Two Gaza Sisters Go Live on Escaping Father’s Abuse

Gazans have been heavily debating two different videos shared online, showing two different narratives of the same family case; two Gazan women appearing to explain that they escaped their father's house after detailing abuse, and a father claiming his daughters were kidnapped by certain "groups", urging the government in Gaza to help return them.

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In the first video, two young women from Rafah, Gaza introduce themselves as licensed lawyers Hana Emad Alasi Altaweel who is also known as Wesam, and her sister Fatima explained that contrary to their father's Facebook post, they were "not kidnapped" and that they were safe and sound in hiding after successfully escaping from their father's house.

During the video, Wesam continued to explain that their father had practiced different forms of abuse against them, including "locking them in the house, depriving them of food, before encouraging them to commit suicide by placing gas cylinder in the room".

Source: Twitter

Wesam, 23, then urged the government in Gaza, in addition to international and human rights organizations to help them find a safe place away from their father.

Several hours later, their father, Emad Alasi Altaweel appeared on a 27-minute long Facebook live video while crying, claiming that his daughters were kidnapped by "certain people" he did not identify, saying they had been blackmailing them and forcing them to make such accusations against him.

Emad Alasi Altaweel then urged the Gaza government to help "save" his daughters, hinting the case is a result of "a targeted campaign against him" and brushing off accusations of domestic abuse, explaining that he had reported them to the Hamas-led government in Gaza.

Translation: "Photo from the live video of Gaza's abused girls, Wesam and Fatima, during which his gun appears on his desk. My question for those who defend the father; why is his gun on his desk?"

In the video, the father tells viewers "if my daughter comes back and gets killed, do not accuse me of it".

Using the hashtag #انقذوا_وسام_وفاطمة (Save Wesam and Fatima), online people shared written testimonies by the girls' friends, detailing examples of abuse they endured from their father over the years, to redraw attention to their narrative, after attempts by their father, uncles, and other relatives, to reshape the case as a political one.

According to Wesam and Fatima's friends, abuse has been going on for nearly 4 years, including many death threats by the father who owns an unauthorized gun, one that appears in his live video on Facebook. They also added that he "had no respect for their privacy as he used to raid their rooms, regularly check the content of their mobile phones, and ban them from leaving the house even for work".

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Online sources have also shed light on the father's background, saying he joined the Fatah movement in his early years by the end of the 1980s, and that he had lived in different countries ever since, including Egypt, Algeria, Sudan, Yemen, Lebanon, during which he was jailed and deported several times, before going back to Gaza. They also claimed that the family dispute is a result of the daughters' travel plans, which were rejected by their father.

In a message she wrote to ICORN international cities of refuge network, Wesam explains that her father had previously forced her to enroll in a university in Gaza and that he now insists on banning her from traveling to Turkey to achieve her dreams, after she received a scholarship to study literature.