In the pre-dawn hours of Friday, Dr Alaa al-Najjar performed her daily ritual: gathering her ten children in a circle for a morning blessing before leaving for the Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis. As one of Gaza’s few remaining paediatricians, she felt compelled to treat the wounded infants arriving from across the southern governorate. Like any mother, she worried about the safety of her brood in a city under near-constant threat from Israeli air and artillery strikes. She could not have imagined that this routine would become her last goodbye.
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Moments after her departure, an Israeli airstrike demolished the family’s three-storey home in the Qizan al-Najjar neighbourhood, killing nine of her children and nearly ending the life of her husband, Dr Hamdi al-Najjar. Only their eldest son, 11-year-old Adam, and Hamdi, 40, survived. Both are now recovering under their wife’s watchful care at the same medical complex where their mother toils daily.
A Nightmare Unfolds
Around 6 a.m., neighbours reported hearing a deafening blast and rushing toward the smouldering rubble. Rescuers and family members sifted through charred debris, uncovering the bodies of seven children, their small limbs disfigured by fire and falling concrete. Two more—six-month-old Sayden and 12-year-old Yahya—remained missing until later retrievals confirmed their deaths. Their names—Yahya, Rakan, Ruslan, Jubran, Eve, Revan, Sayden, Luqman and Sidra—have since been etched into a tragic roster of victims.
“My brother’s oldest child, Adam, was found alive on the pavement, covered in soot, yet breathing,” recounted Ali al-Najjar, Hamdi’s 50-year-old brother. “My brother lay nearby, gravely wounded, his arm severed. I carried them both to hospital, then returned to search for the other children.”
At the morgue, Dr Najjar was unable to identify her own children. The burns were too severe. “She held their bodies, recited the Qur’an and prayed. She begged forgiveness for whoever caused this,” said Dr Ahmed al-Farra, director of the children’s ward at Nasser Medical Complex. “Then she turned back to care for her surviving son and husband.”
A Doctor’s Devotion Amid Grief
Colleagues describe Dr Najjar, 35, as tireless in her dedication to Gaza’s young patients. Each morning, she balanced maternal anxieties with professional duty, dressing wounds, intubating infants, and comforting families who had lost everything. “She lived for her work,” said Mohammed Saqer, head nurse at the paediatric unit. “Now she endures the worst loss imaginable.”
When notified of her children’s deaths, Dr Najjar briefly left her ward to view the rubble. Footage verified by the Guardian shows her weeping as rescuers carried out her daughter Revan’s charred body. Despite her anguish, she immediately returned to her patients. “She is paediatrician first, mother second,” Saqer said, voice trembling. “Just hours after burying her family, she resumed saving other children’s lives.”
Military Account and Civilian Toll
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said the strike targeted “suspected militants operating adjacent to IDF troops” in Khan Younis, describing the area as a “dangerous war zone” from which civilians had been evacuated. “The claim regarding harm to uninvolved civilians is under review,” an IDF spokesperson told the Guardian.
According to Gaza’s health ministry, which is administered by Hamas authorities, nearly 54,000 Palestinians—including more than 16,500 children—have been killed since October 2023. Thousands of families have been displaced, and the destruction of homes and infrastructure in southern Gaza has intensified following the Israeli ground offensive aimed at degrading militant capabilities in the enclave.
Repercussions on Gaza’s Medical Community
Dr Najjar’s loss reverberates across a medical system already on the brink of collapse. With hospitals overwhelmed and supply lines severed, every doctor lost to injury or death deepens the humanitarian crisis. “We have fewer than 15 paediatricians left in the entire south,” said Dr Farra. “Losing one as skilled as Dr Najjar is a calamity for all Gaza’s children.”
International aid agencies have repeatedly called for protected corridors to deliver food, medicine and fuel to hospitals. In recent days, intermittent pauses in fighting have allowed limited aid convoys—but not nearly enough to meet the needs of more than two million people. Doctors warn that without sustainable supplies of power and water, infections and chronic illnesses will surge.
A Family’s Unfulfilled Dreams
Before the war, the Najjar couple had planned to move their family to Cairo, where Dr Hamdi secured a fellowship at Al-Azhar University’s medical school. They hoped to enroll their children in Cairo’s renowned public schools and provide them with stability. “They dreamed of a future beyond this siege,” said Ali al-Najjar. “Now their hopes lie in a single surviving child.”
Dr Najjar’s mother, Fatima, who lives nearby, has taken in her orphaned grandson Adam. “He cries for his siblings, asking where they are,” she said through tears. “He does not yet understand they are gone.” Fatima struggles to shield Adam from constant air raid sirens and the sight of bodies brought into the hospital where Dr Najjar works.
Calls for Accountability and Ceasefire
Human rights groups have decried civilian casualties in Khan Younis as violations of international humanitarian law. Amnesty International called the strike “indiscriminate” and urged the United Nations Security Council to enforce binding measures to protect civilians. Physicians for Human Rights–Israel also condemned the deaths, stating: “Attacks must be directed solely at combatants; hospitals and homes are off-limits.”
Dr Najjar, once a symbol of Gaza’s struggling healthcare system, now embodies its most profound loss. As she navigates her own grief, she continues to treat newborns and children, many of whom have also lost parents. “I have no time to mourn,” she told colleagues. “They need me. I must be their mother now.”
Her story underscores the human cost of a war waged amid densely populated urban areas, where distinctions between civilian and combatant have become tragically blurred. For Dr Najjar, the morning blessing ritual has transformed into a funeral prayer. Yet even in her darkest hours, she clings to the medical oath she took—and to the hope that someday, Gaza’s children may grow up free from fear and loss.
