A life displaced: Mahmoud’s story from Gaza

Before the war
 
Before 7 October 2023, Mahmoud lived with his family in Gaza. Like any family home, theirs was a place where they experienced joy, celebrated achievements, faced everyday challenges and, above all, lived life together. They shared meals, laughed together, and watched the younger children play in the comfort of what they believed was a safe home. It was a place of stability and familiarity. Looking back, Mahmoud reflects that their “days were filled with ordinary moments that now feel priceless”.
 
Mahmoud was a talented student who excelled academically, most notably achieving 82% in his Tawjihi examinations. For him, the result marked the beginning of the future he had worked hard towards: a university education, the opportunity to support his family, and the hope of building a better life. But that future would be bleakly different to what Mahmoud had hoped for so long.
 
The displacement
 
For Mahmoud and his family, as for countless other families across Gaza, the home that had anchored their lives became uninhabitable within days of the war beginning.The love and togetherness that had characterised it and the lives that had unfolded within it, were replaced by overwhelming fear and an absolute incompatibility between staying and surviving. The neighbourhood they knew became a war zone. Bombs fell nearby, people were killed, and hospitals quickly became overwhelmed.
 
Mahmoud’s family left their home on 10 October 2023.A day later it had been bombed and completely destroyed. They fled with only a handful of belongings, leaving behind not only their possessions but the place where they had felt safest. Mahmoud still speaks about the family home with grief: “Our home was not just a building; it was where we shared our happiest moments as a family. When it was destroyed it felt like we lost a part of our lives forever.”
 
Losing their home was only the beginning. To date, Mahmoud and his family have been displaced six times, moving from Gaza City to Al-Bureij, then Nuseirat, Deir al-Balah, Rafah, back to Deir al-Balah and finally Al-Bureij once more. Each move has been driven by the same hope: finding somewhere safer than the place they had just left.Today, Mahmoud says each morning begins with the same questions: where will the family find food, clean water and medicine? The search for those essentials now shapes every hour of their lives.
 
A child caught in war
 
Among the family’s greatest concerns is Ahmed, Mahmoud’s sister’s son. Like any child, he should be thinking about school, playing and spending time with his family. Instead, his days are shaped by illness and a desperate search for the medicine that keeps him alive.
 
Ahmed is suffering from a severe, life-threatening illness that requires daily treatment. The condition remains undiagnosed due to the lack of medical resources in Gaza, but inflicts severe skin peeling and changes in skin colour amongst other things. The five-year-old boy, who once “had a beautiful smile and was full of life like any child his age”, experiences serious pain and suffers daily due to his symptoms.
 
Mahmoud and his family live in constant fear for Ahmed’s life, watching helplessly as he endures pain they are powerless to relieve.They face the excruciating daily decision of choosing between supplying food and clean water to their household of 13, or giving Ahmed the life-saving medication he so desperately needs.
 
On the days when giving him this medication is not feasible, the family watch on helplessly as his pain and suffering worsen and the risk posed to his health becomes greater. Every day, they “pray that he will get better and have the childhood he deserves”. This situation is of course nightmarish for any family, but is especially painful to Ahmed’s mother, as she has already faced the loss of one child, Ahmed’s sister.
 
Mahmoud harrowingly reflects on the loss: “Her absence left a painful emptiness in our home. We still remember her smile, her laughter, and the happy moments we shared with her.”This was a heartbreaking loss for the entire family and is a pain they live with each day, Mahmoud continues.“Her mother lost a part of her heart.”
 
Appalling conditions
 
The war has compounded that grief. During the conflict, her husband was killed by shelling, leaving her widowed and solely responsible for raising her four children in circumstances that would be overwhelming for any parent.Mahmoud describes watching his sister carry that burden with extraordinary resilience. Despite her own grief, he says she continues to do everything she can to protect her children.
 
Since his brother-in-law’s death, Mahmoud has taken on much of the responsibility for supporting the wider family, using the donations they receive to provide food, medicine and other necessities whenever he can.”I try my best to provide… [for the] basic needs of everyone,” he explains, “but the responsibility is very heavy, especially during these difficult times.”
 
The family believes that the poor health faced by the children is not only worsened by the war due to the lack of access to medicine, but is caused by the environment the children have been subjected to due to it. These difficult living conditions include exposure to pollution, contaminated food and water, and other effects of the ongoing war.
 
“As a family, we feel exhausted, scared and helpless. We would do anything to take Ahmed’s pain away, but we are struggling to find the medicine and care that could help him.”
 
Holding on to hope
 
After nearly three years of war, repeated displacement and unimaginable loss, Mahmoud explains that his family keeps on going simply because they must. His dreams of going to university have become notably more modest: he hopes now to reach somewhere safe where his family may live without the fear of being killed and can have a home once again. More than anything, he hopes that Ahmed can receive the medicine he so desperately needs.
 
His message to those reading his story is simple: he does not want people in Gaza to be remembered only through headlines or casualty figures, but as individuals whose lives, hopes and memories matter.“I hope people remember that behind every story there is a human life, a family, and children who deserve safety and a future. I hope they do not see us only as numbers, but as people with dreams, memories and feelings.”
 
For Mahmoud, his mission for the future has become rebuilding a home and a life for his family.
 
“My dream is simple: to have a real home again, not a torn tent.”
 
help Mahmoud look after his family & orphaned children in Gaza | Chuffed | Non-profit charity and social enterprise fundraising