As Mother’s Day draws nearer, we are thinking of the mothers forced to raise their children through humanitarian crises.

Like mothers in Gaza, where there is simply no more food, and 70% of infrastructure has been heavily damaged or destroyed. Women, girls, pregnant women, and new mothers have been left with little to no access to essential supplies or maternal and reproductive healthcare.

This Mother’s Day, supporters like you can bring hope to mothers in Gaza and crisis-stricken regions like it. Will you please make a matched donation to UNFPA that delivers double the lifesaving care, mental health support, and trained staff to women, girls, and pregnant women and their newborns?

Hadeel, 23, lives in a refugee camp called Nuseirat in Gaza with her five-year-old daughter. When we spoke to her, she was seeking a check-up at Al Awda Hospital — one of the few left standing in the region.

Hadeel described the effects the war is having on the women around her. “Giving birth under these conditions is not feasible,” she told UNFPA.

“Every pregnancy these days is a struggle, with illness, fatigue and malnutrition.”

An estimated 155,000 pregnant women and new mothers in Gaza currently face dire conditions and are struggling to survive food shortages in tents and makeshift shelters that leave them and their children exposed to the elements.

This Mother’s Day and every day, UNFPA is doing all we can to reach the most vulnerable enduring crises in Gaza and around the world. UNFPA has deployed six mobile maternity units in Gaza to reach mothers even in areas that are hardest to access, and UNFPA-supported midwives and health teams are working around the clock to provide care to pregnant women and their newborns.

However, there are no more food deliveries and recent funding cuts have severely impacted the ability of humanitarian relief groups like ours to continue reaching those who need it most with lifesaving care.

As one woman in the Jabalia refugee camp explained: “War becomes two wars when it affects a woman — she suffers in all aspects: The bitterness of war, the bitterness of loss, and the bitterness of meeting her needs as a woman.”

You can help us provide for women, girls, and mothers on every front: from mental health support, to providing safe spaces, to delivering lifesaving maternal and reproductive healthcare. Give a lifesaving gift to mothers living through humanitarian crises today — it’s meaningful support you can provide, and your impact will be doubled when you contribute before Mother’s Day.

We condemn the violence in Gaza, Syria, Sudan, Lebanon, Gaza, the West Bank, and Israel, and hope for a sustained humanitarian ceasefire, the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages by Hamas, and an end to the violence. The suffering must end and peace must prevail.

Sincerely,

Anu Surendran
Chief Executive Officer
USA for UNFPA