💔 Stones and Stars – A Real Story from Palestine

• A Boy Named Yahya, Growing Up in Rubble

In the heart of Gaza, where life is wrapped in smoke and silence, lived a 12-year-old boy named Yahya. His home wasn’t made of bricks or cement. It was a fragile tent stitched together from old cloth, plastic sheets, and the fading hopes of a peaceful future.

Yahya didn’t know the comfort of a real bed, the sound of cartoons on a television, or the feeling of playing safely in a park. His days started with the search for clean water and ended with the distant sound of explosions. His nights were spent beside his younger brother Omar, under a roof that could barely keep out the rain—let alone protect them from bombs.

His father used to be a fisherman, but warships now guarded the sea. Their boat was destroyed in an airstrike. Since then, his father rarely spoke, sitting for hours by the shore, staring at the waves that once fed his family. The sea that once gave life now carried only memories and grief.

• No School, Only Dreams

Yahya and Omar no longer attended school. Their school was destroyed in a bombing. All that remained were broken desks and a cracked blackboard. Some days, a volunteer would gather the children to teach under a tree or inside a damaged tent. But more often, learning was replaced by surviving.

Even with no classroom, Yahya carried a small, torn notebook everywhere he went. It was his world. Inside it, he wrote poems about freedom, about his mother who died in an airstrike, and about stars—tiny lights that gave him hope even when the sky was filled with smoke.

• One poem read:

“They can destroy our walls, but not our words.

They can bury our homes, but not our hearts.

The stars above still shine—for me, and for Omar.”

• A Moment of Joy in the Dust

One afternoon, Omar found a flat football buried under rubble. It was dusty and old, but it brought joy. The brothers cleaned it and began kicking it between two bricks set as goalposts.

• For a short time, they were not war victims.

They weren’t poor.

They weren’t afraid.

They were just two boys laughing, chasing a ball in the dust.

Children from the neighborhood joined in. Their laughter echoed through broken streets, louder than the silence of fear.

• But joy in Gaza is often short-lived.

The Explosion That Changed Everything

That night, Yahya sat writing by candlelight. Omar was asleep beside him, the football tucked under his arm. Yahya wrote:

“We have no electricity, but we have stars.

No ceiling, but we have the sky.

I will name a star for every child who never came back.”

Moments later, the ground shook. A loud explosion shattered the night. Their tent collapsed. Smoke and screams filled the air.

• Yahya was pulled from the rubble, his forehead bleeding. His first words were:

“Where’s O”mar?

They found his brother under debris, still holding the football.

• A Boy and His Notebook

Today, Yahya still walks to the ruins of his school. He carries the same notebook—burned at the edges, filled with words. He reads his poems aloud to the wind, to the birds, and to the stars.

• When asked why, he says:

“Because the stars still listen. Because Omar still listens.”

This is Yahya’s story. But it's also the story of thousands of Palestinian children.

Children who dream not of toys, but of peace.

Who sleep not in beds, but on floors.

Who write poems instead of playing games.

They live without much—but they still have courage.

Their stones are real. So are their stars.

And as long as boys like Yahya still dream, Palestine still lives.