Traumatic Effects On Children

Despite the wars, many people do not understand how it will inflict on children. Traumatic events affect deeply into a child’s mind. According to UNICEF reports (2010), more than 2 million children have died as a direct result of armed conflict over the last decade and at least 6 million children have been seriously injured. Trauma and psychological problems hinder children’s lives by putting a barrier to having no childhood, their intended goals are vanished to be an adult, their coping in life after a period of hardship creates a gap between their reality and fantasy world.
Many children are forced to be in a camp for the rest of their lives. [The rest of their lives some see the barb wires, many want someone to care.] However, their lives
shatter through the drastic actions taken on them. In the novella, “Land of Sad Oranges” the child states, “ in the afternoon we reached Sidon, we became refugees”. (Kanafani 76) This quote portrays a child’s exposure to being separated from their home. He is unleashed to the truth that now their home is not their home and they are not people of their land because it is not theirs anymore. He knew he became a refugee right after leaving Sidon where everything is [terrorized] by the Israelis. Similarly, in the film “Promise”, the girl cries for her country being taken away from them and being left with nothing while living in the refugee camp. In despair, the children face family situations that scars their childhood for being forced to live in the refugee camps. In the novella, Men in the Sun, Marwan states, “To leave four children, to divorce you for no reason, then to marry that deformed woman. it is something for which he won't forgive himself, when he wakes up one day and realize what he has done.” (Kanafani 39) He expresses his feelings very coldly and depressed. [A child left alone with his family in the refugee camp in poor and desperate condition.] He questions how any father and husband could do that. [He is thinking why would he go do that to my mother whom he claimed to love yet his greed for money made him make this decision and create this rift between the family.] A child so young in such despair needed his father his companion to support him through the tough traumatic times. Yet he was shocked of what his father done to him and his mother.
Many of the refugees do not survive the harsh conditions in the refugee camp.
Most of them can not get to the right facility because they are not allowed to be near Israelis and everything is controlled by the Israelis. [According to the article, Living in the crossfire: Effects of exposure to political violence on Palestinian and Israeli mothers and children, “According to UNICEF reports (2010) more than 2 million children have died as a result of armed conflict over the last decade and at least 6 million children have been seriously injured.” (Sarit Guttmann-Steinmetz, Anat Shoshani, Khaled Farhan Moran aliman and Gilad Hirschberger)] Children of the refugee camps suffer and [in desperation of survival was death.] They had nowhere to go. The conflict was so intense between Israel and Palestine that it created such horrific scenes of innocent children dying. Their lives were not safe for them on Earth [that lead them to leave forever.]? Similarly, in the article Living in the crossfire: Effects of exposure to political violence on Palestinian and Israeli mothers and children, “More than 1 million have been orphaned or separated from their families, and an estimated 20 million children have been forced to flee their homes because of conflict”. (Sarit Guttmann-Steinmetz, Anat Shoshani, Khaled Farhan, Moran Aliman and Gilad Hirschberger include the page number) their childhood home was gone and their lives were gone. Who else do they have? They were forced to flee or else
they will lose their lives because of the Israelis. They took themselves out but their childhood was erased from that on.
Many children go out of their goals to become an adult. They leave to provide for their family. There is no work to provide for them that can get them morsels of food and shelter. But they sacrifice themselves and their lives to go against everything so they could support their family. In Men in the Sun, Marwan knew his family was in despair and he could not become a doctor. He had this dream to be a doctor and to study hard. Now in all this trauma he geared his goal to just take care of his family. [He states, “I want to work. You know how things are here...” (Kanafani 39)] [Marwan knew at a young age 16 year old teenager looking for work] to make money and make sure his mother, brother and sister are taken care of. Without his eldest brother supporting the family, Marwan had to step in and help his family out. [who stopped giving money made it hard for his family and now he has to step it up.] He is now the [breadwinner.] -- Similarly, he states “It had been wonderful to spend some time with his mother”. (Kanafani 39) He yearns for his mother and only if he could get a job and make sure his mother is taken care of that would be his happiness. He only wants to make she is happy and spend time with her. [His only support that he is alive and going is his mother. His mother is what he makes in his life now his goal now just for her he will go and work so she is fed and happy. ]?
[Many were far way their past but they still live in their past with despair till today.] In the novel, Dawn, Elisha explains of his despair of getting away from the land he was born on.
“ When the Americans liberated Buchenwald they offered to send me home, but I rejected the offer. I didn't want to relive my childhood, to see our house in foreign hands” (Weisel 11). Elisha did not want to go back because there was nothing left for him there. He was snatched away from his childhood to a prisoner where he loses his family and his childhood. He is corrupted now and he will not be himself as he was before. As the child [in the film] explains that we do not know how someone else feels unless we were actually there first hand. Children at a young age should experience [the live]? of enjoying their lives but children who experienced all at first hand will not be the same person as before. ? [Another person] knowing their story does not mean we know what they went through.Their childhood [brittling]? down and all they lost was their innocence and becoming a [new Child.] Similarly, in Land of Sad Oranges, the child exclaims, “As I left my house behind, I left my childhood behind....”(Kanafani 80). The child was leaving to become a refugee never looking back to his home, the land he called Palestine. He can never come back home because the Israelis took his home and he is forced off of
it. Throughout their lives [they] had to learn to cope with periods of hardship. Children in the refugee camps coped with the hardship only to keep their faith going that they will soon get their home back. In [the film] the children are playing and laughing together which shows that they are used to the atmosphere and are coping with the hardship they are already in. + [When Elisha enters into the room he feels like he is betraying himself.] He begins to think, “I found myself utterly hateful. Seeing myself with the eyes of the past I imagined that I was in the dark gray uniform of an SS officer”(Weisel 23) In front of his eyes he saw people dying including his family. He was traumatized of how people were cruel. Elisha witnessed what the SS officers did to the prisoners. He saw the torture and atrocities of what happened at the camp. They were as animals killing people and he felt that he was being a SS officer. Just like the SS officer he was ready to kill the prisoner. Similarly, “They ran like rabbits, like drunken rabbits, looking for the shelter of a tree (Weisel 23). He sees the prisoners running to flee to freedom however their lives end midway. + Ever since the Israelis took over Palestinian. Many children grief over their childhood, their homes. They become very home sick and depressed that they can not cope with losing their land. The narrartor in the novella, Land of Sad Oranges says, ““Driven by the mortal terror of a child who has suddenly caught sight of an ogre...” (Kanafani 80). The pain and terror the father is going through for losing their homes made the children realize they are helpless and now will suffer because of the Israeli. When the narrator came back to the house he saw his cousin acting like he saw the ghost. He knew his cousin knew what was happening. He says, “Your eyes all had a catlike glitter and your lips were sealed as though they had never been opened, as though they were the scars left by an old wound not properly healed.” (Kanafani 80). The narrator’s cuosin is in utter shock and pulled away from his immocemce. He now knows that he will not see his childhood ever again. The conflict between the Israeli and Palestinian also creates the gap between children’s reality and fantasy world. The trust among peers are hard to create.Many do not believe in on annother. It is difficult to live around them. According to Military trauma and social development: The moderating and mediating roles of peer and sibling realtions in mental health, “Children may therefore be afraid of completely trusting their peers to disclose their experiences and share emotions.” (Kirsi Peltonen,1 Samir Qouta,2 Eyad El Sarraj,2 and Raija-Leena Punama¨ki) They are too afraid to share anything with anyone. No one is trusted not even themselves. They do not want to be near anyone to have a conversation and keep everything inside them to cope. As a result according to the article, “Only rivalry in sibling relations and friendship quality mediated the association between the exposure to military trauma and PTSD and depressive symptoms. Thus, in conditions of threat and fear, personal trauma forms a risk for children’s mental health through deteriorated sibling and friendship relations. The mediation results emphasize the importance of cherishing children’s social relations in extreme war conditions,...” (Kirsi Peltonen,1 Samir Qouta,2 Eyad El Sarraj,2 and Raija-Leena Punama¨ki) These fear and threat of being unsafe makes it hard to create relationship. It prevents them to open up and all the emotions inside them building up creates a psychological problem for them and the results become suicidal as well. War and children can ruin a child’s mental health. That being said, it divides them from their own world. As Elisha became hateful for killing because it reminded him of the SS officers in the concentration camp. This is evident when he says, “I found myself utterly hateful. Seeing myself with the eyes of the past I imagined that I was in the dark gray uniform of an SS officer”. (Eisel 23). Similarly there was mental breakdown when the child witnessed the helpless, desperation atmosphere between his uncle losing his land to the Israelis. He says, ““Damn your father! Damn...” (Kanafani 76) He says his father but damn... what? He says damn God. He wanted to point all the blame on God even if he could not. The child sensed it all that war creates human mental breakdown.

Overall, trauma and psychological problems portrays a life of a depressing children in war. These young children were seeking out for help even if no one knew what they were going through which impacted them because of their traumatized life. In the same manner, people with mental disorder do not even notice and many parents do not seem to look out for their children because of the hidden symptoms. These symptoms become very severe and the rate of unawareness is alarming. Therefore, trauma and psychological problems portrays in war society that are unaware of the children’s depression.