For More Than a Year, Ashjan Abdel Aal Has Lived Suspended Between Grief

For more than a year, Ashjan Abdel Aal has lived suspended between grief and hope. Her sons Othman, now 17, and Sami, 13, vanished on June 29, 2025, after leaving their displaced family's home in Gaza City to reach an aid distribution point near the Netzarim Corridor. They promised their six-year-old sister Emarat sweets.

Their father, Rafaat, 41, was away at the time, seeking aid near Zikim in northern Gaza. When he returned, the boys were gone. He searched hospitals, shelters, and relatives' homes, but found no trace.

A month later, a Shujayea resident reported four bodies near the family's old home; two were unidentified, but descriptions resembled the boys. Days later, a relative shared a photo of an unidentified body at al-Ahli Arab Hospital, which Rafaat thought was Othman with 90 percent certainty, but it was not his son. In October 2025, after a ceasefire deal, Rafaat reached the area near their old home and found only destruction, including a missile fragment and a small bone remnant.

The area later fell behind the Yellow Line, cutting off access. The family pursued leads through the Red Cross and human rights groups, but no confirmation came. In May, a lawyer from inside the 1948 areas told Rafaat's brother-in-law that the boys were alive and detained in Israel's Ofer and Naqab prisons.

Ashjan and Rafaat hugged and cried, but the information was never officially confirmed. The family remains trapped between hope and pain, unable to confirm their sons' fate. "I want them to come back,"