In Gaza, women are bearing the weight of grief, displacement, and responsibility, striving to maintain hope for their children amid daily loss. In overcrowded shelters, their resilience becomes a quiet act of defiance against a conflict that has claimed husbands, homes, and normalcy.

At Al-Rafidain School in northern Gaza City, Iman Al-Jarrah grapples with the death of her husband at Zikim. Without a body, a proper farewell, or a grave to visit, she is trapped between shock and waiting. “My children ask about their father, and I cannot give them answers to ease their hearts,” she says, hiding her pain while trying to preserve a sense of life in the shelter.

Marwa Asliya waits for news of her detained husband, raising four children alone while shielding them from despair. “Every night they ask, ‘When will Dad come back?’ I try to plant hope in them, but my heart knows the prisons are cruel,” she explains. Similarly, Naama Abu Khosah channels her loss into daily acts of care, baking bread for her children as part of a women’s project, each loaf a symbol of endurance.

Across Gaza’s shelters, women transform sorrow into determination, turning despair into hope. Their daily struggles illuminate the human capacity to survive and nurture life, even amid relentless conflict.