A small swimming pool in Khan Younis has become an unlikely rehabilitation space for children in Gaza who have lost limbs during the conflict.
A programme organised by Heal Palestine together with veteran swimming instructor Amjed Tantish and his swimming academy is teaching amputee and orphaned children to swim, giving them an opportunity to move without the same fear of falling, physical restrictions or environmental barriers they face on land.
Around 90 amputee and orphaned boys and girls are currently participating in the classes, which began in late July and are being held twice each week. Organisers hope to continue the programme through October and potentially beyond, subject to funding and the ability to maintain and heat the pool during winter.
For the P&O and rehabilitation community, the programme is a powerful reminder that rehabilitation after childhood amputation extends far beyond providing a prosthesis.
Ahmed discovers movement without fear
Among the children taking part is 14-year-old Ahmed al Masri, who lost his right leg in July 2025 while searching for food for his family. His injuries initially resulted in a below-knee amputation, but further surgery later required an amputation higher up the limb.
After several operations, Ahmed spent around five months using a wheelchair.
Swimming has now given him a form of movement very different from what he experiences on land. In the water, his body is supported by buoyancy, reducing the consequences of imbalance and allowing him to explore movement without constantly worrying about falling.
That can be particularly important for a young person adapting to major limb loss.
Before a child becomes a confident prosthetic user, rehabilitation may involve strengthening, balance training, transfers, residual-limb management and learning an entirely new way of moving.
Water can create another environment in which those skills, confidence and independence can begin to develop.
Saleh finds confidence in the pool
Another participant, 14-year-old Saleh al Satari, lost his left leg after being injured in an airstrike in July 2024. He is currently living displaced in Al-Mawasi in southern Gaza.
Saleh initially approached swimming with fear, but has described feeling stronger and more energetic as he learns.
For him, one of the biggest differences is the reduced fear of falling.
That psychological element matters.
An amputation changes far more than the mechanics of walking. Children may become anxious about falling, reluctant to participate in activities or fearful of moving independently, particularly after months of trauma, hospitalisation and displacement.
Aquatic activity gives them an environment where they can experiment with movement while being supported by the water.
Rehabilitation is about more than walking
The swimming project also challenges a common tendency to define amputee rehabilitation almost entirely around walking with a prosthesis.
For a child, successful rehabilitation should also mean returning to play, sport, school, social activity and childhood itself.
Heal Palestine says the initiative is intended to provide physical and psychological relief for children who have experienced extraordinary levels of trauma.
That makes swimming both a rehabilitation activity and a recreational one.
It provides exercise, but also social interaction, achievement and enjoyment.
The distinction is particularly important in paediatric prosthetics.
A technically successful prosthesis is valuable, but the wider objective is enabling a child to participate in life.
Gaza faces an unprecedented paediatric rehabilitation challenge
The programme is operating against an enormous backdrop of rehabilitation need.
The World Health Organization estimated in 2025 that around 42,000 people in Gaza had sustained life-changing injuries, with approximately one quarter of those injuries occurring in children. WHO also reported that more than 5,000 people had undergone amputations.
By 2026, WHO reported that approximately 2,300 people with amputated limbs had been assessed between September 2024 and May 2026, yet only around 500 had received permanent prostheses.
That gap illustrates the scale of the challenge confronting Gaza’s P&O community.
The issue is not simply procuring prosthetic components.
Each patient requires assessment, wound healing, residual-limb preparation, socket fabrication, fitting, alignment, gait training and continued follow-up. Children additionally require repeated replacement devices as they grow.
WHO has previously reported that Gaza had only eight prosthetists available to manufacture and fit artificial limbs, demonstrating how severe the workforce constraint has become.
Children require lifelong prosthetic care
For a child who loses a limb at eight, ten or fourteen years of age, the first prosthesis is only the beginning.
As the child grows, socket dimensions change. Components need replacing. Alignment requirements evolve, and activity levels can increase dramatically as confidence returns.
Paediatric amputees may therefore require numerous prostheses before reaching adulthood.
This makes the current situation in Gaza especially concerning.
International organisations can provide components and short-term clinical support, but sustainable care requires local prosthetists, orthotists, physiotherapists, rehabilitation physicians and workshops capable of following children over many years.
The rehabilitation need created today will remain long after the immediate conflict has ended.
Adapted sport can become part of that pathway
Swimming is particularly suitable for people with limb loss because buoyancy reduces weight-bearing and allows movement patterns that may be more difficult on land.
But the wider lesson extends to many activities.
Football, wheelchair sports, cycling, athletics and adapted recreation can all help children rediscover what their bodies are capable of doing.
One of the instructors involved in the Gaza programme is himself an amputee, providing the children with something particularly valuable: a visible example of an adult living actively with limb loss.
Peer support can be a powerful part of rehabilitation.
Children are not only being taught how to swim; they are seeing that disability does not automatically exclude them from sport.
Resources remain extremely limited
The programme itself operates under difficult conditions.
The pool is located at a house rented by Heal Palestine and had to be restored before lessons could begin. Organisers say transport shortages and high fuel costs have so far made it difficult to bring children from northern Gaza to Khan Younis.
Equipment and pool-maintenance supplies are also difficult to obtain.
Despite those constraints, the swimming academy has assigned experienced instructors at a much lower participant-to-teacher ratio than would normally be used for children’s lessons.
The aim is to provide enough individual support for children who may be learning both to swim and to understand how their changed bodies behave in the water.
Giving children back part of childhood
For CPOs, the images of children swimming without prostheses are significant.
They are a reminder that a prosthesis is a tool for participation, not the definition of rehabilitation.
The ultimate objective is not simply to create a well-fitting socket or enable a technically correct gait pattern.
It is to help someone return to the activities that give their life meaning.
For Gaza’s youngest amputees, that may mean school, friends, football or simply being able to play.
For Ahmed and Saleh, right now it means swimming.
In an environment where children’s lives have become dominated by injury, displacement and uncertainty, a few hours in the water can offer something unusually simple: the chance to move, play and feel like children again.
- EL PAÍS – Ahmed and Saleh, two amputee children from Gaza, learn to swim
- Heal Palestine
- WHO – Gaza’s injured will need rehabilitation care for years
- WHO – Challenges of children amputees in Gaza
- UNICEF – State of Palestine
- International Society for Prosthetics and Orthotics
- IMEA CPO