The stress of life in Gaza has taken most of this little girl's hair

WARNING: This story contains discussion of suicidal ideation

For months now, eight-year-old Sama Tabeel wakes up every morning in a tent camp in the southern Gaza Strip, picks up a broken piece of mirror, and looks at herself, praying that her hair has miraculously grown back.  

Sama, who lives in a tent camp for displaced Palestinians west of Khan Younis, wears a pink bandana to cover her mostly bald head, after losing most of her hair suddenly, back in June. 

"I wish I could put a hair-tie on my hair again and I wish I could go back to holding a brush and brushing my hair again," she said.

"I miss brushing my hair so much."

Her family — a brother, sister and parents — are among tens of thousands of people displaced in the area. On May 6, they were in the southern Gaza city of Rafah when Israeli forces entered, taking control of the crossing into Egypt.

The children were sleep when Israeli soldiers barged into the home, Sama said. 

Her mother, Fattah Tabeel, says the family fled to a nearby hospital, but roughly 30 minutes after they arrived, its upper floor was hit by an Israeli airstrike.

"My daughter got so scared, she was panicking. The shrapnel and the strikes were very intense," Fattah said. 

Doctors said Sama's hair loss was likely due to extreme fear, which caused her to go into a nervous shock, according to Fattah. She says her daughter remains scared, in particular because of the instability and lack of safety from being in a war zone and from constantly hearing ambulance sirens and nearby shellings.

"How can her hair grow back under these circumstances?"

Experts say it's just one of many symptoms of psychological distress and trauma that hundreds of thousands of children in Gaza are experiencing as a result of the ongoing Israeli bombardment on the besieged enclave.

Dr. Abdul Basith, a Toronto-area emergency physician, says hair loss is one of the many ways the stress and trauma of a war can physically manifest.

"The children of Gaza have experienced an unprecedented level of trauma," Basith said.