Health, Home, and Possibility for a Gazzawi Family

My name is Zeena, I'm a Somatic Therapist based in Jordan.

I hesitate to share stories of people I work with from Gaza because I feel it’s important that we don’t sensationalize these stories in a way that also others them. That turns them into their story of pain. Into their sub-human resilience. That sees them only through the lens of their enemy.

The truth is, the impact of settler colonialism is most felt on their bodies, but their bodies also carry the same dreams, longings, and cares we have. They too contemplate relationship dynamics, have a passion for painting, debate which haircut best suits them, and laugh about the absurdity of their mother-in-law. They too seek liberation.

This mother and her three children are a family I began working with after they evacuated during the first ceasefire. I went to support the very blatant ways their bodies were communicating trauma—for what they have seen and endured is far more than I can ever put into words. What they continue to endure—with their father, uncles, and grandmother escaping death every moment—is ongoing.

And while bodies need tending, bodies also live in context. Trauma work cannot be abstracted from whether someone has food, rest, housing, or safety.

The thing with these conditions is that they are layered, corrosive, and drowning. Poverty isn’t something outside of you; its impact is felt inside—in the way our basic bodily functions falter, in the way we are drained, tired, attempting to overcome disease. Left unaddressed, these conditions begin to shape what feels possible. They shrink agency into survival.

But in our understanding of all of this, we must not reinforce power-over dynamics, nor uphold the belief that some are here to change the system while others are too impacted to shape it. We must first and foremost recognize the agency in all of us—that supporting material conditions is foundational only because it creates the ground for one’s agency and responsibility to be remembered.

Today isn’t the day I share all that I am learning from them—but I will share this: even if you are far from direct impact—even if safety, love, and purpose animate your life—everything about you, and all of us, is political. And until we understand that, we will remain out of touch with real and genuine change.

Today I am asking for your support to help this family receive adequate support for medical operations the mother and her son urgently need. This fund will also help them access health insurance and sustain their rent for at least a year. It will also go to her family still in Gaza—her husband, her mother, and the few brothers who have not been martyred.

Despite all the obvious ways this will be of service, this support is really about creating the conditions where rest is possible—not the kind of rest where you sleep, but the kind where your body is no longer bracing. Where it can finally catch a break. Where survival softens enough for possibility to take root again.

These funds will be used as follows: