Gaza mother recounts loss after being widowed twice during war
A young mother from Gaza City has described losing two husbands and two children during the war in Gaza, in a personal account that reflects the wider human toll of the conflict. Nisreen Touman said she has spent the past three years going to bed in tears as she remembers what she lost after the war began in October 2023. By the time she was 34, she said, she had been widowed twice.
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Touman said her first husband and their two children were killed in June 2024, and that she remarried eight months later before losing her second husband in July 2025 while she was pregnant. She said her first family had lived in Nuseirat in central Gaza, where she had shared a stable home with her husband Sami and their children Mahmoud and Laith. According to her account, the children were five and two years old when they died.
She described returning home on June 8, 2024, after visiting relatives who had been displaced to al-Mawasi in Khan Younis. Touman said heavy bombing and gunfire began after she arrived, and that her husband went outside to bring the children and other relatives inside. She said he was later killed by a gunshot to the head from a quadcopter flying over the area, before the house was struck by an aircraft minutes later.
Touman said she briefly lost consciousness and woke to dust that obscured her view. As it cleared, she said she saw blood and body parts and began shouting for her children. She recalled finding them on the ground, one with severe head injuries and the other appearing to be asleep.
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She said she immediately understood they were dead and was unable to move because of shock. Her account is one of many individual stories emerging from Gaza as the war continues to reshape family life, displacement and survival. The conflict has forced repeated movement across the territory, including to areas such as al-Mawasi, which has been used as a refuge by displaced families.
In that context, the loss of homes, relatives and sources of stability has become a defining feature of daily life for many civilians. The story also highlights the long-term consequences of the war for women who have lost spouses and children and are left to rebuild their lives amid ongoing insecurity. Touman's experience shows how quickly a family can be broken apart in a conflict where airstrikes, gunfire and drone activity have all been reported in the same incident.
It also underlines the strain on extended families who shelter together in crowded conditions. What remains unclear from the account is the broader military context around the June 2024 strike and the July 2025 killing of Touman's second husband. The report does not provide independent confirmation of the deaths or further details about the circumstances beyond her testimony.
The next developments to watch are whether more information emerges about the incidents she described and how families in Gaza continue to cope with repeated loss.
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