‘It Reminds You That You Still Exist’: Gaza Women Seek Comfort Amid War

As thousands of women in Gaza face displacement, loss and the pressures of survival, a women-only safe space in Deir el-Balah is providing a place where they can discuss their experiences, receive psychological support and connect with others living through similar hardships.

Every day at around 9am, after taking care of her five children’s needs, Ola Saleh steps out of the tent sheltering her family in al-Amal camp.

Around five minutes later, the 39-year-old arrives at another tent in the camp, where for a few hours she steps away from the demands of motherhood, displacement and grief.

This tent is a women-only safe space where daily sessions are held as part of a wider programme run by Collective Development Projects, an organisation offering psychological support, group discussions and practical guidance for coping with the pressures of war.

Here, Saleh has the chance to speak with others who understand her feelings without needing to explain them. Surrounded by psychologists and women carrying losses of their own, she finds something she has struggled to feel since Israel’s genocidal war against Palestinians in Gaza took so much from her, as reported by Al Jazeera.

“He was killed instantly,” Saleh says with tears running down her face, referring to her 43-year-old husband, Abdul Jalil Saleh, who was killed last August while walking to buy food and household supplies for the family. “I still don’t know whether it was a sniper or a quadcopter.”

In that moment, Ola lost her family’s sole provider and, as she describes him, the person who had been her greatest source of comfort. Now displaced in Deir el-Balah, she is raising her children aged between five and 17 alone.

“Every day is harder than the one before,” she says. “My responsibilities keep growing and his absence becomes heavier.”

According to Al Jazeera, an estimated 16,000 women across Gaza have lost husbands since the start of the war in October 2023. Roughly one in seven families in Gaza is now headed by a woman.

For many, there has been little space or time to grieve. Living in tents without electricity or ventilation, they remain focused on securing food, water and the basics needed for daily survival.

Alaa Daoud, the field coordinator of the women’s safe space, said the initiative was designed to provide women with a safe environment to express themselves freely and receive psychological and practical support.

“Every woman comes with her own experience … the things she has been through and the things she wants to change,” she said.

The programme at the camp’s al-Farah School in central Gaza was launched last week, with plans to expand to other displacement sites across the Strip. Similar sessions are also being held in northern Gaza.

Beyond emotional support, the sessions address issues that have become more pressing during the war, including family pressure, economic hardship, mental health and the difficulty of caring for children while displaced.

Daoud said attendance grew quickly after the sessions began. The first day brought together around 60 women, rising to 65 on the second day and later reaching between 70 and 75 as more women heard about the initiative and joined.

“Women tell us how much they need safe spaces where they can express themselves freely, safely and comfortably,” Daoud says. “They need a place where they can release their emotions, gain positive energy and learn how to deal with society and their children.”

For Saleh, the sessions do not erase her grief but make it more bearable.

She says this is a place she genuinely looks forward to visiting daily, where she is seen, heard and, for a little while, less alone. Listening to other women’s concerns, joining discussions and hearing professionals talk about trauma and stress gives her moments of relief from a life marked by loss.

“I leave with a dose of hope and positive energy,” she said. “It’s not enough to take me out of everything I’m living through, but it helps me keep going.”

“It reminds you that you matter, too … that you still exist.”

Suad al-Gharabali comes to the same sessions from a different route.

At 63, she is one of the oldest participants in the group and, unlike some women who come mainly to speak about their own pain, she often takes a more active role.

She listens to younger mothers and shares her own experience, offering advice shaped by a lifetime of raising her eight children.

Before the war, al-Gharabali lived in Gaza City’s Shujaiya neighbourhood. Like many others, she was displaced after her home was destroyed and now shares a tent in Deir el-Balah with her son, his wife and their children.

Displacement was not the first loss the war brought her. She had already lost two sons, aged 24 and 35, who were killed in separate air attacks in Shujaiya. Both had been engaged and were due to get married.

Al-Gharabali still struggles to speak about them without breaking down in tears, remembering them as young men who were preparing for futures cut short by the war.

Despite that, al-Gharabali tries to turn her experience into something she can share with other women. At the safe space, she often speaks to younger mothers about raising children at a time when war and displacement have changed family life.

“I’m happy with these meetings because they provide awareness,” she said. “Every mother needs to pay attention to her children. This generation is facing many problems.”

For her, the value of the sessions is not only in the support women receive but in what they exchange with each other.

“Someone older than you by a day knows something you don’t,” she said, explaining why she feels responsible for passing on what she has learned.

Her advice comes from decades of hard work.

“I used to sew, go to markets, buy and sell so I could educate and raise my children,” says al-Gharabali, whose deeply-lined face reflects the years she spent working to raise her children.

Before she started attending the sessions, her days were mostly spent between her tent, prayer and quiet time with neighbours. But the meetings have given her something else — a reason to leave the isolation of displacement and spend time with other people.

“It’s a refreshing experience. I share what life taught me with these women.”

Al Jazeera reported that organisers see these spaces as more than counselling sessions. They are also a way of recognising the responsibilities women in Gaza have carried throughout the war.

“Women have been among the groups that carried the greatest responsibilities.

They experienced poverty, displacement and enormous pressure. When we tell them how important their role has been and how much they have given, they feel that their efforts and suffering are recognised.”

(With inputs from Al Jazeera)