Today, June 12, the world marks World Day Against Child Labour — a day meant to raise awareness about the exploitation of children forced to work, instead of learning, playing, and simply being children. This year’s theme, “Progress is clear, but there’s more to do: let’s speed up efforts,” couldn’t be more relevant.
Across continents, millions of children remain trapped in labour, deprived of their rights to education, safety, and a dignified childhood. But as the global community speaks of reducing child labour and protecting children, a painful contradiction stares us in the face: the children of Gaza, whose basic right to live, breathe, and survive has been stripped away — in full view of a largely silent world.
Let’s take a closer look at the global crisis of child labour, and then ask ourselves the real question: Do children’s rights truly matter everywhere, or only in selective regions?
The Global Picture: Millions Still in Chains of Labour
According to the International Labour Organization (ILO) and UNICEF, 138 million children were engaged in child labour in 2024. Out of these, 54 million were involved in hazardous work — jobs that put their physical and mental health at serious risk.
That’s 1 in every 10 children globally.
Child labour is most prevalent in Africa, where 1 in 5 children is involved in work that deprives them of education and safety. In Asia and the Pacific, particularly India, millions of children are still working in textile factories, agriculture, brick kilns, and as domestic labourers — many of them unpaid or underpaid, vulnerable to abuse, and robbed of their future.
Despite a decrease of 22 million cases since 2020, the problem remains massive and deeply rooted in poverty, conflict, and lack of education. These children are often invisible — hidden behind factory walls, under harsh sun in fields, or locked away in homes.
And yet, they are fortunate compared to children in war zones — like Gaza — where child labour is not even the issue anymore. Survival is.
In Gaza, Children Are Not Just Labourers — They Are Targets
Let’s not sugarcoat it: the children of Palestine are being systematically targeted, traumatized, and erased.
Since October 2023, Israel’s brutal bombardment and blockade of Gaza has resulted in the deaths of more than 15,000 children (and counting). According to UN agencies, nearly every child in Gaza is now in need of mental health support. They don’t talk about child labour there — because schools have been turned to rubble, and hospitals have been bombed to dust.
How can a child go to school when the school has been destroyed?
How can a child play when the air is filled with drones and bombs?
How can a child survive when access to water, food, and oxygen is cut off deliberately?
While the world issues statements about ending child labour and protecting children’s rights, not a word is spoken at major international summits about the genocide of children in Gaza.
This isn’t just about hypocrisy. It’s about dehumanization. Children in Gaza are not seen as children by those who preach human rights on other stages.
Double Standards and Deafening Silence
When a child in the Global North is denied education, the world rightly raises alarms. When a child is found working in a sweatshop, campaigns are launched. Laws are enacted. Donations pour in.
But when a Palestinian child is crushed under the rubble of their home, we call it “collateral damage.” When they cry for their mother who died in a drone strike, it barely makes a headline. When they can’t breathe due to white phosphorus attacks, the world looks away.
Where are the human rights organizations that care so much about children’s safety?
Where are the global leaders who speak about the importance of childhood?
Where are the governments who promise to uphold the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which guarantees a child’s right to life, education, and protection from violence?
When it comes to Gaza, they vanish.
Let’s be clear: child labour is a crime, but collective silence over the massacre of children is a far greater evil.
Time to Redefine What ‘Child Protection’ Really Means
World Day Against Child Labour should not just be a day for press releases and hashtags. It should be a day of introspection and accountability.
We must ask:
-
Are children only worthy of protection when they’re not Palestinian?
-
Do child rights end at borders drawn by occupation and apartheid?
-
Can we speak of ending child labour while ignoring the deliberate destruction of an entire generation in Gaza?
If the global community truly believes in protecting children, it must raise its voice for all children — in the factories of Bangladesh, the fields of India, the mines of Congo, and yes, the ruins of Gaza.
It is not enough to save children from labour if we do not also save them from bombs, starvation, and silence.
Reem, the Soul of Her Grandfather, Killed in Her Home
In a now viral video that moved millions to tears, an elderly man held the lifeless body of his 10-year-old granddaughter, Reem.
Through broken sobs, he whispered:
“This is the soul of my soul… Ya Reem, wake up. I brought you chocolates. Your mother is waiting.”
Reem was crushed under the rubble of her family home, bombed by Israeli forces. She had just started learning how to write full sentences in Arabic. Her dreams were simple: to become a teacher, to play, to live. Instead, she died in her grandfather’s arms.
This is not child labour.
This is a massacre of childhood.
Hind Rajab: “Please come. I’m scared.”
6-year-old Hind Rajab became a symbol of Gaza’s agony when her terrified voice echoed through an emergency call.
After her family’s car was shelled, only Hind survived — hiding inside with the bodies of her parents and siblings. She called for help repeatedly:
“Come take me. I’m alone. I’m scared.”
Rescue teams tried to reach her. First responders from the Palestinian Red Crescent were sent — and they too were bombed. Their charred ambulance was later found near Hind’s body, her tiny hands clutching the car seat.
Where were the children’s rights defenders then?
Where were the loud voices who raise alarm when children can’t access playgrounds in other parts of the world?
Hind died alone — not from neglect, but from a systemic, deliberate annihilation of childhood.
The Girl Who Escaped the Fire After Her School Was Bombed
Among the most haunting scenes from Gaza is a video that has shocked the world — or at least those still willing to see the truth.
After Israeli warplanes struck a school sheltering displaced families in central Gaza, a young girl, covered in soot, bleeding, and barefoot, was seen stumbling out of the inferno. Her body was scorched, her hair singed by the flames. She tried to walk, her hands outstretched, mouth open — no sound came out. Just a look of agony no child should ever wear.
“Disturbing footage shows a Palestinian girl trying to escape the flames after an Israeli attack on a school shelter,” reported several news outlets. She had been attending class days earlier. That day, she was just trying to survive.
She collapsed shortly after. Eyewitnesses say she begged for water, but rescue teams never arrived — they were targeted too. There was no ambulance, no medical team, no international aid rushing in. The school had become a graveyard, and she became another name in a long, silenced list.
This is not war. This is not conflict.
This is a direct assault on the right of a child to simply exist.
In most countries, a school is a safe haven. In Gaza, it’s a target.
read: Children and Families Face Unrelenting Mental Trauma in Gaza
A War on Childhood Itself
The UN’s Convention on the Rights of the Child says every child has the right to:
-
Life
-
Education
-
Healthcare
-
Protection from violence
Gaza’s children have none of these.
More than 15,000 children have been killed in Israeli attacks since October 2023. Hospitals have been bombed. Schools flattened. UN shelters turned to bloodstained ruins. Babies shot at point-blank range. And yet — the world moves on.
We cry for child labourers in brick kilns, and rightfully so.
But what about the babies killed twice by an Israeli sniper? What about those who die trying to fetch water or call for help?
There is no protection. No rights. Not even the dignity of global empathy.
Final Thoughts
On this World Day Against Child Labour, let’s commit to more than just talking. Let’s open our eyes to the reality of what children face — from child labour in sweatshops to war crimes in Gaza. Let us hold every government, every institution, and every complicit silence accountable.
Children everywhere deserve the right to live, to learn, to dream — and to breathe freely.
Let’s not let that right become a privilege of geography or politics.
Follow us on Facebook and Instagram