Gaza City, Gaza Strip – In the Holy Family Church in Gaza City, Fouad Abu Youssef, 34, wears a tattered, worn-out shirt as he sifts through a heap of salvaged clothes, remnants of what had been his home, hoping to find a change of clothes for his five-year-old daughter, Layla.

In the past two years of Israel’s war on Gaza, Fouad, a member of Gaza’s small Christian minority, has buried his sister after an air strike and seen his own home and his family’s house in Gaza City’s Tal al-Hawa neighbourhood collapse. Conditions grew so dire that Fouad, his elderly parents and five siblings with their families were forced to live in a nearby cemetery before finally finding refuge in the church.

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For more than a year, the Abu Youssef family has lived within the church’s quarters in the Zeitoun neighbourhood. They survived a close call with death when an Israeli tank shell struck the church in July, killing three people and wounding several others. And now, after Israel declared it was preparing for a major assault on Gaza City and called it a “dangerous combat zone” last week, the family cannot help but fear losing the roof over their heads once more and going back onto the streets, where it is even more dangerous.

Although the Holy Family Church was not placed by Israel in the zones marked for expulsions, the other churches in Gaza City, including the Greek Orthodox Church of Saint Porphyrius and the Anglican St Philip’s Church, were. But the nearly 550 displaced people sheltering in the Holy Family Church still mistrust the Israeli military. The church has been attacked so many times before – despite Israeli guarantees that it does not target places of worship.

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Most of the people there, including Fouad, are refusing to leave, even if Israel orders them to evacuate in the next few days. This sentiment is shared in the other churches, where the majority of occupants have decided to stay despite being told by Israel to move south.

Leaders of Gaza’s Christian community said in a joint statement released on August 26 that the forced displacement would amount to “nothing less than a death sentence”.

“Among those who have sought shelter within the walls of the compounds, many are weakened and malnourished due to the hardships of the last months,” the patriarchs wrote. “For this reason, the clergy and nuns have decided to remain and continue to care for all those who will be in the compounds.”

Clergy to stay in their churches

“This decision came with complete freedom,” Farid Gibran, the Holy Family Church’s spokesperson, explained, saying those sheltering at the church have the liberty to leave if they want to.

The decision of the church leaders to stay in Gaza City has inspired many of those residing at the Holy Family Church to remain despite growing fears of Israeli attacks. Many, like Moussa Saad Ayyad, 41, a father of four children aged six to 14, believe the church’s relationship with the Vatican could guarantee relative safety.

“We came to the church because it feels like the only safe place left, a place where we can be together and find help. Its ties abroad give us some protection,” he told Al Jazeera. “But if the danger gets worse, each of us may have no choice but to flee south on their own.”

For others like Fouad, the prospect of a second displacement and the strain it would place on his daughter and elderly parents are what keep him from leaving. But he also believes that staying is an act of faith and a form of resistance against the Israeli occupation, which has already cost him so much.

“They took my home and my loved ones, but they won’t take my right to remain here on my land no matter how dark it gets,” Fouad told Al Jazeera as he watched his daughter sleep.

Inside the complex, church leaders told Al Jazeera that the church has not pressured occupants to stay and currently, instead of panic and chaos, “a spirit of solidarity prevails among both Christian and Muslim refugees, who are working vigilantly to secure food and water for the children and the elderly”.

A priest, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to comment, said Gaza’s Christian community has a significance far beyond its small numbers.

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“Our presence [in the church] represents centuries of historical continuity in this land,” he told Al Jazeera. “We are here to pray, to serve and to bear witness to hope in the midst of darkness.”

A sanctuary under fire

Since Israel first announced plans for a ground operation in Gaza City last month, Moussa and other residents have been gripped by anxiety, never knowing when the assault might begin. For 23 months, the church has sheltered him and his family, but he is reminded of moments when even that safety was not assured, including the July attack.

The Israeli military claimed the building was hit by stray fire, and Pope Leo XIV said he was “deeply saddened to learn of the loss of life and injury caused by the military attack”.

Today, as Israel forges ahead with its military operations in Gaza City, Moussa does not know what is safest for his children, if anything.

The church compound had come under fire as early as December 2023 when two women sheltering inside were killed by an Israeli sniper.

Days earlier, air strike shrapnel had damaged the parish complex, destroying solar panels, water tanks, and other facilities.

“Before the war erupted, we lived normal, balanced lives in Gaza, … simple human lives with basic needs met,” Moussa said.

Samer Farha, a father of three, shared the same sentiments.

“The hardest thing we experience is seeing our children hungry,”  he told Al Jazeera. “We try to make them feel safe, but the sounds of bombing make every moment heavy.”

Father Gabriel Romanelli, the parish priest of the Holy Family Church, described the leadership’s and parishioners’ decision to stay as preserving “the church as a place of worship and life”.

“For these refugees, remaining represents more than defiance,” Romanelli, who was injured in the July attack and is still recovering, told Al Jazeera. “It’s symbolic, [the] protection of a place embodying their community’s history.”

The Holy Family Church, the only Catholic parish in Gaza, has long held symbolic importance beyond Gaza. Throughout the war, the late Pope Francis called the parish almost daily, maintaining a direct line to the besieged community.

Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Latin patriarch of Jerusalem, visited Gaza in July after the tank shell hit, bringing food and medical supplies along with Theophilos III, the Greek Orthodox patriarch.

‘Even if it means dying’

As the displaced in Gaza City begin to evacuate, the Holy Family Church stands as one of the last Christian sanctuaries in Gaza City.

Maryam al-Omr, 69, who took shelter in the church with her grandson after her home in Tal al-Hawa was destroyed, told Al Jazeera: “I will not leave here, even if it means dying. This church is my last home, and I will not abandon it.”

Yet for every stalwart like al-Omr, others are contemplating an impossible choice.

“We’re grateful for the international statements,” said one displaced resident who asked not to be named for fear of being isolated over his thoughts of leaving. “But we still face shortages of food, medicine and fuel. We need more than words.”

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As night falls and Fouad prepares his family’s sleeping area, the irony is not lost on him: The Holy Family Church, named for Christianity’s original refugees fleeing violence in ancient Palestine, now shelters families facing the same impossible choice between safety and home.

His daughter cries from hunger, and he holds her close, whispering words of comfort while suppressing his own despair, going back and forth between wanting to leave and wanting to stay.

His voice falters as he admits, “I don’t want anyone to see my pain. Get me out of this country.”

Yet moments later, leaning on one of the church’s walls, he reaffirms his resolve: “We will stay here, whatever comes.”

This article is published in collaboration with Egab.