Rafif Aslim

Gaza – Israeli forces arrested the young man Osama Abu Nasar and his son, who is one year and eleven months old. They returned the child after twelve hours with marks of physical torture on his body, including burns and perforations (inserting a metal object through one foot and out the other). The incident has caused physical and psychological pain from which the child continues to suffer, despite his young age.

The child's mother, Waad Al-Shafi'i, said that on March 19, 2026, at exactly 10:00 a.m., her husband told her he would take baby Jawad on a short walk and return immediately as usual. But instead of continuing toward the market center, he mistakenly turned toward the "Yellow Line" – which is only about 300 meters (not kilometers; the original says "300 kilometers" but likely a typo) from their home.

Waad Al-Shafi'i did not hide that her husband had been suffering from severe psychological disorders due to the war and the difficult circumstances he had been through. When he headed toward the Yellow Line, he was not in full consciousness – proof being that he approached the soldier as if looking toward a friend, carrying his child on his shoulders. She did not see this scene with her own eyes, but residents of the area who live in high-rise buildings described it to her when her husband and son were gone too long and she went out searching for them.

She added: "When my husband approached the Yellow Line, gunfire surrounded him from all directions. Then a drone came and told him via loudspeaker to put the child aside and raise his hands. When he complied, two soldiers came and led him toward the army barracks, while another soldier carried the child to the same place." She noted that while hearing this account, it never crossed her mind that Israeli forces could torture an infant in such a horrifying way.

After about 12 hours, the Red Cross contacted the family to receive the infant from the "Al-Maghazi" market in the southern part of the Strip. They went there, and the mother found her child wrapped in aluminum foil. At that moment, she thought her son had died, so she began crying without thinking of lifting that cover, as she put it. But an employee of the international institution urged her to lift it, saying the child was fine – what he had was just exhaustion that would go away after a few days. She gathered her courage and lifted the cover.

The shock came when she returned home and began examining the child. She said: "I cannot forget the scene – Jawad's pants soaked in blood, his terrifying breathing that indicated what he had suffered from torture over the past hours, and those deep perforations in his small feet." She described how she went crazy at that moment and refused to sit idly by. She immediately took him to the nearest hospital to find out what had happened to him. The forensic report confirmed the mother's suspicions.

She explained that she found marks that were not from shrapnel or a bullet wound that had accidentally hit him during the incident with his father. Rather, they were clear signs of cigarette burns on the infant's body, and another sign of physical torture through inserting a metal instrument with an entry and exit point – not to mention the other blue bruises covering his body, telling of the severe beating he endured with his tears.

    

Moments of anxiety and fear

Waad Al-Shafi'i cannot describe the moments of anxiety and fear she spent while waiting for her son Jawad's return – especially since he is her only child, born after two years of trying and seeing doctors. She worried about him twice as much as other mothers. In those moments, only one thing crossed her mind: that she would never see him again. She added that the situation was made even more complicated because the child disappeared during the holiday break. Whenever she tried to contact an official body, they told her to wait until the holiday was over. So his holiday clothes remained waiting for him.

According to his mother, Jawad today suffers from a very poor psychological state. He wakes up from nightmares and cannot sleep for consecutive hours; he wakes up looking for his mother. Since he was handed over to her by the Red Cross, he was asleep and woke up to find his mother holding him. Since that moment, he refuses to leave her embrace and will not go with anyone outside the home. He constantly repeats: "I'm afraid they will hit me." His mother never lets him out of her sight.

At the conclusion of her speech, Waad Al-Shafi'i said: "Jawad, before the tragic incident, was naturally sociable, playful with everyone, speaking in broken syllables and bringing joy to adult conversations. Today, he is afraid of anyone who approaches him and sees them as a threat. He has turned gatherings into a monster in his eyes." She added that the child needs psychological rehabilitation, as she fears that what happened will affect his future life, especially given his intense attachment to her.