Israel & Palestine

Israel’s genocide in Gaza has been catastrophic for women and girls, with widespread destruction of infrastructure, 90 percent of the population displaced, severe shortages of fuel and basic necessities, and the decimation of maternal care. Israel continues to restrict the flow of aid into Gaza, while Israel is allegedly deliberately depriving Palestinians in Gaza of water as a form of collective punishment. Women-headed households—now comprising an estimated one-in-four households in Gaza—face overlapping pressures and acute caregiving burdens, while worsening poverty and food insecurity  increases girls’ risk of child marriage, which has surged since October 2023. The near-total destruction of Gaza’s courts and legal system has drastically reduced access to protection and accountability mechanisms for survivors of gender-based violence, leaving women and girls at heightened risk of violence with few avenues for justice. At the same time, women and girls in the West Bank and East Jerusalem face escalating abuses—including sexual harassment and violence—by Israeli settlers, in what has been condemned as a coordinated campaign enabled by the Israeli government aimed at expelling Palestinians from the occupied territory. Israeli military operations and restrictions on movement—including the detention of women and journalists—continue to impede Palestinians’ access to healthcare, employment, and education, disproportionately affecting women and girls who often shoulder caregiving responsibilities while facing compounding pressures.

While women-led organizations in Gaza serve as key humanitarian responders, they remain under-resourced and under-recognized. The conflict has been one of the deadliest for journalists on record—including women journalists and aid workers—further silencing key voices that document the suffering of women and girls. Women remain largely excluded from formal negotiation processes, and only one woman has been selected to serve on the 15-member National Civil Administration for Gaza (NCAG).  In Israel, women make up only six of 32 ministers in the government, and while the number of women in the Knesset has increased in recent decades, their representation in local governance and party leadership remains persistently low. 

Despite underrepresentation, Israeli and Palestinian women continue to lead vital initiatives to advocate for peace through civil society organizations. Women Wage Peace and Women of the Sun, which bring together Israeli and Palestinian women to advance peacebuilding, were nominated for the 2024 Nobel Peace Prize, while women in Israel have continued to lead grassroots movements protesting the deaths of Gazans and calling for an end to the war. Sustained international support for women’s protection and participation remains essential, including efforts to recognize and amplify women’s leadership in negotiation, peacebuilding, and recovery.

A September 2026 report by Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem outlines Israel’s coordinated system of abuses against Palestinians in the West Bank. The report documents movement restrictions, social and political repression, displacement, and sexual and gender-based violence—the effects of which uniquely impact Palestinian women and girls who already face heightened, gender-specific risks. Years of systemic abuses are culminating in record levels of violence and settlement expansion, which risk permanently removing Palestinians from their homes, and cutting off access to healthcare, education, livelihoods, and places of worship—including recent attacks on Taybeh, the last remaining all-Christian village. West Bank violence has sparked international outrage, including the UK’s announcement of sanctions on illegal Israeli settlements, marking a major policy shift. 

The number of woman-headed households in Gaza has almost doubled since 2023, as Israeli attacks have killed tens of thousands of civilians and leaving women to bear the burden of caring for their families amid near-total destruction of critical infrastructure—often forced to make impossible choices between basic necessities. Women heading households face heightened protection and displacement risks: 68 percent report unmet housing needs, 74 percent have had their homes damaged or destroyed, and women-headed households have been displaced an average of eight times since October 2023. The dramatic demographic shift illustrates gendered-impacts of the conflict, which is transferring economic, caregiving, and protection responsibilities onto Palestinian women.

More than 1,300 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the October 2025 ceasefire, as Israeli attacks continue to strike civilian areas and critical infrastructure—the destruction of buildings has also risen by 10 percent in the same period. Efforts to implement the next phase of the ceasefire and transfer authority to the National Civil Administration for Gaza (NCAG) face persistent barriers amid ongoing Israeli military operations and destruction of infrastructure. The NCAG includes only one woman among its 15 members, reflecting persistent exclusion of Palestinian women—who continue to experience devastating harm—from participating in decision-making about the future of Gaza. 

The ongoing food and healthcare crises are compounding risks for pregnant and breastfeeding women, which is reflected in the sharp rise in recorded miscarriages. The miscarriage rate in the first half of 2026 is more than three times that of the second half of 2025, with health workers attributing the spike to the compounding effects of malnutrition, dehydration, displacement, psychological trauma, and disrupted access to care.

The near-total destruction of Gaza’s courts and legal system has drastically reduced access to critical protection and accountability mechanisms for survivors of GBV, leaving women and girls at heightened risk of violence with few avenues for justice. Reported GBV cases have increased by 32 percent in early 2026 compared with the previous year—while child and teen pregnancy have surged since 2023. The increase in documented cases may reflect expanded access to reporting mechanisms, but assessments indicate that these figures remain a significant undercount of the true scale of GBV. At the same time, Palestinian women and girls in Israeli detention are subject to sexual harassment, invasive strip searches, and other forms of torture and ill-treatment.

SHIFT Futures, a binational initiative led by Israelis and Palestinians, offers an innovative approach to envisioning a shared future by explicitly centering women as key agents of recovery, peacebuilding, and political transformation. The Woman & Gender framework was developed by Israeli and Palestinian women and draws on lessons from Ireland’s Good Friday Agreement, moving beyond treating women’s inclusion as a matter of representation to identifying concrete pathways for women to exercise power in peace processes and post-conflict governance.

For women and girls in Gaza, who have endured prolonged displacement, loss, caregiving responsibilities, and exposure to violence, art is providing a rare outlet for processing grief and preserving a sense of agency. Palestinian cartoonist Safaa Odah has documented displacement and daily life from inside a tent, using art to process and bear witness to her experiences. Such efforts underscore the importance of creating safe spaces where women and girls can heal both physically and psychologically.