Three years after a junior surf lifesaving program in the Gaza Strip was indefinitely suspended by the outbreak of war, surviving participants have returned to the water, though the reunion on September 25, 2026, was shadowed by immense loss, The Guardian reported.
Hassan Al-Habeel, who oversees the Gaza Nippers program and trained at the North Steyne Royal Surf Lifesaving Club in Sydney over the 2019–20 summer, watched children in yellow and black rash vests return to the beach near the Al-Shati refugee camp. The children spent the day catching waves, dancing, and playing in the sand, but out of the 45 children originally involved in the program, 15 have been found alive. The rest remain missing, uncontactable, or have died during the conflict.
Losses Among the Nippers and the Fight to Regroup
The toll of the war hit the organizing committee and families directly. Among those who have died since October 7, 2023, are Maha Al Bura’e, Khalil Badra, Zuhair Al Bura’e, Hatem Awad, Mustafa Thrayya, Omar Mduokh, Safa’a Abu Saif, and Mohammed Mduokh. Al-Habeel’s own 15-year-old son, Ali, whom Al-Habeel had trained with the goal of becoming a lifeguard to teach children on the shores of Gaza, died in his father’s arms after the family was unable to access food and medicine due to ongoing blockades and bombings.
Shamikh Badra, the program’s co-founder living in Australia, worked alongside Al-Habeel to trace the surviving children through word-of-mouth from friends and family still inside Gaza. Many had fled south toward the Egyptian border, making confirmation difficult. Once 15 children were successfully contacted, the Northern Beaches Committee for Palestine raised funds to replace equipment like body boards and rash vests that had been lost, stolen, or destroyed during the fighting.
Navigating Stressed Realities Beyond the Shoreline
While the children gathered on the beach in September, other residents in Gaza sought out similarly ordinary prewar habits elsewhere in the enclave. In Deir Al Balah, adults turned to Gaza’s only functioning swimming pool, where owners could not afford to pay $1,000 to filter and treat the water, or $700 to refill it, The Christian Science Monitor reported. Swimmers described a distinct psychological weight, noting that routine words like “stressed” fail to capture the reality of living through prolonged military offensives and blockades.
Christine Stewart Gibbs, former president of the North Steyne Royal Surf Lifesaving Club and member of the Northern Beaches Committee for Palestine, described the return of the Nippers as a miracle amid bombed-out buildings and widespread shortages of food and healthcare. Organizers plan to run the Gaza Nippers program again next summer, emphasizing that these children require international support to live safely and without the pressure of occupation and siege.
