From limb loss to rehabilitation: Inside Al-Bait village where Gaza’s child amputees learn to live again
Hassan Herzallah reports in The New Arab on 1 October 2026:
Upon arriving at Al-Bait, the first village in Deir al Balah in central Gaza, providing education, healthcare and rehabilitation to orphaned children and children who have lost limbs, I expected to see children whose lives had been shattered by the devastation caused by Israel’s ongoing genocidal war.
Instead, what stood out was the effort being made to give the children back something they had lost even before their limbs: the feeling of simply being children. That sense of normality showed up in the ordinary things around the village: children sitting together for meals, drawings covering the walls, and teachers welcoming them as they arrived for the day, making the place feel less like a centre for children affected by the war and more like a new home.
This feeling of home is reflected in the name Al-Bait, which translates to ‘the house’ in English, and the idea for such a place came from an experience Abdulkarim Abu Daher, the founder, had several months before the village opened.
In July 2025, while Gaza was experiencing one of the most difficult stages of the war and famine, Abdulkarim left his home looking for food for his starving family. Markets were empty and, after losing hope of finding anything, he headed towards an aid distribution point, hoping to find something among those returning from there.
On that journey, Abdulkarim saw scenes that would later lead him to create Al-Bait Village. While the sounds of bombing filled the area, he saw a mother trying to protect her child amid the fear and chaos and heard her saying, “I lost your father. Who do I have left if you leave me too?” On his way back, he also saw two children who had lost limbs waiting for one of their relatives to return from an aid distribution point.