Feed Marwa’s Children in Gaza (Formerly 5 Families, Now 1)

Co-organized

Kelly McKay and Yasmine Ramadan are organizing this fundraiser.

Donation protected

My name is Kelly McKay, I'm a social worker and humanitarian living in Iowa City, Iowa. I, along with Yasmine Ramadan, a professor and fellow Iowa City resident, are raising funds for a young woman named Marwa Em Khaled and her family in Gaza who are struggling to survive due to the lack of access to humanitarian aid during this unfathomable nightmare. We're hoping to continue to provide them with the basic necessities of life: food, water, medicine, and hygiene supplies. They are a family of five: 30 year old Marwa, her husband Mokhles Eid, their daughter Lilas (7), son Khaled (6), and daughter Manal (2), who was only a few months old when their nightmare began. When they have enough supplies to share, they also help support their extended families, including elderly family members. We have a safe and reliable way to transfer the funds through a family friend from Gaza currently living in Europe, who then sends the funds directly to their bank accounts--as wire transfers from US to Gaza are prohibited.

Prices have gone up to insane levels, where a 25 kg bag of flour that will last a family of 5 a month is $1000. Somehow, with the help of many kind donors, Marwa and her family have managed to stay alive. Please help us keep it that way. We are their only hope!

Note: this fundraiser started in February, 2024, originally for 5 young women -- Marwa, Bayan, Haneen, Israa and Ayat, and their families. In August 2024, it became dedicated exclusively to Marwa's family. This occurred for various reasons: some of the women found other sources of support, others became impossible to send funds to due to the many obstacles that have arisen as infrastructure has been destroyed--such as banks and Money Gram locations running of cash in some locations. The vast majority of the funds raised were during the 6 months where the donations were being split between 5 families, so Marwa and her family have actually only received about $5,500 total as of Sept 1, 2025. They have somehow made it through, with Marwa and her husband Mukles Eid sacrificing meals for days and weeks on end to keep their children alive. I hope we can give them enough support to not have to do that anymore.

Please give generously, even if you can only afford $5--it adds up! From each according to their ability, to each according to their need. Please share with your sympathetic friends and family. THANK YOU for helping your fellow humans survive.

I am keeping the stories of the original five women below, in order to accurately document this fundraiser. I hope and pray they are all still alive and as well as can be under these extreme circumstances.

Thank you for caring!

Haneen: "Hello all, my name is Haneen Badwan ❤ I am 28 years old. I have two sisters, two brothers, my mother, and my married sister, her husband, and their five children--all who live and eat with us. My mother needs monthly treatments at a cost of $150 for blood pressure. She also suffers from calcium deficiency and joint problems, and needs medical glasses and monthly follow-up for eye problems I am from Nuseirat camp, Central Governorate, and I was displaced to Rafah due to the difficult conditions, when two shells fell on our house and it became uninhabitable. I lost my beloved father and my younger brother, Tareq, to the bombing. They were my support, to whom I resorted in my difficult times.

I need $2000 to meet my family’s needs for food, drink, and shelter. As you know, the cost of this is high. This house we live in is in very difficult conditions. It has no windows, doors, tiles, electricity or water. There is no better place than this, and if we do not accept it, we will sleep in the streets. The place is very cold and the children wake up from the extreme cold. We suffer from malnutrition due to the lack of healthy food. I need blankets for $200 and clothes for $300 because we could not bring anything from the house as it burned. We also need diapers for the babies at a cost of $200 per month, milk at a cost of $100, etc. And the homeowner asks for a monthly rent of $600. My sister in law is pregnant and needs to eat more than we have available.

I need help to buy healthy food, mineral water, and vegetables, and as you know, the prices here are very high and insane due to exploitation by merchants... The situation in Rafah has begun to increase with bombing and an escalation in the pace of events and threats. We want to save our lives and the lives of the children and go to a safe place, but no.

I know that there are compassionate and sympathetic hearts that sympathize with our situation that we are saying now. The conditions we are living in are miserable and very difficult. I hope you do not experience these situations, and I know that there are pure and compassionate hearts that feel our condition. I only hope that my family and I live a decent life, not sad or afraid and not feeling hungry, humiliated or thirsty, a beautiful life away from war, bombing, killing machines and genocide. My heart is crushed with pain for my family. I want to help them and not make them need anything. I love them, they deserve life."

Haneen's nephew Wael (her niece Roaa is in the cover photo)

Haneen's niece Jenan

Bayan: "My name is Bayan, I am 28 years old. My family consists of 7 members-- me, my husband, my four children, and my husband’s mother, who live and eat with us. We live in a small plastic room with my husband's brothers, their wives and their children. I lost two of my children and my house was damaged due to the bombing of my area. [Bayan was 9 months pregnant with twins--Elias and Jane. She was taking medication for a blood clotting disorder and lost them after bombing began which prevented access to any medication.]

I need at least $1000 dollars a month to pay for the plastic room, which costs me $300 dollars, and to buy diapers for the children and baby formula, and to buy treatment for my daughter, who suffers from a disease of soft nerves, and its price is very high. Also, treatment for my husband and his mother resulted in approximately $300 in which we learned they both have diabetes and high blood pressure and need ongoing medication.I was displaced from Gaza city to Khan Yunis and then to Rafah. I am living in a tragedy."

This is Bayan's house after it was bombed :(

Marwa: "We were in Al-Breij and fled to Nuseirat, then we fled to Rafah, then again we fled to Nuseirat, and then we returned again to Al-Breij under the fire, sitting under the fire, not knowing what to eat or drink, or able to buy diapers for our children. All of life is expensive. If we want to live our lives, $1,500 is not enough for us. We are 20 people in a house--me, my husband, my children, and my family, and husband's family as well, because their house was bombed. I need money for food and supplies -- including pampers and children's medicines for colds and fevers, which is approximately $300 alone, and the rent for the tent is approximately $500.

We want to return to safety, peace, our freedom, and our life as it was before. We are tired, our psychology is tired, our bodies are tired, and there are no tricks left in us."

Two of Marwa's 3 children: Lilas, age 7, Khaled, age 6, and Manal, age 2

Ayat: "My name is Ayat Khaled Eid. I am 21 years old. I was married in September. I am from Bureij and was displaced to a tent in Rafah. I live here with my husband's family, sisters and brothers--the number of children is 10. I need at least $1000 to meet our needs every month. I now have two children--the daughters of my husband’s brother and his wife who were killed in the war. Here is my tragic situation, and these two girls I adopted are Ghazal and Saba, ages 4 and 5. My husband's nephew need treatment for diabetes, and it costs $200 a month."

Ayat's nieces-now-daughters

Israa: "I am 25 years old. I was a student at Gaza University before the war. We are a family consisting of 16 members. My father is elderly and diabetic, and needs treatment for approximately $200 a week. My mother is elderly, and I have 7 sisters and one brother is married and lives with us. Our house was destroyed and we were displaced to Rafah and sat in a tent. Then we were displaced again to Bureij due to the situation, and we now stay in a tent, and we need approximately $1,000 dollars a month to meet our needs of food, drink, treatment, and a tent My father is suffering from a chronic disease (diabetes) and the price of his treatment is so high that I cannot afford it sometimes."