Rafah, Gaza Strip ― June 7, 2010 ― Twenty-three-year-old Heba Mansour lives with 13 of her family members in a modest house in the Rafah area in the southern part of the Gaza Strip. When she was three months old, Heba’s parents discovered that she suffered from Thalassemia, a genetic disease causing severe anemia. Two of Mansour’s younger siblings suffer from the same health problem, 16-year-old Mahmoud and 12-year-old Hanan.

In spite of her health difficulties, Mansour graduated from university with a social science degree in 2008. She tries to live as normally as she can. “I remember my illness only when I go to the hospital for transfusion once every month or two,” she says.

When Mansour graduated from university two years a go, she volunteered with a local organization to try to find a source of income to improve her family’s meager $120 per month. She was also afraid of getting isolated at home. In early 2010, she heard about an International Relief & Development (IRD) project implemented through the Al Beit Al Said Society in Rafah area that aims to provide temporary job for recent graduates through local NGOs. She immediately applied. “For the first time, I felt that I was lucky,” Mansour said. “The society was just about to send their graduates list when I went there and asked to participate in the project.”

Mansour started her work in the Al Beit Al Said Society on the first of April. The project offers physical and psychosocial health care for families in the Rafah area. Mansour was initially only very glad that she could help her family with an additional $330 per month. But after a while, she found that she also gained experience in her major. “During my work as a social worker, I have met with many families who are suffering because of their children’s sickness,” she explains. “My interventions with these families are very effective due to my understanding of their feelings and the difficulties they are facing. I discovered that my weakness can become my point of strength.”

“The society was surprised when we reviewed Heba’s cases reports,” says Nahed Zorob, Al Beit Al Said Project Coordinator. “For the first month of her work in the Society, Heba offered psychosocial, and health-care workshops and group sessions for 1,120 persons, which is a huge number compared to her colleagues. Heba has a creative ways to attract the beneficiaries to attend her sessions. Besides, she is a very understanding and open-minded social worker.”

“Everyone in my big family is very happy because of my work. Even the environment in the house improved since I started my work. We have started thinking positively.” Mansour adds, “I started my first step to achieve my dreams. I hope that one day I can establish a society to take care of children suffering from Thalassemia in the south of the Gaza Strip.”

“The IRD project offers Heba a unique opportunity to use her energies and improve herself,” says Zorob. “For the first time in Gaza, we are witnessing a cash-for-work project that is really interested in giving graduates real experience related to their majors.”

With her first stipend from IRD, Mansour and her brother Mahmoud, who is the family’s other breadwinner, bought some basic needs like food and clothes. She also bought two packs of the medications that she and her two siblings need to modify the iron percentage in their blood. The two packs are intended for one person for a month, but she shared them with her sick siblings. “My little sister Hanan is still very young. She needs those bills to improve the performance of her heart and liver,” Mansour explains.

“Because of the IRD project that reached me and more than 1,050 recent graduates in the Gaza Strip, I am strong now. I do not need sympathy,” she exclaims. “I am a productive woman who can help herself and her family.”

“I send my deep gratitude to IRD for their supportive project, which not only helps recent graduates, but also the local NGOs to expand their services and help a large number of needy persons in the Gaza Strip,” she concludes.