A haunting portrait of a young Palestinian boy from Gaza who lost both of his arms in an Israeli strike has been named World Press Photo of the Year for 2025.
Mahmoud Ajjour, 9, was fleeing an Israeli attack in Gaza in with his family when he turned back to urge his loved ones to move forward, the World Press Photo organization said in a statement accompanying the picture taken by Palestinian photographer Samar Abu Elouf.
Then he was hit in an explosion, the Netherlands based nonprofit added.
One of Ajjour’s arms was completely severed, while the other was left severely injured and ultimately had to be amputated.
“One of the most difficult things Mahmoud’s mother explained to me was how when Mahmoud first came to the realization that his arms were amputated,” Abu Elouf said in the statement from the World Press Photo organization. “The first sentence he said to her was, ‘How will I be able to hug you?’”
Ajjour was evacuated out of Gaza for treatment in Qatar’s capital Doha, where Abu Elouf took his portrait for The New York Times. The photographer also fled to the city.
Ajjour is one of hundreds of children in Gaza to have lost at least one limb during the war, which has seen more than 51,000 people killed since Oct. 7, 2023 according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run enclave.
UNICEF warned in December that more than 1,000 children in Gaza had seen one or both legs amputated alone since Oct. 7, 2023, when Israel began its military campaign in the enclave following the Hamas-led terror attacks in which some 1,200 people were killed and around 250 taken hostage, marking a major escalation in a decadeslong conflict.
“These are unbelievable numbers,” Dr. Ahmed Al-Fara, head of the pediatric department at Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza’s Khan Younis told NBC News’ crew on the ground in an interview earlier this month, noting that thousands of children have also been killed and more still have been left without one or both parents.
Al-Fara said he could not understand “the silence of the world” in the midst of the widespread devastation in Gaza, where much of the enclave has been destroyed.
Many of the operations children in Gaza have had to undergo have been done without anaesthetic, according to UNICEF, with the enclave’s healthcare system also hit hard by Israel’s offensive, which it restarted last month after a pause in the fighting.
Talks for a permanent end to the fighting were supposed to begin after the first phase of the ceasefire deal — in which Hamas released 25 living hostages and the bodies of eight in exchange for around 1,800 Palestinian prisoners and detainees — ended March 1.
But Israeli forces shattered the fragile truce and have since launched airstrikes on the enclave while also resuming military ground operations.
Israel has also enforced barred the entry of medical supplies, along with food, water and other vital aid during a more than a monthlong blockade of the enclave.
Efforts to secure a more permanent ceasefire and secure the release of hostages held in Gaza have so far failed to yield results.
In the meantime, Mahmoud is learning how to live without his arms, the World Press Photo statement said, adding that he requires support for most daily activities, including eating and getting dressed.
He is also learning to use his feet to do things like opening doors, writing and playing games on his phone, it said, adding that he is hoping to receive prosthetic limbs — a dream now shared by a growing number of children in Gaza.
