She was a nine-year-old girl — beautiful, yet fragile from pain.

Injured in an airstrike, she lay helpless in the emergency room.

I carried her in my arms to the operating theater, not knowing her name, not knowing who she was — yet her eyes clung to mine with a look of love, fear, and silent plea.

As I prepared her for surgery, she kept staring at me, refusing to look away.

My tears fell inward, my heart pounding painfully in my chest.

When the anesthesia took her under, I began to fight the hardest battle — the one between duty and heartbreak.

Her left arm was crushed beyond repair.

I had to amputate it below the shoulder… my hands trembled, and tears blurred my sight, for I knew I was cutting away a part of her childhood.

Then I worked on her right arm — fixed it with an external frame, cleaned and stitched her wounds, and left the room drained and broken.

The next day, during my rounds, I passed by her bed.

She wasn’t looking at her missing arm — only to the right, as if refusing to acknowledge the loss.

I walked away silently, my heart bleeding inside.

The following day, the nurse came to me and said,

“Doctor, the girl still refuses to look at her amputated side. Please come.”

I went to her, my heart burning.

I sat beside her, tried to cheer her up — and with the innocence of a child, she looked at me and asked:

“Uncle… when will my hand grow back? I want to play with it again.”

I couldn’t hold back my tears. I hugged her tightly, and from that day on, I visited her every morning.

We talked, smiled, and slowly, she began to look toward her right side again.

Some weeks later, she was sent abroad for treatment.

Before leaving, she smiled and said,

“I’ll come back, Uncle… when my hand grows again.”

That… is the true face of war.

Not the ruins, not the smoke — but the eyes of a child who lost her hand, and still dares to dream that it will return.

Dr Nasim

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