This article was originally published by Ma'an News Agency and is republished with permission.



UNRWA called it a record-breaking day Thursday as 6,000 of Gaza's children from 119 schools brought their homemade kites out to the Beit Lahiya beach and set them aloft in the wind.

Observers counted at least 3,000 kites, shattering the previous record of 710, registered in Germany.

The day was organized by UNRWA summer camps, which operate throughout the Gaza Strip and host 240,000 children each summer. Each camp was allotted space on the long beach, and volunteers from the International Committee of the Red Cross supervised and registered the name of each child participating.

According to Al-Jazeera, Guinness Book staff were invited to verify the record-breaking attempt, but the organization cited a UK government warning against travel to the Strip and declined the invitation, sending detailed guidelines to organizers instead.

Guidelines stated that all kites counted in the record had to remain aloft simultaneously for at least 30 seconds.