The children who streamed into the field in the Bekaa Valley on a warm November afternoon had something in common that no child should have to carry: they knew the sound of drones overhead. They had watched fighter jets fill the sky. They had lived through airstrikes and the long, heavy nights that follow. For them, a sense of safety could not be assumed.

Medair's Mental Health and Psychosocial Support team gathered more than sixty of these children for a sports and games day — musical chairs, basketball, group games — and the account written by one of the team members is a reminder of why this kind of work matters as much as food and medicine. Mental health is not a luxury, says Sara, Medair's project officer. It is a lifeline.

The day was not just recreation. Through psychosocial activities, play becomes a tool for healing — a way for children to release stress, rebuild trust, express emotions, and connect with one another in an environment where trained community volunteers hold the space with care and intentionality. The children arrived buzzing with energy and left still laughing, still retelling the day's highlights. Their joy, the writer observes, is not naïve. It is brave.

For UK supporters of Medair, this story is a window into a dimension of humanitarian work that often goes unnoticed: the patient, relational, psychosocial labour of helping children remain children in the middle of a crisis. Medair's Lebanon work is funded by the German Federal Foreign Office, Swiss Development Cooperation, and private donors — and it is a reminder that the church's call to care for the vulnerable extends to the inner lives of the youngest and most vulnerable of all.