SAFA — Seven-year-old Saadi Ghaliya was sleeping on a makeshift cloth pillow in a crowded classroom where his displaced family had sought refuge after Israeli attacks destroyed their home in northern Gaza.

Around midnight, an Israeli artillery shell tore into the school-turned-shelter in eastern Deir al-Balah, killing the child as he slept beside his family.

“We woke up to the sound of a huge explosion, and Saadi was soaked in blood,” his father, Hossam Ghaliya, said, describing the moments after the shelling.

“We fled Beit Lahiya in May after our house was demolished and life became impossible. We came to this school on Salah al-Din Street thinking it was a safe area,” he added.

The shell struck a classroom inside the school, which was sheltering displaced Palestinian families.

“We went to sleep and woke up to the blast and smoke in the darkness. I was shocked to see that the shell had torn through my son’s body without even exploding,” Ghaliya said.

“He was lying there, covered in his own blood, killed where he slept before any of us understood what had happened, before he could even wake up.”

Witnesses described panic among the displaced families sheltering inside the school.

“The fear and terror among the families and children was overwhelming when the shell entered the classroom,” said Mohammed al-Kilani, who was at the school at the time. “Then we realized Saadi had been killed.”

Residents said families sheltering at the school were left in shock, with some considering leaving because they no longer felt their children were safe there.

“Airstrikes and direct shelling now chase the displaced even inside the classrooms of schools that are supposed to be safe,” al-Kilani said.

The killing comes amid continued Israeli violations of the Gaza ceasefire. According to Gaza medical sources, 1,344 Palestinians have been killed and 4,481 injured since the ceasefire took effect in October 2025.

For Saadi’s family, however, those figures have become painfully personal.

“He thought his pillow in the classroom would give him the warmth he lost when our home was destroyed,” his father said. “Instead, death reached him in his sleep.”