Each spring, families across the world celebrate Mother’s Day, a day of flowers, breakfast in bed, and makeshift gifts for our matriarchs. If spring is the season of hope and life, mothers are the settled roots that remain grounded and steady year-round. Mother’s Day in this sense sounds simple and pleasant. A familiar embrace of traditions: showcasing a child’s handmade coupon book or sharing breakfast with a bouquet of fresh flowers often handpicked from a nearby garden or field. However, this Arab Mother’s Day, nothing is familiar, particularly for the mothers of Gaza.  

Families may be separated, having been unable to afford or access passage into any place of safety. There is no breakfast in bed for mothers whose homes are covered in rubble and food is under blockade. Coupons for “one free hug” cannot be shared between a mother and a child who has lost their limbs. Warmth is not felt by a mother who must celebrate Mother’s Day alone, while her kids’ remains are lost.  

Palestinian mothers are a testament to unwavering care, despite unimaginable hardship. Today marks the recognition of all facets of “mother” no matter their circumstance: To every mother who has risen to the challenge neither wanting to or being prepared, to those who fill the role of caretaker to children who are not their own, to every mother who does not know what comes next and continues to put on a face of composure for the sake of her children, to mothers martyred, and mothers who despite all odds continue to survive, this day is for you.  

While bombs are dropped on mothers and children in Palestine, and weapons made in countries outside Palestine are used to terrorize our people inside Occupied Palestine, we acknowledge how we are all inextricably tied to the same concept of Mother’s Day, the same knowing of motherhood: the fierce love of a mother, the vulnerability of raising children in a world that often seems unjust, and the yearning for a future where our children are safe.