Abeer Wael Tawfiq Eshtiwi, 28 years old, a mother of three daughters, resident of Gaza City.

Date of Testimony: 20/02/2025

With a forced smile masking her pain, Abeer, 28, greeted the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights’ Field Researcher and said, “They left me all at once, my dearest, I relied on them without question, always turning to them with my burdens, my pain. Now, they’re gone, leaving my daughters and me to navigate life’s hardships alone.”

 Then, she began to recount her sorrow-filled story.

“I was married to Riyad Rafiq Radwan Eshtiwi, 30 years old, and we had three daughters: Lama, 7 years old, Ruba, 5 years old, and Nada, who was just one year old—born during the war. We lived with my husband’s family in a two-story house; I stayed on the ground floor, while my in-laws lived upstairs.

Around 6:30 AM on Saturday, October 7, 2023, as I was preparing my middle daughter, Ruba, for a heritage day celebration at her kindergarten, and my husband, Riyad, was getting ready for work in construction, we suddenly heard loud, consecutive explosions. My daughters were terrified and began screaming from the intensity of the sounds. At the time, I was eight months pregnant with my third child. We tried to understand what was happening, and through social media, we realized that war was imminent.

By the evening, the situation escalated. Bombings were heard everywhere. I was constantly worried—about my father-in-law, who was trapped in Israel, and about my family in Al-Zaytoun, a highly dangerous border area. I contacted them and urged them to evacuate to our home. On October 21, 2023, my parents and siblings arrived—four sisters, one of whom was married and came with her husband and his family, as well as my two brothers, Ahmed (23) and Mohammed (21). Several other relatives and in-laws also joined us. We decided to shelter the women and children upstairs and the men on the ground floor as the situation became increasingly dangerous.

In November 2023, Israeli forces began their ground incursion into Al-Zaytoun. Our neighbors, the Al-Araj family, were bombed, killing two of them. Fear gripped us all as the bombardment grew heavier and more relentless. My uncle and his family, along with my aunt’s family, decided to seek refuge at Atta Hashem Al-Shawa School, intending to move south the next day. However, they returned unexpectedly and stayed with us.

On November 7, 2023, I went into labor. Despite the difficulty in communication, I managed to reach a doctor by phone, who instructed me to go to Al-Helo International Hospital. We struggled to leave our home safely and met my uncle in Al-Zaytoun, who took me to Patient Friend’s Benevolent Society Hospital. There, I was informed that I needed an emergency C-section, but we couldn’t afford the 1,000 shekel fee. We then went to Al-Helo International Hospital, where we were told no C-sections were being performed that day. Left with no other option, I walked—despite my excruciating pain—to Al-Sahaba Medical Complex, knowing that I suffer from chronic hypertension during pregnancy. Finally, I was admitted. I delivered my daughter, Nada, via C-section on November 8, 2023. The next day, I was discharged and returned home to Al-Zaytoun.

A week later, my husband, Riyad, took our newborn daughter to Al-Zaytoun Clinic for her first vaccination.

On November 20, 2023, at around 11:00 PM, we woke up to the sound of intense and close-range shelling by Israeli forces. We rushed to the living room, and my husband’s brother, Saqr (29), went upstairs to check on us. Suddenly, everything went dark. I felt a crushing weight on my shoulder, my daughter in my arms. I heard my mother calling my name, but when I answered, she didn’t respond.

Saqr arrived, cleared the rubble off me, and helped me out. I saw my mother holding my sister, Doha (16), who was bleeding profusely. My grandmother took baby Nada from my arms, washed her face with water, and performed mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, believing she had died from the Israeli airstrike. After a moment, she regained consciousness, and my grandmother handed her back to me.

Saqr urged me to leave the house. As I stepped outside, I was crying, unaware of the fate of my daughters or my husband. Then, I saw two men in black uniforms with weapons—I immediately knew they were Israeli special forces. I begged them to let me go back for my daughters. In response, they shone a red laser on me and pointed their guns, signaling for me to walk away. I compiled, making my way toward Hassan Al-Nakhalah School. I knocked, but no one answered. I then went to the adjacent Atta Al-Shawa School, where my cousin was sheltering as a displaced person. I stayed with her, lost and in shock, until 5:00 AM, when my relatives arrived at the school. One of them brought me my daughters, Lama and Ruba.

Then my uncle arrived, hugged me, and broke into tears. His grief told me everything—I had lost my loved ones. He confirmed the deaths of my husband, Riyad (30), my father, Wael Tawfiq Eshtiwi (50), my male brothers, Mohammed (21) and Ahmed (23), and my sister, Doha (16). I also lost my husband’s brothers, Mohammed Rafiq Eshtiwi (17) and Ahmed (14); my sister’s husband, Firas Hamed Eshtiwi (31); his father, Hamed Faris Eshtiwi (65); his son, Iyad (42); and Iyad’s children, Hamed (16), Hala (10), and Kinan (1). My uncle, Fadi Tawfiq Eshtiwi (32), and my cousin, Hana Faris Ishtaywi (10), were also among the dead. Among the displaced relatives who got killed were Yehya Ismail Fatouh (18), Hassan Munir Fatouh (35), his daughter, Noor (5), and Sama Radwan Eshtiwi (8).

As Israeli tanks neared the school, we fled to Al-Muntar School in Al-Shuja’iya, where I found my mother and sisters. We collapsed in grief, the pain consuming our hearts and bodies. We had lost everything. My mother, Maryam Issa Ibrahim Eshtiwi, my sister, Ola, and I had all become widows. We had also lost our brothers. But we placed our faith in God to endure this tragedy.

After two harrowing days in Al-Shuja’iya, we moved to a friend’s house on Al-Sahaba Street, where the owners had evacuated south. We stayed there for the duration of the war, struggling with hunger and thirst, collecting firewood to cook. With our breadwinners gone, we relied on humanitarian aid.

When the ceasefire was declared on January 19, 2025, my mother, sisters, and I moved to the Gaza Directorate of Education, which serves as a shelter for displaced families. We had nowhere else to go—our home had been completely destroyed by Israeli forces.”