My friend Shahad Dahlan in Gaza.

I am raising funds for my friend in Gaza. This fund is to help her leave Gaza and move to Egypt where she can live in peace with her family. This is her message to everyone:

My name is Shahad Dahlan, I am 30 years old, and my husband is Hassan Al-Badrsawi, 34 years old. We live together in a story filled with both hope and pain, a story that began many years ago in a small, warm home that represented security to us. Those walls, despite their small size, contained everything: our memories, our hopes, and our dreams. But, in a single moment, we lost everything.

In the early days of our life together, we lived in a rented house, and we struggled with all our might to provide a better life. We worked hard, despite the hardships of life, until we reached our goal: a small home of our own. We even built it with our own hands, and when we finished, it was one of the happiest days of our lives. But the dream didn’t last long. Due to the deadly war that swept through our country, we were forced to leave our home.

The moments when we said goodbye to our house, carrying all our memories and dreams, were some of the hardest moments in our lives. We left it behind with everything in it, and lived for a long time in tents. We fled to Al-Aqsa University, but when the occupation took over, we had to move again, first to Rafah and then to Deir al-Balah. It was a journey filled with suffering, confusion, and hardships that we didn’t know how to face. We were even bombed several times and escaped death by miracle.

But what destroyed us completely was when we returned to our home, only to find that everything had turned into a pile of rubble. Our memories, our dream, and our hard work were gone. The house that was once full of memories and dreams we built with our hands was now nothing but ruins. We lost our job, we lost our home, we lost everything. Even our small cat, who was part of our family, disappeared.

Our lives were once full of hope, but now we live day by day, struggling just to stay alive. I had studied physical education at Al-Aqsa University, and I worked in gyms and children's entertainment programs for summer activities. As for my husband, Hassan, he worked in interior design and decoration, and he was passionate about his work. But now, he can’t find any job opportunities, and we are living in very difficult conditions.

Our dream today is simply to survive and stay alive. Our dream is to reach Egypt, where we hope to find a safe place to start over. This is our only dream, and every day we fight to achieve it.

Today, we are in desperate need of your help. Any donation from you, no matter how small, will have a significant impact on rebuilding our lives. You are our hope after God, and with your support, we will be able to build a new future full of hope.

We thank God first, and then we thank you for your support and assistance in this difficult journey.