In a quiet village on the outskirts of Hebron, Palestine, a woman named Mariam recently faced a modern nightmare that threatened to shatter her life. A trusted friend had secretly photographed her without her veil and was using the images as leverage for extortion, threatening to broadcast them across the internet. Thousands of miles away, in the Jiwaka province of Papua New Guinea, Lilly lives in a state of perpetual hyper-vigilance. She fears the moment her husband returns from the market intoxicated, knowing his violence is often accompanied by the seizure of the household’s only mobile phone—an act of digital isolation that severs her connection to the outside world and life-saving resources. Meanwhile, in the war-torn streets of Kyiv, Ukraine, Iryna*, a survivor of sexual violence living with HIV, found herself adrift in the chaos of a full-scale invasion, her essential support networks and medical care suddenly unreachable.
These women live in vastly different cultures and geographies, yet they are bound by a common thread: the escalating volatility of a world where violence against women is no longer confined to physical spaces. As the boundaries between the real and the virtual continue to dissolve, the threats facing women and girls have mutated, becoming more pervasive and harder to escape. However, a powerful shift in global philanthropy and humanitarian response is taking place. Through a coordinated effort by multilateral funds, the international community is moving beyond simple crisis intervention toward a model of long-term resilience, ensuring that when the next disaster strikes—be it a war, a pandemic, or a digital breach—the infrastructure to protect women is already in place.
The statistics remain a sobering reminder of the scale of this challenge. Globally, one in three women will experience gender-based violence in her lifetime. These numbers are not static; they surge during times of conflict and economic instability. Today, however, the "traditional" forms of abuse—physical assault, domestic servitude, and systemic exclusion—are being amplified by technology-facilitated violence. From deepfakes and non-consensual image sharing to high-tech stalking and online harassment, the digital frontier has become a new battlefield. This digital abuse does more than cause psychological harm; it systematically pushes women out of public life, silencing their voices in schools, workplaces, and political arenas.
To combat this multifaceted crisis, two primary United Nations grant-making mechanisms—the UN Trust Fund to End Violence against Women (UN Trust Fund) and the United Nations Women’s Peace and Humanitarian Fund (WPHF)—have forged a strategic partnership. By working alongside UN Women, these funds are bridging the gap between immediate emergency relief and the sustained institutional building required to foster lasting safety. Their philosophy is simple but revolutionary: local women’s rights organizations are the most effective first responders. They possess the cultural nuance, the community trust, and the lived experience necessary to navigate the complexities of violence in their specific contexts.
The transformation of the Ukrainian Foundation for Public Health (UFPH) serves as a hallmark of this "resilience-first" approach. Long before the current full-scale war, between 2011 and 2014, the UN Trust Fund invested in UFPH to strengthen protection services for the most marginalized—women living with HIV and those experiencing homelessness. This early investment was not just about immediate aid; it was about building a professional network of social workers, health providers, and law enforcement officers trained in survivor-centered care.
When the invasion of Ukraine began in 2022, this pre-existing foundation allowed for an incredibly rapid response. Partnering with the WPHF and UN Women Ukraine, the UFPH activated its veteran network to launch the "Safe Women Hub." This online platform was designed specifically to reach women like Iryna, providing mental health support, legal referrals, and anonymous shelter options to those displaced by the fighting. Because the expertise had been cultivated years prior, the organization did not have to start from scratch; they simply scaled an existing ecosystem of care to meet the demands of a wartime emergency.
In the Occupied Palestinian Territory, the concept of resilience takes on a different form—one rooted in decades of community building. The Rural Women’s Development Society (RWDS) has spent forty years establishing a network of 58 women’s clubs across the region. These clubs are more than just meeting rooms; they are sanctuaries where women can escape the isolation imposed by both conflict and traditional social structures.
For Mariam, the victim of digital blackmail in Hebron, her local women’s club was her only lifeline. Through the club, she was connected to a psychosocial therapist who helped her navigate the trauma, while RWDS worked with the Palestinian Cybercrime Unit to ensure the non-consensual photos were removed from the web. The WPHF and the UN Trust Fund have provided complementary layers of support to RWDS, allowing them to adapt to the newest threats. While the WPHF provides flexible funding to empower youth and women as "early warning" reporters of violence, the UN Trust Fund ensures that specialized services remain available for widowed women and women with disabilities—groups that are often the first to be forgotten when a conflict intensifies.
Rulla Sarras, the Director of Funding and Development at RWDS, emphasizes that protection is the foundation of all other progress. "Right now, what women need most is protection," she explains. "They want to live in their homes safely, free from attacks. Even amid war, women are caring for their families and communities, and they need to feel secure—physically, mentally, and emotionally—to continue keeping those around them safe."
The necessity of this work is perhaps nowhere more evident than in Papua New Guinea, where two-thirds of women experience violence. In the Jiwaka Province, the grassroots organization Voice for Change (VfC) is dismantling the culture of violence from the ground up. With initial support from the UN Trust Fund, VfC led a province-wide initiative that transformed local markets into safe zones for women vendors and catalyzed the creation of a Women Human Rights Defenders network.
Now, with the agility provided by WPHF funding, VfC is tackling the digital dimension of abuse. They have established Family Safety Committees that bring together police, justice officials, and peace mediators to create streamlined referral pathways for survivors. Crucially, these committees are now educating women on how to navigate online spaces safely, ensuring that technology remains a tool for empowerment rather than a weapon for abusers. By integrating digital safety into their community prevention plans, VfC is ensuring that as the country modernizes, its women are not left vulnerable to new forms of exploitation.
The success of these initiatives highlights a critical lesson for the global humanitarian community: ending violence against women is not a project with a fixed end date, but a continuous process of adaptation and support. We are currently facing a global funding crisis that threatens to roll back decades of progress. In this environment, the "feminist funding" model—characterized by long-term investment, institutional strengthening, and local leadership—is more vital than ever.
The partnership between the UN Trust Fund and the WPHF represents a new paradigm in international aid. By combining the UN Trust Fund’s ability to build robust, long-term institutions with the WPHF’s ability to move quickly and reach the most remote, crisis-affected communities, they have created a unified ecosystem. This approach recognizes that a woman’s safety is a continuum; it is not enough to save her during a war if she is left to face digital blackmail or domestic abuse in the silence that follows.
True resilience is built when survivors like Mariam, Lilly, and Iryna no longer have to negotiate for their dignity. It is built when the organizations they turn to have the resources to stay open, the expertise to evolve, and the power to lead. By investing in the women on the front lines, these multilateral funds are doing more than responding to crises—they are building a world where safety is a guaranteed right, both in the physical world and on every screen.
