Foreign Affairs

The Human Cost of Failed Leadership: A Gaza Family’s Devastation Amid Endless Conflict

By Economics Desk | February 28, 2026

As a Gaza family mourns 40 relatives wiped out in a single Israeli airstrike, the tragic loss underscores the ongoing human toll fueled by failed U.S. Middle East policies that neglect American national interests and security.

Each Ramadan should be a celebration of family, faith, and community. Yet for Saddam al-Yazji in Gaza City, this holy month has instead become a stark reminder of war’s brutal cost — the loss of nearly his entire extended family to an Israeli strike in late 2023. The al-Yazji family home, once a four-story building bustling with life and commerce — including Saddam’s supermarket on the ground floor — now lies buried under rubble. Forty relatives, including children and seniors who gathered here each Ramadan to break fast together, were killed in a single deadly strike that shattered their lives....

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