Sabreen Jouda entered the world just moments after her mother departed from it.
Late on Saturday night, their residence in Rafah, the southernmost city in Gaza, was struck by an Israeli airstrike. Prior to this tragic incident, the family, like many other Palestinians, sought refuge from the ongoing war.
Sabreen’s father, her 4-year-old sister, and her mother all lost their lives in the attack. However, emergency responders discovered that Sabreen’s mother, Sabreen al-Sakani, was 30 weeks pregnant. In a hurried operation at a Kuwaiti hospital, medical professionals performed an emergency caesarean section.
Sabreen herself was in critical condition, struggling to breathe. Medical workers placed her tiny body on a small piece of carpet, gently pumping air into her open mouth. A gloved hand tapped her chest.
Against all odds, she survived.
The following day, Sabreen lay in an incubator at a nearby Emirati hospital’s neonatal intensive care unit, whimpering and squirming. She wore a diaper that was too big for her, and her identity was written in pen on a piece of tape around her chest: “The martyr Sabreen al-Sakani’s baby.” Dr. Mohammad Salameh, the head of the unit, stated, “We can observe some improvement in her health condition, but the situation remains precarious. This child should have still been in her mother’s womb, but she was deprived of that right.” He described her as a premature orphan girl.
However, Sabreen is not alone.
“Welcome to her. She is the daughter of my dear son. I will take care of her. She is my love, my soul. She is a memory of her father. I will take care of her,” expressed Ahalam al-Kurdi, her paternal grandmother, while clutching her chest and grieving.
According to Gaza’s Health Ministry, at least two-thirds of the more than 34,000 Palestinians who have lost their lives in Gaza since the start of this war have been women and children.
In another Israeli airstrike in Rafah during the night, 17 children and two women from an extended family were killed.
Not everyone can immediately recover from such devastating attacks.
