In a tiny playground in the suburbs of Padua, northern Italy, Zeina is being pushed on a swing.
a typical scene in any part of the globe.
Zeina, however, is two years old, and her head is immobile. Additionally, there are severe, still-angry scars on the right side of her face, neck, and scalp.
But for now, she’s nourished and safe. She also gets a sense of flight.
Zeina is among the five thousand individuals who have been granted permission to depart from Gaza in order to receive specialized medical care overseas since the conflict erupted following the Hamas assaults in southern Israel on October 7.
Over 22,000 Gazans, according to the World Health Organization, have had life-altering injuries as a result of the fighting; but, since the Rafah border crossing with Egypt was closed in May, relatively few of them have been permitted to escape the strip.
The family had already made two escapes from their Khan Younis home: once to Rafah and again to the vast al-Mawasi “humanitarian zone,” where they believed they would be safe.
Shaimaa remembers that Zeina and her sister Lana, who is four years old, were playing together, cuddling, and saying to each other, “I love you, I love you,” when there was a loud explosion nearby.
Frightened, Zeina raced and clutched at her mother, who had a pot of boiling soup that spilled all over her daughter.
