Gaza ministry records 54,468 children who have lost parents since 2023
Widows in central Gaza now rotate custody of orphaned siblings, facing severe financial strain while managing care without stable housing.
By Elijah Fitzgerald ·
Three siblings in Gaza pack their belongings and move between tents every two days. Mariam, 16, Aya, 14, and Jebril, 12, have followed this routine since losing their mother in late 2025. The Abu Asser family had already lost their father during the 2014 Israeli offensive. When their home in Gaza City was destroyed during the war that began in 2023, they sheltered with their mother, Islam, in a makeshift tent in Deir al-Balah.
An Israeli bomb hit the tent on the nineteenth day after the ceasefire took effect on 10 October 2025. The strike killed Islam in front of her children. Jebril was sitting in his mother's lap at the time and sustained injuries. Their aunt, Warda al-Muzeini, said the children have no stable home. They primarily stay with their paternal grandmother but rotate between their maternal aunts, spending two nights with each.
The Palestinian Ministry of Social Development in Gaza states that the siblings are part of a group of 54,468 children who have lost one or both parents since October 2023. The ministry reports at least 64,000 widows and 71,000 orphaned children across the territory. This count includes individuals bereaved in earlier Israeli military attacks on Gaza. The ministry's registration system also identifies approximately 3,000 children with no registered guardian, custodian, or caregiver.
Warda al-Muzeini lost her husband in an Israeli air strike. She now raises their four children alone without a job or reliable income. She says she struggles to provide even one meal a day. One of the aunts helping care for the Abu Asser children is also a widow. The sisters share the financial burden. One buys pyjamas, another buys slippers, and another provides pocket money for a couple of days.
Aziza al-Kahlout, a ministry spokesperson, said the figures do not capture the daily suffering involved. She stated that a child who loses both parents loses care and safety. Such children are also deprived of education and childhood, forcing them to carry responsibilities far beyond their years. Women who become their families' only breadwinners face the double burden of providing for children and raising them amid devastation.
Kahlout warned of deeply alarming signs of growing risks of child labour, school dropout, and early marriage in Gaza. She attributed these risks to poverty, displacement, and the loss of family breadwinners. She said orphaned children are especially exposed as economic and humanitarian conditions worsen and adequate shelter remains scarce.
Wafaa al-Attar, now 13, lost her entire family in a single air strike on 22 February 2024. She was 10 when she left her home in Deir al-Balah to charge her father's phone at her uncle's nearby house. A massive blast struck as she was about to go inside. The air strike hit the multi-storey building where her family was staying. It killed her father, Ahmed, her mother, Khouloud, and her four siblings: Rital, eight, Muhammed, five, Obada, three, and nine-month-old Yazan.
Attar suffered minor shrapnel injuries and was taken to hospital. She kept asking about her family until her uncle arrived and told her they had died. She fell silent for two or three hours. She later asked if all of them had died at once. She first stayed with her grandparents and later moved in with her uncle, his wife, and their newborn. Attar said she wished for months that she had been in the house when it was bombed. She noted that no one could ever replace her own family.
