed 80 percent of Gaza's homes, including the one that Inas picked through where much of their family died and where, last year, Inas took her nephew and his prized possession as he pointed at the site where his sister and grandfather are buried.

Inas Abu Maamar (through translator):

Even my father, our backbone, is gone.

Nick Schifrin:

Ahmed has his grandmother, even if she is now a widow. And, for now, there's a canvas roof over their heads. But any hope for a cease-fire is muted by memories.

Inas Abu Maamar (through translator):

My fear is that the negotiations will fail and the war continues, because we are afraid of losing more than what we have already lost. We cannot bear that. What we lost is enough. A lot of our loved ones are gone. We left our homes with them and we will return without them.

Nick Schifrin:

But before the return is relocation. Of all of Gaza's shocking statistics, the highest is nine out of every 10 Gazans have been displaced, many multiple times. They carry what they can on any available means, no matter the distant airstrikes.

And that has made Palestinian displacement multigenerational; 20-year-old Mohammed Saleha supports his grandfather, 81-year-old Dheeb Saleha. The family shares this tent, their fourth home since the war began. They're grateful for it and for the patriarch who inspires his granddaughters' smiles.

But he is so worried, because he has been here before. In 1948, he and his family fled their homes from what is now the state of Israel, Palestinians call it the Nakba, or catastrophe.

Dheeb Saleha, Grandfather (through translator):

The exile and displacement was harsh. Life was disastrous. People left their property, possessions and sources of income and took refuge.

Nick Schifrin:

Today's exodus has pushed him toward what was once the unthinkable, leaving the land of his ancestors.

Dheeb Saleha (through translator):

Gaza today, what is our fate now? Because, in the Gaza Strip, there is no life. There is no salvation. Where do we go? We will knock on the doors of exile.

Mohammed Saleha, Displaced Palestinian (through translator):

Today, we the grandchildren are living through what our grandfather lived and suffered in 1948, when they were displaced from their homes. And today is worse and more difficult, according to our grandfather. So, today, we are at point zero.

Nick Schifrin:

Ten-year-old Hala holds on to her childhood as best she can, even if her backpacks are now family suitcases. But she saved her schoolwork and is trying to save her dreams.

Hala Saleha, Displaced Palestinian (through translator):

(through translator): I want the war to end and I want to go back to my home. I want to go back to my school and I want to play with my toys. I wanted to be teaching girls when I got older.

Nick Schifrin:

But it is hard to think about the future when she must survive the present.

Hala Saleha (through translator):

I'm afraid of the sound of the airstrikes and bombs. I don't know what to do.

Diana Shams Odeh, Author, "A Different Kind of Motherhood": I'm a woman, a mother and a daughter. I have lived and experienced and also survived two years of war.

Nick Schifrin:

Diana Shams Odeh's story is of motherhood in war, of being brave in the face of bombs for her children, Rose (ph) and Karim (ph). She sent us this message on the war's fourth day.

Diana Shams Odeh:

As you can hear now, this is the bombing. They are going to bomb a tower beside us. We are very scared.

(Child crying)

Diana Shams Odeh:

This is the sound of my daughter.

Nick Schifrin:

Her daughter Rose, only a baby then, now a playful toddler, standing up and walking, feeling safe in her mother's hands in a world with no safety.

Diana Shams Odeh:

Safety is never guaranteed during a war. So how can you raise a child during our, where safety is never an option? It's never easy for a mom to protect, to love and to raise her kids during war, how to protect them, how to keep them away from fire and continuous bombardment.

Nick Schifrin:

The family has escaped bombs and has been displaced from home to home until there was no home left.

Diana Shams Odeh:

I used to have a home where it's never easy, in Gaza Strip, to own a home. So talking about a home and losing it, I took my children and been homeless for almost a year.

Nick Schifrin:

Raising her children under impossible circumstances, Diana felt compelled to share their story and write a book on what it means to be a mother in Gaza.

Diana Shams Odeh:

I do not put my children to sleep with lullabies. I put them to sleep with whispered prayers, hoping that the next bomb doesn't fall too close. I do not worry about screen time or healthy snacks. I worry about clean water, medicine and whether today will be the day we have to run again. When your child asks, "Why are they bombing us?" and there is no answer that makes sense.

My father has always been my inspiration to create this book and talk about the sufferings and the struggles I faced as a mom.

Nick Schifrin:

Her father is "News Hour"'s Gaza producer, Shams Odeh, who over the past two years has documented death.

Shams Odeh:

There's a lot of people killed here in this place in Rafah.

Nick Schifrin:

Destruction.

Shams Odeh:

This is the last home that our — my family owned in all Gaza Strip.

Nick Schifrin:

But also hope.

Shams Odeh:

My dream was that everyone, Israelis, Palestinians, lived near each other with peace, with love. And this bloody war must end, must end, because of our kids and their kids for a good future for them.

Nick Schifrin:

Now it's his kids' turn.

Diana Shams Odeh:

This is not a story of politics. It's a story of people, of women, of mothers, of survival through love. To mother in Gaza is to carry both hope and heartbreak in your arms at once. And somehow we still do it.

Nick Schifrin:

Because here's the thing. No matter the environment, kids grow up, even if sometimes they're forced to grow up too fast.

For the "PBS News Hour," I'm Nick Schifrin.