Dear Yusef,

There are no words to describe the horrors we have been through these past few months. Last year, we sat around a dinner table as a family of four, making plans for the future. Now it’s just me and you – and our only hope is to survive tomorrow.

I often think back to our family picnic on the beach last summer. Your brother Ismail ran towards the sea and your mother chased after him, both laughing. I sat holding you in the shade and watched them – and I thought to myself: I must be the luckiest man in the world.

But in less than a year, everything has changed.

One day, three months into the war, I went looking for bread. Your brother Ismail had wanted to come too but your mother was sick so I asked him to stay with her. You started to cry and I took you from her arms, hoping to offer some respite. But we returned to find our entire building reduced to rubble after it was hit by an Israeli missile.

You’re too young for any of this, Yusef. At night, you ask me to sing the lullabies your mother sang to put you and Ismail to sleep. But I don’t know all the words. I make up my own funny lines and you giggle.

I’ve always been good at being the funny guy, but you need a father, not a clown. I wonder how long it might take for you to forget your mother and her lullabies. You’ve started asking about her less and less – and don’t cry for her like you used to.

You don’t deserve this, Yusef; no child does.

You should be playing hide and seek with your brother. Instead, you’re crouched here in the dark next to me; hiding from Israeli missiles, seeking protection from the next airstrike.

Every night, I place my hand over your racing heart and am grateful that it is still beating. I thank Allah that you are still alive and pray you’re still here in the morning.

You’ve become used to the sound of explosions now, some nights you even sleep through them. But your tiny body, curled up next to mine, still flinches instinctively.

Every day when we wake, we find the trail of destruction that has been left behind after the bombs. We walk among the debris, your small hand in mine, as we search for food. This is no place for a child.

Amid the death and devastation we experience daily – you are a light that flickers in the darkness, a triumph over fear.

Yusef, if I should die before you, please know how loved you were. I hope you grow up knowing your place in this world. I hope your hands get to pluck olives from the trees. I hope we both get to return to the beach and watch the sunset by the sea.

My son, I want you to know that your very existence is an act of resistance, of freedom and of hope.

It’s not something I can think about right now but I do know this: I will do everything in my power to ensure we survive this war. We will rise from these ashes and continue to exist.

I will teach you how to play football and how to swim. I will learn to cook your mother’s recipes and memorise her lullabies. I will be the best father I can be.

When this war is over, we will pick up all the broken pieces and find a way to make us whole again. That is my promise.

Your father,

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/ng-interactive/2024/jun/16/fathers-day-letters-from-frontline-to-children-gaza-ukraine-afghanistan-sudan

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blame Hama's for all tribulations and calamities befall u guyz! they Started it all! those Israelis been killed in Oct 7 were some family members nah!

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