Gaza's sick children talk not of illness, but hunger as they arrive in Jordan 

Jordan has been treating some of the many sick Palestinian children who need medical help, as ITV News International Editor Emma Murphy reports

On Jordan’s border, we heard the ambulances long before we saw them. Their shrill cry signals the arrival of children from a place of war to a place of safety.

On board the buses and ambulances, 47 beautiful children are struggling with dreadful illness or injury. And yet it was neither their injuries nor their illnesses they spoke of. Their eyes and often their bodies told of the mental and physical toll of war, but they didn’t. They talked about being hungry.

About how long it had been since they had eaten. About how much hunger, real hunger, hurts the stomach. But that hurt was nothing compared to the sadness of leaving their families behind, without food.

It was interesting to watch their reactions as food and juice were handed out. Of course, they had been given some on their journey, but no one grabbed it, no one devoured it. They seemed quite in awe of it.

And then there were the tears, the tears of guilt that overwhelmed even their need for food.

Children get sick in war as they do in peace.

The tragedies of health are no different, but the chances of recovery are.

Try surviving childhood cancer living in ruins, in a place where there are no fully functioning hospitals, where there’s limited food, limited medication and no safety.

Try getting well without nutrients or a bed to lie in.

In Gaza, now exhausted, frightened and hungry patients are cared for by exhausted, frightened and hungry doctors.

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That they have more medical knowledge than their patients goes no way to ensuring they have any more chance of staying alive.

Some 14,000 medical or surgical patients are still waiting to leave Gaza; they wait, unsure if a terrible injury, a terrible illness or hunger will take their lives first.

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