Under a blockade and siege since 2007, children in Gaza don’t have many fun things to do. One very popular activity is kite flying. In 2011, over 13,000 kites were flown in Gaza to break a Guinness World Record. This one minute report by ABC, tells the poignant story.

Thousands of Palestinian children fly kites along the beach during a UN-sponsored summer camp in the northern Gaza Strip on, 30 July 2009. Palestinian children in the impoverished Gaza Strip on 30 July 2009 claimed a world record, flying hundreds of kites at the same time on a northern beach of the Hamas- controlled enclave. Khalil el-Halabi, education programme head at the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), told reporters that 6,000 children had taken part in the event. EPA/MOHAMMED SABER [Two years later over 13,000 kids in Gaza broke their old 2009 record.]

 

Israel never misses a chance to play the victim card!

During the recent “The Great March of Return” protests in Gaza, starting in March, about 150 people have been killed and over 2000 people have been wounded by Israeli snipers. To fight back, some Palestinian protesters in Gaza decided to try out “armed” kites and helium-filled balloons as weapons that have ignited some Israeli farmlands (see here & here). After all, Gaza is the world’s largest open air prison and some of the inmates aren’t too happy about the ongoing Israeli economic blockade that is slowly strangling Gaza to where it will be unlivable by 2020 (see here).