Initially, young mother Warda Sbeita struggled to find her newborn baby Anas among the 31 children who had just arrived in southern Gaza after being evacuated from the destroyed Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City. Warda stated in an interview with Reuters on Tuesday, "I was starting to lose hope of seeing my child alive," after being unable to see him for 45 days. Warda and her husband checked the names provided by the head of the neonatal unit at a hospital in Rafah, where Anas's name was listed. While watching her sleeping son in the hospital, Warda said, "I felt like I came back to life again; I thank God that our child is now safe in our care." A smile lit up her face as she cradled him, with her husband helping wrap him in a white blanket with pink ribbons and a cap. Once he felt the warmth, she held him close to her chest.
Warda, who is 32 years old, has seven other children besides Anas, and the family is currently living in a school in Khan Younis in southern Gaza after having resided in Gaza City before the conflict erupted. The school has turned into a shelter for hundreds of people displaced from the northern region. The mother was offered the chance to leave for Egypt with Anas to receive further medical care, but she refused to leave her husband and other children behind. She said, "I cannot leave them with their father only. He won't be able to take care of them. So I had to reject this offer."
Anas was one of only three children saved from Al-Shifa Hospital who remained in Gaza out of 31 premature infants present in the hospital. Doctors at Rafah Hospital reported that no one recognized the other two children, and they did not provide information about the third child. When doctors at Al-Shifa Hospital issued a warning nine days ago about the premature infants under their care, there were 39 children alive, but eight died due to harsh conditions before the evacuation to Rafah and Egypt could be organized. A World Health Organization official reported on Tuesday that two of the eight children died the night before the evacuation.
Among the 31 children transferred to Rafah on Sunday, 28 left for Egypt on Monday. UNICEF spokesman James Elder stated on Tuesday that 20 of them were unaccompanied, while eight were with their mothers. Elder added that some of the unaccompanied children had lost their parents, so no one was with them, and there was no information about the families of the other children. He continued, "All this highlights the horrific situation of families in Gaza."
Anas was unable to feel safe in Egypt but has returned to his family's embrace. Warda mentioned that her son was receiving treatment at Al-Shifa Hospital when the war broke out, the same day that Hamas militants entered southern Israel, leading to the deaths of 1,200 Israelis and the kidnapping of 240, according to Israeli figures. Like thousands of other residents in northern Gaza, Warda fled with her family from their home to southern Gaza, while Anas remained at Al-Shifa Hospital, where electricity, water, food, and medicines were steadily running out. She said, "They called us from Al-Shifa Hospital to come and take the child, but it was difficult for us to go back. The exit route from Gaza City was open, but the return route was closed."
Compounding the family's suffering was the entry of Israeli forces into Al-Shifa Hospital last week, resulting in a loss of contact with the facility, which Israel claims Hamas uses as a base for its operations—a claim the Palestinian group denies. Warda expressed, "We completely lost any news about the child. We couldn't find out anything about him. Is he alive? Is he dead? Is there anyone giving him milk?"
Due to communication outages in the school they were sheltering in Khan Younis, the parents struggled to obtain any confirmed information until other displaced people staying in the school told them they had heard that the children were being transferred south. The parents rushed to Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, but they were told to go to the maternity hospital in Rafah, where they finally met Anas. His health condition was good enough to leave the hospital on Tuesday, and his parents were preparing to take him to the school in Khan Younis to start a new life with his siblings.
