Israel's requirement for war zone DNA tests has divided a family across the country and Gaza

It's early morning, the only time Arwa* could meet before starting the first of her two jobs.

She sits on a bench facing a playground in the Israeli city of Ramla but there are no children playing in the park, the swings are still and the slide is empty.

Her grandchildren are almost 100 kilometres away, in war-torn Gaza.

"They always speak with me and tell me: 'We want to come to you, grandma,'" she said sadly.

Almost four months ago, Arwa and three of her children made a treacherous journey through Gaza to a border crossing, after months of negotiations and legal wrangling in Israel.

The Arab Israeli was born in Israel and is a citizen, but thanks to a complex web of rules, only some of her family members are entitled to come to the country.

It means the family is now split between the country and the enclave, a situation Arwa wanted to avoid.

"I did not want to come here [to Israel]. I was saying either we die together or live together," she explained.

"But my younger son was crying so much, and said to me: 'If I die, I won't forgive you.'"

One of Arwa's daughters, Aida*, and two of her grandchildren are among the family members still inside Gaza, despite a claim to Israeli citizenship.

They are willing to have DNA tests done to prove the children's biology, but a not-for-profit legal service representing them says the Israeli processes for the tests have inexplicably changed for their case, leaving the young family stranded.

Lawyers have expressed shock at the sudden shift and now they are challenging it in Israel's High Court.

In the interim, Aida and her children, aged two and four years old, are stuck in a war zone.

"It is taking so long," Arwa said.

"She was supposed to come with me. I waited for her for six, seven months, because she was afraid to come [on her own]."

How the citizenship law works

The policies regarding Israeli citizens in Gaza far outdate the current war and can be traced back to 2003, when a temporary order on the issue was passed during the second intifada, a Palestinian uprising.

The so-called citizenship law denies naturalisation to Palestinians from the occupied West Bank or Gaza who marry Israeli citizens.

It officially became law in 2022 after the Knesset voted 45-15 in favour of it.

It means mixed couples like Arwa and her husband, who is Palestinian, largely live in the Palestinian territories.

For children to obtain Israeli citizenship, they must have one parent who was both born in Israel and is an Israeli citizen.

Travelling from Gaza into Israel, even for citizens like Arwa, has become significantly more difficult since October 7.

Lawyer Osnat Cohen-Lifshitz from Gisha, an Israeli human rights group, described it as like "parting the Red Sea".

"It's truly epic, the efforts we put in in order to get them out were huge," she said while sitting in her office in Tel Aviv, a wall-mounted map of the Gaza strip peaking over her shoulder.

"The first thing you have to know is that Israel, unlike other countries, was not the one who sent out a message to its citizens and said, 'come home.'"

Ms Cohen-Lifshitz said Gisha and other human rights groups in the country pushed for an evacuation plan.

More than 140 Arab Israelis have since returned to Israel in coordinated groups.

The situation is more complex for children who are entitled to citizenship but have not previously been registered with Israeli authorities.

'Divided families' across the border

At the start of the year, an Israeli woman and her three children, who had not been previously added to Israel's population registry, tried to leave but only her application was accepted.

Gisha filed a court petition on the woman's behalf, arguing the children were citizens by birth and had been "registered as the children of an Israeli citizen in the Palestinian population registry, which Israel controls" and could be added to Israel's registry upon arrival.

A process was established where families could pay a guarantee of 10,000 shekels ($4,000) per child before submitting their unregistered children to a DNA test at the border before entering Israel.

Once the results came back proving they were biological children of an Israeli citizen, the guarantee payment would be returned.

If they weren't biological children, they would be deported back to Gaza after the war.

Ms Cohen-Lifshitz says while not unheard of, the DNA tests were not standard procedure before the war.

Israel's Population Authority insists it is not new and applies to all cases, not just those from Gaza.

"When there is no certainty regarding the alleged parental relationship, proof between the requesting parent and the alleged children is required."

Gisha says six women and their children now have crossed into Israel under the process and all were proven to be biological children and therefore Israeli citizens.

While the NGO initially protested the DNA tests, Ms Cohen-Lifshitz says the system is "sufficient" in allowing Israel to ensure citizenship, especially given the guarantee payment.

"For a Palestinian resident, 10,000 shekels per child is an insane sum, a crazy amount that they take from these families," Ms Cohen-Lifshitz said.

But the rules have seemingly changed for Aida.

She has been told her children must travel to the border, have the DNA sample taken, then go back to Gaza and wait for the results, before travelling back to the border to cross into Israel.

Ms Cohen-Lifshitz said it was unacceptable the family had been asked to make the "dangerous journey" three times, describing it as "a kind of bureaucratic violence and never-ending abuse".

She said she was shocked when Aida's case stalled after the DNA testing process was used successfully for the six other families.

"I was sure it was a mistake," Ms Cohen-Lifshitz said.

"They behaved differently than with all the other processes we had done."

Gisha filed a petition with the District Court to argue the state's refusal to allow Aida to "enter Israel with her children is a violation of the family's most basic human rights".

It lost that court challenge and has now filed an appeal with the country's High Court.

"We'll make the same arguments: that it's not reasonable for the State of Israel to abandon its own citizens because of some bureaucratic demands for registration in the Population Authority; and that they expect them to risk their lives, both in the journeys and in the very fact of staying in the Gaza Strip," Ms Cohen-Lifshitz said.

She speculates that the Israeli government is concerned about how many citizens have returned from Gaza.

Israel's Population Authority says the process with the DNA test and guarantee payment is "possible in circumstances where the parents of the minors applied regarding the regulation of their status in Israel prior to [October 7, 2023]".

"The state's position is that in a time of war, residents of Gaza who have established their lives in Gaza and whose rights to Israeli citizenship have not been proven so far, and who are now claiming for the first time the right to citizenship without the required proof of the claimed family relationship, should not be allowed to enter Israel."

But Gisha says only two of the six women that previously used the DNA testing system had started the registration process for their children before the war.

Arwa's family is now in limbo

Not all of Arwa's grandchildren are entitled to citizenship, with or without DNA tests.

Even if Aida and her children get to Israel, Arwa knows some of her family will remain in Gaza.

Arwa and her husband have six children: two were born in Israel and have citizenship, while the other four were born in Gaza and were registered with Israeli authorities more than a decade ago to become citizens.

Aida is the eldest daughter and because she was born in Israel, her children can get citizenship.

But one of Arwa's other daughters, who was born in Gaza, cannot pass citizenship onto her child. So, she is staying in Gaza with her husband and child.

Arwa's husband also remains in Gaza, along with a daughter-in-law and another grandchild.

Arwa says it's too dangerous for Aida and her grandchildren to make the trip to the border three times, so they have not gone for the DNA tests and are instead waiting for the high court challenge.

"It is already hard for anyone to go once, so how would she go so many times?" Arwa asked.

"It is frightening. If Jews would spare her, the Arabs won't, they would think she is a spy and would kill her."

Arwa knows better than most, after making the journey with her younger three children.

They had to wait 6 hours to get clearance from the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to make the trip.

"There were clashes and problems. They were afraid for our lives," she says.

"[The man from the IDF said] 'when I give you the green light to leave towards Karem Abo Salem [border crossing], you go'.

"Of course, the road was scary — bombing and shelling, [it was] very frightening."

Men along the highway threatened them with guns and then armed IDF soldiers stopped them.

"We told them, 'We are Israelis and have permits'."

Arwa hasn't told Aida about the journey, because she doesn't want her to be afraid.

She pulls out her phone to bring up pictures of her grandchildren, who have developed skin infections.

The photos show stretches of angry red boils.

"There is no medicine to treat them, and they are so afraid."

What next?

Arwa struggles to describe the situation in Gaza.

"This is Armageddon. This is not war. This is terrifying." she says, enunciating each line.

"This is not how war should be."

Her family has been displaced and has been living in a tent for about 10 months.

"They do not have bread, they can hardly find any water, everything is very hard to find," she says.

"Even if I want to send them money, there is no bank, no cash available so they can withdraw money. It is hard."

She tries to speak to her husband each day, but he often has to walk to find reception. She panics if she doesn't hear from him.

Members of their extended family were killed in Jabalia.

Her eldest son, who is with her in Israel, is struggling. His wife and daughter are still in Gaza.

"My granddaughter also tells me that 'you went with my father and left us in the tent'.

"She sends voice notes while she is crying."

Even Arwa's younger children, who wanted to flee the danger, are besieged now they are in Israel.

"They are not OK, they are crying," she said.

"They say, 'we regret that we left, we wish we stayed there with our father and died with him.'"

Aida is praying that she can leave with her children before anything happens to them.

Ms Cohen-Lifshitz is confident of the High Court appeal succeeding, but Arwa struggles to share in the optimism.

"I do not know what will happen, I wish it will end well [but] we are hopeless — there is no hope.

"I do not feel there is hope that she will come."

*names have been changed.