By Salma M Al-Sayed Allaham

War is often examined through the lens of destruction, trauma and loss. However, beyond the immediate horrors of violence, war seeps into the psyche of its youngest witnesses, shaping how they see themselves, their nation, and even their understanding of right and wrong. Children do not process war as adults do. While adults worry about survival and loss, children attempt to normalize it, fitting war into the framework of their developing worldviews. The battle lines drawn by political conflict often become the lines that shape their cultural identity. I know this because I lived it.

In 2016, when I was eight years old, my family traveled to Syria. The revolution was ongoing, and soldiers lined every street, checking IDs — their presence an ever-present reminder of the fragile existence we were navigating. My mother, knowing the dangers, always reminded us to stay quiet and smile when we approached soldiers. They had the power to take anyone away, never to be seen again.

Bribery was an unspoken rule: an entry fee to safety. I understood the stakes, but I never questioned why we had to behave that way; it was simply how things were. One day, as we faced a soldier at a checkpoint, he examined our IDs before turning to my six-year-old brother and asking, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” My brother, listening to my mother’s advice, simply smiled and said nothing. We continued walking, my mother’s grip on our hands tightening. Then, just a few steps away, my brother turned to her and, without hesitation, announced, “I want to be ISIS.” My mother went pale. She didn’t respond. She simply kept walking, her pace quickening, but I could feel the terror radiating from her.

At the time, I didn’t understand what had scared her. To me, it was just a word, an idea that had slipped into our world like the gunfire that echoed through the streets. My brother had never heard those words at home. Our parents were against extremism.

We had recently visited my uncle’s house, a place littered with bullet holes, where we heard gunshots and the cries of “ISIS!” filling the air. As children, we did not understand the context. We heard the words, saw the chaos, and, in our need of coping, transformed it into a game. We ran through the house with toy guns, shouting those same words, turning war into something fun, something digestible. We played this game because it was our way of making sense of the senseless.

We didn’t see ISIS as a force of terror; we saw them as part of the world we had been put into. The concept of hero and villain was blurred. Looking back, I now understand that moment as a defining one in my childhood. It was the first time I realized how war seeps into a child’s subconscious, how it transforms not just their fears but their very understanding of identity. War did not just happen around us it was something we were unconsciously absorbing, something that was becoming a part of us.

The psychological effects of war on children are well documented. Research shows that children exposed to conflict often develop altered perceptions of morality, authority and national identity. They learn to navigate a world where survival depends on silence, on obedience, on knowing when to smile and when to disappear. A study published in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, titled “psychosocial consequences of war: Northern Sri Lankan experience”, highlights that children who grow up in conflict zones often have their concepts of heroism and villainy shaped by the violence they witness.

This rings true for my own experience before I could even fully understand my national identity, I had already been made to feel ashamed of it. For years, I carried the weight of that shame. Syria, my homeland, was often spoken about in whispers, in news reports filled with images of destruction, in conversations heavy with pity. I remember feeling like my nationality was something to hide, something that made me less than others. But war, despite its horrors, also has a way of forging resilience. As I grew older and as the tides of revolution shifted, so too did my perception of my identity.

The liberation of Syria did not just mark a political victory; it marked a personal one as well. I began to reclaim my heritage, to find pride in the struggle of my people, in their resistance, in their unwavering hope. This transformation is not unique to me. A study on war-affected children in Palestine shows that, while conflict can create identity crises, it can also foster a stronger sense of belonging and cultural pride, particularly in post-war generations.

The duality of war is that while it strips people of their homes and safety, it also strengthens collective identity. For children like my brother and I, the process of navigating war’s impact on our identity is ongoing. We are left to reconcile the memories of fear with the newfound pride in our heritage. The story of war is not just one of death and destruction. It is a story of the people who live through it, who are shaped by it, and who, in the end, redefine their own place in the world because of it.

Children do not just witness war; they internalize it. It shapes how they see themselves, their country, and their future. My brother’s innocent words in 2016 were not a reflection of ideology but of environment. They were a testament to how war had already woven itself into our understanding of the world. We did not understand the politics; we only understood what we saw, what we heard, what we turned into a game. The lines between heroes and villains were blurred, drawn not by right or wrong but by who held the weapons and who made the rules. And yet, as time passes, we rewrite that understanding. War does not get the final say on who we are. We do.