As their first birthday approaches, the triplets Gaza-native Hanane Bayouk gave birth to in Jerusalem before the onslaught have seen their mother just once, and she fears she will “die without them”, AFP reports.
The 26-year-old had to return to the Palestinian territory alone after giving birth to Najoua, Nour and Najmeh on August 24, 2023, because her Israeli travel permit had expired.
Bayouk received a permit to exit Gaza and give birth in annexed east Jerusalem’s Al-Maqased hospital after seven years of painful IVF procedures.
She caught a glimpse of her children in their incubators, “barely an hour and a half”, before driving back to Gaza after her permit “expired and the hospital told me to leave”.
Bayouk was supposed to return in early October after her daughters had spent several weeks in incubators, which were in short supply in hospitals in Gaza even before the Israel-Hamas conflict erupted last October.