The streets of Gaza no longer look like streets. They have turned to rubble. Tents have replaced homes. Hunger hangs in the air like dust.
Nevertheless, against this backdrop of collapse, there remain people who choose not to give up. People who wake each morning, even after losing homes and loved ones, and decide to serve others before themselves. Among them are the staff of the Near East Council of Churches, the volunteers of the Spark Foundation for Innovation and Creativity, and the small but steady community of churches whose walls continue to shelter the displaced, despite the general evacuation orders issued by the Israeli Defense Forces. Their work is fragile, their resources scarce, yet they remain a thread of humanity holding together a people pushed to famine and the brink.
The Near East Council of Churches — known to most as NECC — has been part of Gaza’s life for generations. Founded in 1952, it once operated three health clinics in the strip subsidized by CNEWA that cared for mothers and children, treated chronic diseases and offered family health services. For decades, its clinics were safe havens in a place where health care was always under pressure. But after the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war in October 2023, those havens have turned into targets. Two clinics were destroyed or damaged, staff was displaced, and the health system fell apart. It was forced to move its headquarters four times.
Still, NECC did not stop. Mobile clinics were launched, small medical points opened, and staff who had lost their own homes continued to serve strangers.
“In November 2023, we were already operating emergency services for displaced people,” said Lubna Saba, a program coordinator with NECC.
“We screened children under 5 for anemia and malnutrition, provided supplements when we could, cared for pregnant women and new mothers, and continued treatment for diabetes and hypertension. Every day, between 250 and 300 people still come, even now, for the most basic services.”
The work has demanded sacrifices no health care professionals should have to make. “We are forced to make impossible decisions,” Ms. Saba said. “Who receives the little we have? Which child gets the last nutritional biscuit? Which patient must go away without medicine? No health worker should face this, but we cannot turn people away.”
In the crowded refugee camp of Nuseirat, located in the central Gaza Strip, In’am Abu Rukba oversees one of NECC’s most recent medical points, established in September 2024, after the organization was forced to move from Rafah.
“Every day, more than 400 people come here — children with malnutrition, mothers in need of prenatal care, patients needing dental treatment,” she said. “We even try to provide psychological support for children, but our staff is constantly displaced, and we work under shelling.
“Everything affects us, our safety and our mental health, but despite everything, we persist. The work must continue.”
Supplies arrive sporadically — sometimes through the World Health Organization, UNICEF or Gaza’s Ministry of Health — and they are never enough. Staff is exhausted. Nevertheless, the clinic doors stay open for at least five hours every day.
While NECC tends to the body, the Spark Foundation for Innovation and Creativity has taken on the wounds of the mind. In Gaza, where schools have collapsed and children have spent years without proper classrooms, Spark has become a small light in the darkness.
“We recently worked on the Stars of Tomorrow Project, supported by CNEWA-Pontifical Mission in Jerusalem,” says project coordinator Ahmed al-Dayeh. “We opened an educational space in Deir al-Balah for students who lost their right to education. We adopted unstructured learning to match their psychological state and combined it with ministry curricula where possible.”
Spark established its center in Deir al-Balah after being displaced three other times since the war began. Paper, pencils and books remain scarce. Students move from tent to tent as their families are displaced repeatedly. Yet, Spark’s space has allowed dozens of young children to continue learning each day and to acquire skills to cope with the devastation that surrounds them.
The organization runs activities and art workshops that allow children to be children again, as well as group therapy sessions. It also offers personal development programs and activities aimed at teens and young adults, such as self-management, decision-making and problem-solving.
Nagham al-Louh, 17, says Spark is more than an educational space; it is a lifeline.
“This foundation is the only place that took us out of the atmosphere of war.
“It gave us some of the life we had before. In the tents, everything is pressure, nothing feels safe. Spark gave us relief, laughter, hope. I want it to stay with us always.”
Meanwhile, Gaza’s few churches have become shelters of last resort. Their courtyards and halls are filled with families who arrived with nothing but grief. Church leaders distribute food parcels and clean water when available and keep the sanctuaries open for prayer. Faith has become both the anchor and the fuel of survival.
“We have nothing extra to give, only what little we have,” said a church leader on condition of anonymity for safety reasons.
“But the church has always been a place of refuge. We pray with those who are afraid, we cry with those who mourn, and we share bread even when we are hungry ourselves. Faith tells us that in suffering, God is still with us. This is how we survive.”
The contrast between the past and the present is stark. Before the war, NECC’s clinics and Spark’s classrooms offered a sense of normalcy, albeit fragile. Families visited for checkups, children played in schools, teachers planned exams. Life under blockade was difficult, but it still held rhythm. After the war, clinics became tents, schools became memories, and daily survival replaced long-term hope. Beyond sheer necessity, faith sustains these organizations.
“Sometimes I ask myself how long we can keep going,” said Ms. Saba of NECC. “But then I see the mothers, the children, the families. We cannot stop.”
Ms. Rukba of Spark expressed it simply: “The work continues, and it must continue.”