The man putting a smile on children's faces in Gaza as war rages around them

Newsgathering by Humam Husari, words by Rachel Dixon and Khadija Kothia

Crowds of children clap, sing and play parachute games in a school playground in Gaza - a brief glimpse of normality, as war rages around them.

Some of the youngsters have been paralysed by airstrikes, three are in wheelchairs, another was left deaf by the explosions.

"This is the first time I've seen my son smile in weeks," a mother says as she thanks Ibraheem Abu Mustafa, a children's entertainer.

It is down to him and his team that the children are having fun again.

Mr Mustafa, who is originally a personal trainer, gives up most of his time to cheer-up thousands of children in Gaza who have been displaced since the Israeli airstrikes began.

Crowds of children play in the grounds of a UN school where they have been taking shelter. Credit: Handout

He and his family fled their home and now live in a former UN school, where around 4,000 people are taking shelter.

Mr Mustafa told ITV News: "For me as a volunteer, our mission is to entertain the children and put a smile on their faces among all this aggression implemented on us in Gaza."

He and three other volunteers, who work with German organisation Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit , bring streams of children out from their classroom shelters to play in the school playground.

There are around 1,200 youngsters - the number is "beyond his capacity" Mr Mustafa says.

One morning he noticed three children in wheelchairs, who were trying to take part in the dancing.

He said: "These three children were crying. I hadn’t seen them before and apparently the activity wasn’t suitable for them.

"I asked every child in the crowds to sit down just like those disabled children, and to do all the activities moving only their upper body parts.

"At the end of the session, a mother of one of these children in a wheelchair came to me and thanked me because this was the first time she had seen her son with a smile on his face for weeks."

With no aid or support, Mr Mustafa and the three other volunteers have to work hard to keep their sessions, and their voices, going.

While it is his mission to keep positive, he is among many men in the region struggling to keep his family safe during the ongoing conflict and supply blockade.

Children gather round a parachute, and colour in drawings. Credit: ITV News

He said: "My niece was injured while she was at a school because an airstrike shattered a widow and the glass hit her. 

"I have my wife, four children, elderly parents, my disabled grandmother and my sisters with me.

"Taking care of my old grandmother is the most difficult.

"She has Alzheimer's and the school's facilities are not prepared to meet her needs.

"If we have to evacuate again it will be very difficult to mobilise and move with her."

Schools in Gaza were once a place of learning and fun, now they are shelters, not because they are safe, but because people have no where else to go, Mr Mustafa tells ITV News.


An explosion near a school, which is now a UN shelter, in Khan Yunis, a city in the south of Gaza

Since the conflict began, more than 20 people were killed following explosions at three UN schools in Gaza, a relief agency has said. The IDF has not yet taken responsibility for the blasts.

Although these explosions were on schools in the north, Mr Mustafa has seen strikes near to where he is in the south-where Gazans were told to move to by the Israeli government.

He added: "No place in Gaza is safe, even the schools aren’t safe. So many strikes happen nearby all the time."


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