When the economy plummeted after the first and then second Intifada many men lost their jobs and it was left to the women to find a way to sustain their families. Fatmeh Braigeya found herself in this situation. She had four married children and grandchildren to support.

Born and raised in Venezuela, Huda returned to her family’s village of Silwad at eighteen to marry and raise a family. She went on to have nine children. As a result of family intermarriage, three of Huda’s children have severe mental and physical handicaps. Huda needed to find a way to earn income to pay for her children’s treatment and medications.

Samar is 46 year-old married with 7 children, she lives in Yabad, a village close to Jenin in the Northern West Bank. Samar was working in trading clothes since she was 30 years old. She used to go from one boutique to another in Jenin in order to sell her products, which she buys from Jordan and Syria.

Sabah from Yabad who is the mother of five, began her business life in 1987 during the first intifada. Because of continued closures and curfews food was hard to obtain, and Sabah began to sell juice and sandwiches from her home. This went well and so she expanded to selling special foods for Ramadan.