Children in Gaza experience ‘trauma beyond their endurance’

Parents say they are at a loss in dealing with the trauma of their children who should be playing, not grieving.

Gaza City, Gaza – Toqa al-Dalo cries relentlessly in a state of shock after hearing about the death of her best friend in Israel’s first air attack on the Gaza Strip on Tuesday.

As the 10-year-old got ready for school that morning, she saw her parents crying quietly. They had received word that Mayar Ezz El-Din, 10, was killed in the bombing of her home in the central Gaza Strip, along with her brother Ali, 7, and father Tariq Ezz El-Din.

“I can hardly believe what happened,” a weeping Toqa told Al Jazeera as she hugged a gift Mayar recently gave her after she broke her hand in an accident. “She was very kind and supported me during my injury. What was her fault and what was her little brother’s fault? Why did they kill her?”

Toqa recalled how they visited each other’s homes and were constantly messaging one other.

“I have known Mayar since we were in the first year of kindergarten, and we continued our friendship as classmates at school. She was my best friend. We were always in touch.”

Israel continued its air attacks on Gaza on Friday with the Palestinian death toll now at 31, including six children and four women. More than 100 people have been wounded as the attacks entered a fourth day. Rockets were also launched from Gaza into Israel.

Toqa al-Dalo reacts after discussing the killing of her best friend

Alaa and Mohammad al-Dalo, Toqa’s parents, tried to calm her down despite their own pain.

“It’s very difficult to see your child go through such a severe state of grief at this early age, when the child is supposed to be playing with friends, and not receiving the news of their horrible killing with their families while they are asleep,” Alaa told Al Jazeera.

“Our children in Gaza are growing up prematurely and are exposed to great traumas that are beyond their age and endurance.

“We parents are confused about how to deal with them,” she added, while wiping her daughter’s tears.

Toqa’s parents are concerned about her intense grief, but mostly fear her return to school where she won’t find Mayar by her side.

“This will greatly worsen her psyche,” said Mohammad.

“Toqa used to spend most of her time at school with Mayar and her brother Ali, who she used to play and chat with constantly because of his kindness and fun. Now there it became a heavy return to school on her heart,” he added.

Alaa al-Dalo, Toqa’s mum, tries to comfort her

Five-year-old Hajar al-Bahtini was killed along with her father Khalil Al-Bahtini, 45, and mother, Laila, 43, in an Israeli bombing, also on Tuesday, of their home in the Tofah neighbourhood east of Gaza City.

“We were sleeping safely. Suddenly we woke up to destruction, the sound of bombing and dust. I could not move because a wall had fallen on my feet,” said Hajar’s 14-year-old sister, Sara al-Bahtini, after she was discharged from hospital with a splint on her broken foot.

“My brothers were screaming near my parents’ room, which was burning,” she told Al Jazeera.

“When they put me in the ambulance, I saw my brothers screaming and crying. I was trying to deny the idea that it was possible that my parents had been killed, but I was shocked when I learned that Hajar was also killed with them.”

Sara said she sometimes “envies” Hajar because she is with her parents, and will not cry for their separation again.

“Hajar was the fruit of the house. Everyone loved her for her intelligence and wit, and because she was the youngest. What was her fault that she was murdered while she was sleeping?

“I feel like I’m living a catastrophe and an endless nightmare. I lost my mother, father and younger sister in a matter of moments. How will I and my six siblings continue life?” she added, bursting into tears.

Mohammad Daoud, 41, is in a state of shock, still reeling from the death of his four-year-old son, Tamim, who suffered from a heart ailment.

“Tamim woke up terrified because of the heavy shelling. He came running to his mother’s lap crying and trembling with fear,” said the father of two, recalling the attack.

“For a moment I didn’t realise that Tamim’s heart couldn’t stand it. I tried to calm him down, but his heart was beating so hard, as if it was going to fall out of place.”

He rushed Tamim to the children’s hospital for cardiopulmonary resuscitation, but the doctors said the child’s condition had already deteriorated.

“Tamim stayed for hours in intensive care until he passed away late in the day,” Daoud said.

“He’s my only son with a cute smile. Very smart and active. It’s too much for us. It is true that my son was suffering from a chronic heart disease, but the terrifying Israeli strikes on the Strip are beyond bearable,” he said.

“Why should our children endure all this? A normal person trembles in fear of the severity of the bombing, so how about children and the sick?”

The United Nations children’s agency condemned the continuing attacks by Israel, noting six kids had been killed so far.

“This is not acceptable. All children must be protected, everywhere, from all forms of violence and grave violations, according to international humanitarian law,” UNICEF said in a statement.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA

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Astronomers identify largest cosmic explosion ever observed

The explosion – AT2021lwx – is a fireball 100 times the size of our Solar System and 10 times brighter than a supernova.

Astronomers have identified the largest cosmic explosion ever observed, a fireball 100 times the size of our Solar System that suddenly began blazing in the distant universe more than three years ago.

While the astronomers offered on Friday what they think is the most likely explanation for the explosion, they emphasised that more research was needed to understand the puzzling phenomenon.

The explosion, known as AT2021lwx, has currently lasted more than three years, compared with most supernovae which are only visibly bright for a few months, according to a study published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

Led by the University of Southampton, the astronomers believe the explosion is a result of a vast cloud of gas, possibly thousands of times larger than our sun, that has been violently disrupted by a supermassive black hole.

According to the study, the explosion took place nearly 8 billion light years away, when the universe was about 6 billion years old and is still being detected by a network of telescopes.

Such events are very rare and nothing on this scale has been witnessed before, the researchers say.

Last year, astronomers witnessed the brightest explosion on record – a gamma-ray burst known as GRB 221009A, which was nicknamed BOAT – for Brightest Of All Time.

Although BOAT was brighter than AT2021lwx, it lasted for just a fraction of the time, meaning the overall energy released by the AT2021lwx explosion was far greater.

AT2021lwx has earned the nickname “Scary Barbie” from researchers owing to its “terrifying energy”.

According to Danny Milisavljevic, assistant professor of Physics and Astronomy at Purdue University, AT2021lwx was first assigned a random alphanumeric name when discovered: ZTF20abrbeie. The “Scary Barbie” nickname came from its alphanumeric designation “abrbeie” and “scary” because of its power.

AT2021lwx was first detected in 2020 by the Zwicky Transient Facility in California and subsequently picked up by the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) based in Hawaii.

But until now the scale of the explosion had been unknown.

Philip Wiseman, research fellow at the University of Southampton, who led the research, said: “Most supernovae and tidal disruption events only last for a couple of months before fading away. For something to be bright for two plus years was immediately very unusual.”

It was only when astronomers, including Wiseman, looked at it through more powerful telescopes that they realised what they had on their hands. By analysing different wavelengths of light, they worked out that the explosion was roughly 8 billion light years away. That is much farther than most other new flashes of light in the sky, which means the explosion behind it must be far greater.

It is estimated to be about 2 trillion times brighter than the Sun, Wiseman said.

Astronomers have looked into several possible explanations. One is that AT2021lwx is an exploding star – but the flash is 10 times brighter than any previously seen “supernova”.

Another possibility is what is called a tidal disruption event, when a star is torn apart as it is sucked into a supermassive black hole. But AT2021lwx is still three times brighter than those events and Wiseman said their research did not point in this direction.

The only somewhat comparable bright cosmic event is a quasar, which happens when supermassive black holes swallow huge amounts of gas in the centre of galaxies. But they tend to flicker in brightness, Wiseman said, whereas AT2021lwx suddenly started flaring up from nothing three years ago and it is still blazing away.

“This thing we have never, ever seen before – it just came out of nowhere,” Wiseman said.

Now that astronomers know what to look for, they are searching the skies to see if other similar explosions have been missed.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES

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Russia denies Ukraine push in Bakhmut, UK to send cruise missiles

The UK announced it will provide Storm Shadow long-range cruise missiles to Ukraine for its defence against Russia’s invasion.

Russia has denied that Ukrainian forces have made a breakthrough in the bloody battle for the city of Bakhmut while the United Kingdom has become the first country to supply Ukraine with long-range cruise missiles.

Ukraine has for months requested long-range missiles from its Western allies but has only received shorter-range weapons as supporters feared more advanced weapons would be used to strike targets inside Russian territory and further escalate the conflict.

UK Defence Minister Ben Wallace said on Thursday that Storm Shadow cruise missiles – which have a range of more than 250km (150 miles) compared with the US-provided HIMARS range of some 80km (50 miles) – will be sent to Ukraine.

“We will simply not stand by as Russia kills civilians,” Wallace told members of parliament when announcing that Storm Shadow missiles are being provided to Kyiv.

Wallace said the cruise missiles are being sent for use within Ukrainian territory, implying he had received assurances from Kyiv that they will not be used to hit targets inside Russia.

The Kremlin previously said that the UK’s provision of such missiles would require ”an adequate response from our military”.

Russia’s Defence Ministry on Thursday was forced to deny reports that Ukrainian troops had made advances in the months-long fight for Bakhmut.

“The individual declarations on Telegram about a ‘breakthrough’ on several points on the front line do not correspond to reality,” the ministry said in a statement.

Pro-Moscow military bloggers have suggested that Ukraine’s long-awaited counteroffensive has quietly started while the head of the Wagner Group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, said this week that Russian troops had withdrawn from some areas of Bakhmut and that Ukrainian forces had advanced north and south of the city in what he also said was the start of the offensive.

In a video released on the Telegram messaging app on Tuesday, Prigozhin said Russian troops were fleeing positions in Bakhmut because of the “stupidity” of their commanders.

“Today, everything is being done so that the front line crumbles,” he said

Russia’s Defence Ministry said in the statement that Moscow’s forces had repulsed several Ukrainian attacks in the course of the day, adding that the ongoing battle occurred near Malynivka in the eastern Donetsk region and involved both air power and artillery. Russian forces were “continuing to liberate the western parts” of Bakhmut city, it added.

The Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, said the reactions of Prigozhin and Russia’s Defence Ministry to Ukraine’s movements in Bakhmut “reflect increased panic in the Russian information space” about the long-awaited Ukrainian counteroffensive.

“The deployment of low-quality Russian forces on the flanks around Bakhmut suggests that the Russian MoD [Ministry of Defence] has largely abandoned the aim of encircling a significant number of Ukrainian forces there,” the think tank said.

Amid speculation that Ukraine’s counteroffensive may have already started, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was reported as saying that Ukraine needed more time before beginning the operation against Russia.

“Mentally we’re ready…” Zelenskyy told the BBC. “In terms of equipment, not everything has arrived yet,” he said.

“With [what we have] we can go forward and be successful. But we’d lose a lot of people. I think that’s unacceptable. So we need to wait. We still need a bit more time,” he was quoted as saying on Thursday.

Patrick Bury, a senior lecturer in security at the University of Bath in the UK, said he was not surprised by Zelenskyy’s comments.

“If you are Zelenskyy, you are doing everything you can to make sure you get everything you need” before launching the offensive, he said.

“On the other hand, I would not be surprised at all if it started in the next couple of weeks, depending on the mud. … As of last week it was still one of the wettest springs they’ve had over there in years … It’s just not favourable,” Bury said.

Ukrainian military analyst Oleksandr Musiyenko said Kyiv’s allies needed to understand that a counteroffensive “may not result in the complete eviction of Russian troops and the definitive defeat of Russia in all occupied areas”.

“We have to be ready for the war to continue into next year – or it could end this year,” Musiyenko told Ukrainian NV Radio.

“It all depends on how the battles develop. We can’t guarantee how the counteroffensive will develop.”

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES

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