I Was a Starving Child in Yugoslavia. Now I See Myself in Gaza’s Children

ByNina

When I was four years old, I almost died of starvation in former Yugoslavia.

I remember what it feels like. And I don’t mean that as an idea, but as a physical, very real truth. Hunger wasn’t just a word for me. It was pain and suffering, waiting and not knowing if I’d survive, and the fading light in my mother’s eyes as she tried to hide her fear.

Today, I look at the children in Gaza and other parts of the world in conflict, and I see myself.

A Child Should Never Know Hunger Like That

I was one of the lucky ones. Aid made it through. Strangers who I will never get to know helped me, and they saved my life.

But right now, in Gaza, over half a million people are on the brink of famine. Tens of thousands of children are malnourished. Some are dying.

Not because we don’t know how to save them or don’t have the resources, but because they are being blocked from food and care.

Mothers in Gaza are making impossible choices no mother should ever be faced with…

Who eats?
Who waits?

The Numbers Are Telling

  • 1 in 3 children under two in northern Gaza are acutely malnourished
  • Over 70,000 children could suffer acute malnutrition this year
  • Children are already dying of starvation

But statistics don’t cry out.
Children do.

Their bellies swell. Their skin changes color. Their voices weaken.

These aren’t just numbers on a screen. They are real human beings with names, faces, and futures. And if we don’t act, many of them won’t have a future at all.

Why I’m Speaking Now

Because I survived, and because many don’t.
Because silence is complicity.

When you’ve once been the child who almost didn’t make it, you never forget. You also don’t have the right to look away when others are suffering the same fate.

What’s happening in Gaza is not just a humanitarian crisis.
It’s a moral one.

Here’s How You Can Help

  1. Donate to frontline organizations:
    UNICEF, World Central Kitchen, Save the Children, World Food Programme
  2. Contact your representatives. Demand full humanitarian access. Food must never be used as a weapon.
  3. Share this story. Or your own. Stories remind people that these are lives—not just headlines.

To the Children of Gaza

I don’t know your names.
But I know your pain.
I once lived inside it.
And I survived—because someone, somewhere, cared enough to act.

Now it’s my turn to do the same.

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