As a group of smiling children in yellow and black rash vests bundled towards the beach near the Al-Shati refugee camp through concrete alleys lined with rubbish, rubble and the occasional bullet hole, Hassan Al-Habeel felt joy again.
The Palestinian man, in his 40s, oversaw the return of Gaza Nippers, Palestine’s chapter of the popular Australian junior surf life saving program, last month after three years.
The group of Gazan boys and girls spent the day catching waves, dancing and playing in the sand and sun, footage seen by Guardian Australia showed.
But the return of Gaza’s Nippers program was a moment tinged with sadness for Al-Habeel, who trained at North Steyne Royal Surf Lifesaving Club in Sydney’s northern beaches over the 2019-20 summer.
Of the 45 children involved in the original program, 15 have been found alive. The rest remain missing, uncontactable or have died as a result of the conflict.
One of them was Ali, Al-Habeel’s 15-year-old son. Unable to access food and medicine due to blockades and bombings, Ali died in his father’s arms before he was able to reach the closest hospital.
“I wanted to prepare [Ali] to be a lifeguard, so when he gets older, he would teach children how to swim on the shores of Gaza,” Al-Habeel said in the footage.
“But unfortunately, the war took Ali from us as it took many children in Gaza.
“And now I see children play without Ali, which is difficult for me, but what can we do? That’s the decree of God.”
No safe place for children
First devised on the shores of Sydney in 2017, the Gaza program was able to run its first summer season in mid-2023 after the pandemic set it back.
But by October, it was indefinitely suspended as Israel began its invasion into Gaza after Hamas militants attacked southern Israel, killing 1,200 people, mostly civilians.
Since then, Israel’s relentless military offensive has killed 73,000 Palestinians, mostly civilians, wounding many more and reducing swathes of Gaza to rubble.
During the conflict, Al-Habeel and others coordinating the program attempted to track down the children but some had fled south toward the Egyptian border, or couldn’t be reached.
Shamikh Badra, the program’s co-founder who lives in Australia, says he worked tirelessly with Al-Habeel and others still in Gaza to confirm whether the children were still alive.
Word of mouth from friends and family still in Gaza gave Badra clues as to their whereabouts – or worse.
“We waited to make sure, if we found some of them were killed, we would confirm,” Badra tells Guardian Australia. “I can’t confirm anything without evidence because it’s not easy to declare something like that.”
In the end, 15 were able to be contacted and were invited to again take to the waves.
The original program targeted particularly disadvantaged kids who had been injured or lost family members in previous conflicts, but Badra says making the selection in the midst of the current war was even harder.
“We said, ‘let’s invite some children who have difficult circumstances like [before],’” he says.
“Some of my friends told me all the children are suffering now, not like before … it’s no safe place.”
There were other logistical challenges. Many of the rash vests, flags and flotation devices donated to them by the North Steyne RSLC had been lost, stolen or destroyed. The Northern Beaches Committee for Palestine raised funds to send to Al-Habeel so he could buy body boards, gold and black rash vests and other equipment.
The final hurdle was safety. Badra says he and Al-Habeel spent months trying to find the right time to return without endangering the children. Even after the ceasefire was agreed to last October, intermittent bombings and increased tensions repeatedly forced the launch date back.
Eventually, 25 September 2026 was marked in the calendar. As exciting as the moment was, thousands of miles away, Badra waited nervously to hear news of its success.
“I was worried all this day. I was waiting, calling the team. I wanted to know, how are they? I wanted this day to be finished and people and children to return and come back to their home safe.”
A ‘ray of hope’ in Gaza
Christine Stewart Gibbs, the former North Steyne RSLC president and now a member of the Northern Beaches Committee for Palestine, says seeing the footage of happy children in Gaza was a “miracle”.
“Here in the middle of war-torn Gaza – with buildings bombed out and a lot of rubble, and difficulty moving around, and still a lack of food and lack of healthcare – for Hassan to pull together the program with his helpers and bring the kids together was fantastic,” she says.
“There’s no good news coming out of Gaza, and this felt like a ray of hope.”
The plan is for the Gaza Nippers program to return again next summer.
“To enjoy, to laugh, to swim … [is] something simple … but in Gaza, it’s so hard and difficult and dangerous,” Badra says.
“If we surrender to the sadness and we be negative, we can’t help the people in Gaza.
“This message is for the United Nations and all the world: these children need to live as all the children around the world. They need to live in peace. We should not leave them isolated under the pressure of occupation and siege and blockade.”
