"In the End, It Was All Just Empty Words"

“I married him without truly agreeing—he already had a wife and children, but my family convinced me. He promised he’d do anything I wanted, buy me anything I asked for… but in the end, it was all just talk. He constantly blamed me for everything. He never respected me. Every day was a fight.” That’s how Suheir, a 40-year-old woman from a village near Ramallah, describes her marriage—a relationship that recently ended when she filed for divorce, unable to continue living with a man who regularly drank and never treated her with dignity. Despite her husband’s attempts to smear her reputation by claiming she wanted the divorce because she was in love with someone else, Suheir says: “What matters most to me is getting him out of my life—permanently.” Living with hearing and vision impairments, Suheir had to sell her own bracelet just to afford a hearing aid. She now lives in a single room in her parents’ home with her children, where privacy and independence are difficult. “I just wish I had a house of my own to raise my children in peace—away from my parents’ constant interference. At first, my father refused to let me stay at their home and demanded I go back to my husband. It wasn’t until my brother stepped in, understood the abuse I had endured, and helped me appoint a lawyer to claim my rights, that I began to feel some relief.” Although her ex-husband is financially well-off and recently remarried, he has cut off all contact with Suheir and their children. She says the most painful part is watching their youngest daughter—who was especially attached to him—struggle with abandonment. “She couldn’t believe her father had left and stopped asking about her. She cried so much that it damaged her eyes. We still haven’t been able to get her the treatment she needs.”