Haya Abdelhadi knows firsthand that “women are paying the highest price” since the start of the Gaza war on October 7. Her job is to give Gazan women a voice and ensure their needs are heard. “Unfortunately, we often see women made invisible, although they receive most of the damage,” says Abdelhadi, Oxfam Intermón Gender Justice technician from Rafah, in the south of the strip.
More than 25,000 women and children have died due to the war that Israel is waging against Hamas, the US Pentagon recently revealed, this is more than 80% of the 30,800 deaths recorded by health authorities in the strip. They also represent 70% of the almost 72,300 injured.
This 30-year-old woman tells La Vanguardia that on one of her field visits she met a pregnant woman who had not known the whereabouts of her 4-year-old son for a week and was wondering what life she could give to the baby she was carrying inside. . Another pregnant woman was afraid that she would not make it to the hospital to give birth. “Access to reproductive health care services is very poor,” she details, “not to mention the lack of food and the fact that nowhere is safe on the strip.” She explains that the weight of war is greater for them because they have the double burden of having to care for those in their care. And due to the conflict, many of them have had to extend care to more family members.
One of the biggest problems, Abdelhadi highlights, is the overcrowding that exists in the centers for displaced people, which has led to an increase in gender violence. More than one and a half million people live overcrowded in the south. “Very different families live in the same store, there are conflicts. “Women and young women are distressed by the lack of privacy inside the stores, because they do not find adequate spaces to dress or urinate,” he explains.
She had to leave her home in Gaza City on October 13. Her home was completely destroyed by the bombs. “It was the only refuge we had, the box that kept all the memories of our life,” she laments. She now lives in Rafah with her parents and three brothers and she listens with great fear to Israel's plans to extend ground operations to this part of the strip. She just hopes for the day when there is a permanent ceasefire, when people have a place to feel protected again and lives stop being lost.
And it concludes with a halo of hope: “Despite the current emergency in Gaza, there are women who emerge as winners to help those in need. They are the backbone of society. I hope that in the future they will have a greater space in this society.”
