Gaza today is a graveyard. A dystopian landscape where thousands of people and millions of dreams lie buried under a once vibrant city, laid to waste by Israel’s genocidal war. Two years into the war that has killed more than 67,000 people, most of them women and children, TRT World tells the story of Gaza through four Palestinians – stories of struggle and survival, of death and destruction and, above all, resistance and resilience.

This is the story of Ghadeer Al Habbash, 37. A widow and mother of four. This can very well be the story of thousands of other widows and mothers, navigating life through bullets and bombs.

Ghadeer introduces herself as the “wife of a martyr”. 

Her husband, Raaed Al Habbash, the sole breadwinner of the family, was killed by an Israeli sniper in February this year, leaving her to fend for the family alone. 

Their house in Khan Younis was destroyed earlier in an air strike, forcing them to move from place to place in search of safety and shelter.  

“One day, he went back to our destroyed house to try and find some clothes and food in the rubble...he was carrying a bag of flour and some clothes on his way back to the tent but…(an Israeli) sniper shot him in the head,” she tells TRT World at the tent in Khan Younis, which has been her home for the past several months.

“He died right there at the doorstep of what was once our house.” 

Since then, life has become a constant struggle – trying to find food for her four children. The youngest is just four.

As Israel squeezed aid delivery and a full-fledged famine gripped Gaza, meals were reduced to small portions of bread and lentils. Fruits and vegetables became a luxury. Clean water is scarce, and access to sanitation facilities is limited.

With no fixed source of income, the family is surviving on small financial grants that add up to no more than US $300.  

Survival begins at dawn: morning

Each morning, Ghadeer puts on one of her two only abayas left, wraps a star-patterned scarf around her head, and sweeps the dust from the tent she shares with others. 

The shelter is crowded, with tarps trapping heat during the day and providing little comfort at night, and thin mattresses that serve as both beds and seats.

“There is no privacy,” she says. “We cannot even protect our bodies, our dignity, nothing. This tent is not fit for life. When winter comes, the rain will flood it and the cold will freeze us.”

She combs her daughter’s hair before heading to a makeshift bazaar with limited items and high prices, just behind her tent.

“Just today, I went to buy some things for the children,” she says. “What used to cost 10 or 15 shekels now costs 50. I do not know how we will find 50 shekels. There is no money.” (1 USD is roughly equivalent to 3.30 shekels)

The summer heat is suffocating, and the nights offer no respite “We are dying from the heat during the day,” Ghadeer says. “At night, too, we cannot sleep. The barking dogs, the flies, the stifling heat”

Noon: Heat, hunger and shattered lives

By noon, the camp is sweltering. Inside the torn tent, Ghadeer prepares the only meal her family will eat that day: a pot of lentils simmering over a fire fed with scraps of wood and whatever else she can find.

Their most substantial meal of the day comes from a nearby community kitchen. But with Israel cutting off aid supply, it can’t function on days when there is nothing to cook. Today is one of those days.

As Ghadeer stirs the lentil slowly, she reminds herself and the children that “this is the only meal of the day”.  But the time for eating is still a few hours away. 

“No breakfast, no lunch. Just this one (in the evening) …maybe a piece of bread at night before they sleep.” The children are lucky to find a packet of biscuits or a piece of bread throughout the day.

The family craves potatoes, meat, and tea with sugar. But those remain out of reach. 

“A kilo of meat costs 70 shekels. Even potatoes are too expensive,” she says.”

Her youngest daughter, Suad, only four years old, has been sick for days. 

“I cannot buy her medicine,” Ghadeer says, watching the girl curl up on a thin mattress. “If their father were alive, he would have taken care of them. But now… I do not know what to do.”

Two days ago, shelling struck near the tent. A jagged piece of shrapnel tore through the canvas and landed just above where the children sleep. “God alone protected them,” she says. 

Her eldest son, 14, carries a burden far too heavy for his age. 

“He often prays, ‘Oh God, take me to my father, give me peace.’ A child should have dreams and ambitions, but he just wants to escape this life.”

Winter is coming, and the family fears what lies ahead. “We wait for God’s mercy… maybe someone will help us, maybe someone will take care of these children.”

Evening: One meal, many prayers

As dusk settles over the camp, Ghadeer sets the pot of lentils in the centre of the thin mat. 

The children gather silently around the medium-sized pot, their faces streaked with dust and heat. Her daughter scratches the rash on her arms.
“Mama, it burns,” she whispers.

Ghadeer looks at her, helpless. “We go to the clinics and they tell us to buy it ourselves. But from where? Where do I get the money?”

She tears the bread into pieces and soaks it in the thin broth.

“Eat, my loves,” she tells them softly. “It is all we have.”

The spoons scrape the bottom of the pot. No one speaks.

“Alhamdulillah,” Ghadeer murmurs. “We keep saying it every day. We say we are patient. But sometimes…” She hesitates. “Sometimes we say, ‘Oh God, take us. It would be better than this life.’”

She looks at the pot, now nearly empty.

“The children wait for hours in the sun to get food from the charity kitchen. And if there is no food?” She shrugs. “They go hungry.”

Getting water for her children also feels like a battle, she says. 

“Did you see the line today? People fight for everything. For bread, for water, for firewood. Men push, women push. Should a woman have to crush herself in the crowd just to get water? This is what the war has done to us.”

She wipes the last scrap of bread across the pot.

“Oh God, relieve us,” she says quietly. “No one in the world feels what we are going through. We are exhausted, truly exhausted.”

But as the children finish, she whispers again:

“Alhamdulillah,” she says. “Alhamdulillah for another day.”

Night: Tea by the fire

By nightfall, the camp fades into darkness. No electricity. No lamps. Only a faint fire crackles at the tent's edge, fed with scraps of broken wood collected during the day. Ghadeer crouches beside it, stirring a pot while the children crush tea leaves into the boiling water.

“Wood costs too much,” she says quietly. “We look for anything people throw away, anything we can burn. Just so the children can have tea before they sleep.”

The firelight dances across their faces as they pass the cups carefully, thin steam rising into the night air.

“It feels like the old days,” Ghadeer says. “Before the tents, before the bombing… tea at night meant peace, meant family. Now it only means they will not go to sleep half full, still slightly hungry.”

The children sip slowly. One leans close to her. “Mother, will tomorrow be better?”

She stares into the flames. “Maybe,” she whispers. 

As the day ends, the fire dies to ash. The cups and pots become empty, and the darkness closes in.

“This is our life now,” she says. 

“No one sees us. No one hears us. Only God.”