The beach and sea in Gaza during a peaceful moment before the war. Photo: Ghada Abu Muaileq

In Gaza, the sea is not just a coastline or geographic space—it is an inseparable part of every Gazan’s identity. It is the city’s lifeline and the only open space in a place suffocated by siege. 

Over the years, the beach has become Gaza’s sole space for leisure and emotional escape. During my childhood, trips to the seaside with my father would be the highlight of the week. As I reached the shore, the refreshing water would be calling out to me with love. People played volleyball, children laughed and everyone smiled. 

Looking out at the horizon, it felt like the sea belonged to Gaza alone. It was our only window to the world and made us feel free. I was too young to know that Israeli restrictions extended even to the sea and banned fishermen from sailing out beyond 3 to 6 nautical miles.

As I grew older, the sea remained a sanctuary as the weight of life under siege and occupation sank in and became my reality. My daily commute to university would involve a long walk along the coast at 7 a.m. The sight of its shimmering blue helped me forget my academic pressures. I would watch fishermen casting their nets out within the narrow space permitted to them as seagulls spread their wings overhead. People would be jogging along the shore and groups of friends would be having breakfast, taking in the breathtaking view.

A seaside café in Gaza before the war. Photo: Ghada Abu Muaileq

In the evenings, the beach lit up with the colors of the seaside cafés. The shore echoed with laughter, the calls of vendors selling popcorn, cotton candy and nuts, and a man playing music by strumming his oud in front of friends after a long day.

The port was a particular highlight—a meeting place for people from all parts of Gaza, especially during holidays. People would flock to the beloved Al-Baqa Café, which was named after the family who owned it. This simple two-story wooden structure perched directly above the water. Despite its modesty, it was a second home for many students and young people in Gaza. We would go there to forget the heaviness of life and to laugh with our friends.

I was separated from the sea after Israel started its war on Gaza in October 2023. Every Gazan’s life was turned upside down during this period. Death and destruction took over and life as we knew it was no more. Israel’s navy would patrol our sea with gunboats and would target civilians deliberately. We could hear the shelling every night.

But a few months ago, during the temporary ceasefire, I returned to the beach with my sister and aunts. The streets along the coast had changed. The once joyful path to the beach was now filled with rubble and the tents of people who had lost their homes. Famine had spread right across Gaza. The street vendors who used to sell food are gone. 

On the beach, there were more tents. Women were washing clothes in the seawater, as their children walked slowly along the sand. Despite their innocent smiles, the look in their eyes had changed.

We sat by the water. Nearby, a small family seemed to be trying—like us—to throw the weight of war into the sea. To our left, a man in his 30s wore headphones and stared deeply at the waves. I imagined he was thinking of the life waiting beyond that horizon that he could never reach. The sea was calm, as if it were listening to him.

Gaza’s sea is not just water. It is our silent companion when we are exhausted. The best listener for both our joy and our grief. Could that be why it is also being targeted by the Israeli forces? 

In the early days of the war, Gaza’s port was directly bombed and dozens of fishing boats were destroyed. Later, Israeli tanks entered the port and deliberately defaced it—a symbolic erasure of one of Gaza’s most precious spaces. And then came the massacre at Al-Baqa Café on June 30, 2025, which killed dozens of people—children, women, students, journalists and athletes. Their only crime was sitting by the sea and being Palestinian.

The sea in Gaza during the war, after the evacuation orders. Photo from the Facebook page of journalist Imad Zakou

Among the victims was the photojournalist Ismail Abu Hatab, whose Instagram feed is filled with photos of the sea. He deeply loved Gaza’s sea and captured its most beautiful moments through his lens before he was killed by Israel on that very shore.

The bomb dropped on Al-Baqa Café reportedly weighed approximately 500 pounds, which is the kind of munition meant to destroy military bases, not a small wooden beach café. Yet like so many other war crimes, this one passed without accountability.

As the situation becomes increasingly desperate here in Gaza, the Israeli military has now declared the sea a closed military zone. Swimming, fishing and diving are prohibited. But despite these military restrictions, the sea knows its people. It remembers those who fished its waters and swam with its waves, those who played on its shore and collected its shells.

Gaza’s sea represents our lost freedom. I wish it peace until we meet again with our freedom stretched to the horizon and beyond.

This article is co-published with Washington Report on Middle East Affairs.