Children in Gaza are being provided with psychological support in response to the recent conflict. Sharek Youth Forum (SYF), a grassroots Palestinian group supported by Project Hope Foundation and the UN Population Fund, is offering food aid alongside child and play-led psychological first aid (PFA). The latter seeks to reduce the long-term prevalence of post-traumatic stress disorder following disaster or terrorism. In addition to talking therapy, SYF has staged volleyball tournaments, played traditional Palestinian games and organised football matches for children at shelters. Alongside off-the-shelf emergency plans, the group has devised a temporary classrooms programme – the Hiroshima-Gaza initiative – inspired by the productivity of the Japanese city’s post-war recovery following a nuclear bomb.
Since 22 October, Gaza has been the site of conflict between Israeli forces and Hamas, a political and military Sunni Muslim movement that controls part of the Gaza Strip. Children in Gaza during the latest phase of the conflict have witnessed their parents being taken away by Israeli forces and have been displaced multiple times. In such circumstances, children with insecure access to food, sanitation and hygiene are vulnerable to psychological harm. Overall, the conflict places every child in Gaza at risk of anxiety, depression, self-harm and PTSD.
Recent systematic reviews of papers on children and adolescents in the Middle East that predate the current conflict suggest that PTSD affects Palestinian children in Gaza at rates ranging from 23% to 70%. Research evidences that children who grow up in conflict zones experience lifelong impacts on their development, physical and mental health and social wellbeing. For Dr Audrey McMahon, psychiatrist for healthcare charity Médecins Sans Frontières, the needs of children affected by the current conflict are ‘gigantic’.’>{Ends}
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