The paintings of little Saddan El-Safade, 9 years old, speak for themselves. There, a black background full of points of light like explosions in the night. Here, the sea and vivid touches of gouache on a strip of land. Here again, a Palestinian flag with a bloody red triangle and whose white stripe has disappeared. “These are my memories of Gaza”He blurted out in a neutral tone.
Saddan, his mother, Israa, his little brother, Ahmad, and his sister, Watin, now live in a housing estate. It emerged from the earth in the middle of the desert, about thirty kilometers east of Cairo. The small family arrived in the Egyptian capital in February, after several months of survival in the Palestinian enclave, devastated by Israeli fire.
Saddan is a miracle. On November 4, 2023, a bombing blew up his house in Chadjaya district. The girl, who played cards in the living room, is buried under the walls. “Stone by stone we took it out of the rubble”says his mother, Israa El-Safade, whose handkerchief caught fire when it came into contact with the incandescent ashes.
Surviving, a “constant challenge”
The boy’s skull is open, one of his legs hangs in the air, at a right angle. His whole body is broken. At Al-Shifa Hospital, she is summarily sutured before being transferred a few streets away to the Patient’s Friends Medical Center, where a young intern cares for her. “Are we cutting back or not? » The question still haunts Israel. The mother immediately rejects her daughter’s amputation. He manages to take her 25 kilometers away, to Deir Al-Balah, to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, where the girl is finally saved and her leg is preserved thanks to interventions performed without painkillers.
Months later, sitting in a cafe in Cairo, the little girl, 9 years old, speaks easily about these traumatic episodes. In front of his devastated mother, Saddan speaks in a clear voice, as if he were recounting an ordinary day at school, while devouring a chocolate ice cream. In the hospitals of Gaza, she decided that she would become a world-renowned surgeon and would work in Gaza, “babysit. Because all countries must know that Gaza exists”he said, his look determined.
“Today my only concern is that my children study”Israel book. “But, without an Egyptian residence permit, it is impossible to register them in an establishment”he laments. Several days a week, Israa takes Saddan to language classes at a private institute, “So you don’t forget French and English. But it’s expensive! »laments the mother, alone with three children in her care.
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