Jerusalem -In a dusty tent on the southern edge of Khan Younis, 24-year-old Malak Brees rests her hand on her swollen belly. Seven months pregnant, she speaks softly, weighed down by fear.
“I’m scared my baby won’t survive,” she says. “The doctors told me I’ve lost a lot of amniotic fluid because of malnutrition. They said it’s in God’s hands now.”
Across Gaza, women like Malak are carrying new life under the weight of war. What should be a time of joy has become a daily struggle for survival.
Hospitals are barely functioning. Food and medicine are scarce. Electricity cuts are routine. And every airstrike brings new chaos.
Since Israel tightened its siege on 2 March, saying it aimed to pressure Hamas, the humanitarian crisis has worsened. The United Nations warns that one in ten newborns is underweight or premature. Miscarriages, stillbirths and birth defects are rising.
At the Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, Dr Ahmad al-Farra sees it every day.
“These women know they’ve had no proper check-ups,” he says. “They haven’t eaten enough. They expect their babies to be born weak or ill. And after the birth, they don’t know how they’ll feed them.”
‘Nothing left to give’
Breastfeeding is difficult when mothers themselves are starving. Formula is expensive or impossible to find. Clean water, essential for mixing it, is often unavailable.
Aya al-Skafi, sheltering in Gaza City, holds photos of her daughter, Jenan. The baby was born healthy in February. But as food ran out, Aya’s milk dried up.
“There was no flour, no fruit, no clean water,” she recalls. “Jenan got sicker and sicker. I begged for help. Only God heard me.”
Jenan died last month, aged just four months.
The story is tragically common. Sandra Killen, an American nurse and lactation specialist, has spent months working in Gaza and training medics remotely from her home in the US.
“There are babies being born every day who should be in intensive care,” she says. “But there’s no space. They’re sent home within hours even the premature ones.”
At Nasser, the neo-natal unit is full. It’s one of the few still running after Israel struck the nearby European Hospital in mid-May. The military claimed Hamas leaders were hiding underneath. The group denies it.
Bombs, births and displacement
In the shelters, women give birth in tents or on makeshift beds. Some don’t make it to a hospital at all.
“One mother gave birth alone with her husband under fire,” Killen says. “She tried to breastfeed for five days. By the time she got to hospital, it was too late.”
Another woman survived a tank shell that hit her home but suffered shrapnel wounds to her chest, severing her milk duct. A third was helped by Killen to breastfeed her premature baby only to lose her husband in a strike days later. Then came an evacuation order. She fainted from shock and couldn’t feed for three days.
“There’s desperation, hopelessness. Even suicidal thoughts,” Killen says. “It’s overwhelming.”
According to UN estimates, around 55,000 women in Gaza are currently pregnant. Most are not getting basic prenatal care.
“Childbirth used to be a family celebration,” says Killen. “Now it’s a question of whether mother and baby will make it.”
A short-lived joy
Jomana Arafa, a pharmacist from Deir al-Balah, had high hopes for her twins, Asser and Aysal. She gave birth via Caesarean section and sent a voice note to Killen in English: “Thank God, we are healthy.”
Three days later, her shelter was hit by an Israeli missile. She, her babies and her mother were killed. Her husband received the news while registering the twins’ birth certificates.
At the time, the Israeli military said it had no knowledge of the incident but insisted it targets only military sites and seeks to avoid civilian harm.
For Killen, the news was unbearable.
“Devastating beyond words,” she says. “I still cry when I think of her.”
Lives in the balance
Children make up half of Gaza’s population of 2.1 million. Now, the newest of them are being born into hunger, displacement and danger.
Aid groups and medics continue to call for a ceasefire and the free flow of humanitarian supplies. But for the mothers still waiting to give birth, and the ones cradling babies already here, time is running out.
“These are babies,” says Killen. “They deserve a chance. They deserve more than this.”
