DW meets Palestinian medical evacuees in Doha

DW (English)

The UN has called the conflict raging in Gaza "a war on children." As Israel continues its campaign against Hamas militants, it is the youngest in Gaza who bear the brunt. WARNING: Report contains graphic images.

Transcript

00:00In many ways, nine-year-old Mahmoud is like any child his age.

00:07He enjoys playing with his father and beating his younger siblings at video games.

00:12During those moments, he is a happy boy.

00:16I am Palestinian.

00:17I am patient.

00:18I can take a lot.

00:23I can endure everything.

00:27But sometimes, as if out of nowhere, what he has gone through overcomes him.

00:33His mother tells the story, Mahmoud cannot.

00:37I saw Mahmoud lying face down.

00:42His head was moving and he was breathing, but his right arm was not there.

00:47And his left arm was completely crushed.

00:49He told me, Mom, you take my sister and go.

00:53I will be martyred.

00:54I told him no, my love.

00:56I would never leave you.

00:57He fell from my arms twice.

00:59I could not carry him at all.

01:04That was back in December.

01:05Mahmoud's mother tells me the family were heeding Israeli calls to leave the northern

01:10parts of the Gaza Strip.

01:11Then an Israeli rocket landed near Mahmoud.

01:16In the days after the strike, because of the anesthesia and fever, he was coming in and

01:20out of consciousness.

01:21He was hallucinating when he woke up and he would look at himself and ask me, where am

01:25I?

01:26Where are my hands?

01:27Why am I like this?

01:28And he would cry.

01:29I could not make him stop.

01:30So I would cry with him.

01:32After the injury, he became like a baby again.

01:34He needed help with everything.

01:40Slowly but surely, Mahmoud is recovering here in Qatar, along with more than 2,000 other

01:46evacuees from Gaza.

01:48Most of them are women and children.

01:50Many have serious injuries.

01:53Initially built to house football World Cup fans, this compound is now a microcosm of

01:58human suffering, caused by a war Israel says is justified to protect its people.

02:06Everyone here has a story of loss and tragedy.

02:10In November, Mahmoud, his wife, and two of their children were on their way to a market

02:15in Gaza when they were hit by an Israeli airstrike, he tells me.

02:20This video, he says, shows the aftermath of the attack.

02:23The boy being carried away is his youngest, Bahat.

02:27The woman lying in the background is his wife.

02:30Bahat lost his leg.

02:32His wife died in the hospital.

02:37She was everything.

02:45She was life.

02:51But thank God she left me the children.

02:53We were civilians walking down the street.

02:55All our lives, all we ever asked for from God was protection.

03:03His son is getting treatment.

03:05He misses his mother and his siblings, some of whom are still trapped in Gaza.

03:11Getting the family back together is all that Mahmoud can think about.

03:14But so far, all his attempts have failed.

03:21As for little Mahmoud, in one sense, he's the luckiest of the lucky.

03:25He was able to get out with his siblings and both of his parents.

03:29It's a big reason why, they say, he's having mostly good days.

03:34But the memories of his home, now a pile of rubble, are always with him.

03:41I'm used to being in my country, playing with my friends and playing with my cousins.

03:46What I loved the most was playing with my cousins.

03:49I loved them.

03:52We would ride bicycles together.

03:54We would play soccer together.

03:56We would go swimming.

03:57We were happy.

04:04We had fun.

04:08Mahmoud wants nothing more than to be able to return home one day.

04:12But the Gaza of his childhood no longer exists.

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