Ryad Al-Hams, 2, suffering from a spinal cord tumor, at Nasser Hospital in Gaza, November 4, 2025. He is awaiting medical evacuation. AHMAD ALBABA
Two small, nearly identical heads of dark hair pressed together, a gentle smile crinkling their large black eyes. The twin sisters, Rawan and Razan Barbakh, appear as children in the photograph Rawan chose for her Facebook profile. In reality, the teenager's entire page has become a memorial to her sister, who died in November 2024 at the age of 14. Razan, whose smile is more reserved in the photo, had leukemia, just like her surviving twin. In the Gaza Strip, devastated by Israel's ground offensive, doctors at Nasser Hospital in the south could do nothing for her.
"We suffered so much during the war. Both of them needed regular blood transfusions, and we had to find donors ourselves because the hospitals had no supplies," said their father, Arafat Barbakh, by phone – Israel still bars international press from entering Gaza. Originally from Rafah, he is now living in Al-Mawassi, on the southern coast, where hundreds of thousands of displaced people live in tents.
The 43-year-old man, his voice weary, took deep breaths as he told his story. The twins had been added to the evacuation list for urgent treatment abroad. But before they could leave, the Barbakh home was bombed, and Razan was severely wounded. Lacking the medical equipment needed to operate, doctors had no choice but to amputate both her legs.
