For most of her 39 years, Naima lived in survival mode.
As a teenager she was married and then widowed, left to raise her young son Feisal alone in Somalia. A mother at just 15, her own parents had died years earlier.
Knowing she needed to work to provide a better future for her son, she sought out English lessons but was caught by Islamist extremists who chopped off her hand.
For years, Naima and Feisal, a Muslim mother and son, were self-reliant, navigating life alone.
Then, in April 2025, a WhatsApp call marked a change – for the first time, she felt she wouldn’t have to carry everything by herself.
On the screen, from Melbourne, was a group of six friends – Karen, Nicole, Dave, Danielle, Lyn and Jennifer – who had been matched with the family and would help them start a new life in Australia. The friends made up a Jewish friendship group called Hope for Eden.
“When they told me how they were going to help us in Australia, we had never had anything like that, it was everybody fighting for themselves,” Naima said.
“I was always in survival mode. When I came to Australia I finally felt like no one was going to hurt me.”
That call was the beginning of a relationship which has grown over the past 12 months into a deep friendship between a Muslim refugee family and a group of Jewish friends, bridging cultures and religious traditions against the backdrop of escalating conflicts and divisions.
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