Iraqi Women Association Fund

Small on purpose.

Being small means we can look at every case and every project individually, and make sure each pound reaches the child or family it was given for.

IWAF is non-political, non-religious and non-racial. We help whoever asks, regardless of colour, religion or ethnicity, and we follow all the rules of the Charity Commission for England and Wales.

Orphan sponsorship

£1 a day keeps one of the poorest children in school, and off the streets. A monthly lifeline for their family that costs less than a meal out in London.

£1 a day · £30 a month

Boys holding up new footballs in the school playground

Al-Farah orphan schools

Across the Al-Farah group of orphan schools in Baghdad (previously Kafil Al-Yateem) we fund school meals, clothing and medical support, so no child learns hungry, cold or unwell.

£10 a month feeds a child

Girls tracing ancient cuneiform script in an art workshop

Art expression workshops

Art-based sessions that build confidence, wellbeing and life goals for children affected by war and loss, led by artist and teacher Khulood Da'mi.

For four years and counting

Women's livelihoods

Bread-making machines, tanoor ovens, sewing machines and lessons, ice-cream carts and IT courses, so widows can build an income for their families.

From £70

Food parcels laid out ready for families

Ramadan & emergency appeals

Iftar nights for orphans, food baskets for families in extreme poverty, and help building homes for widows and orphaned families.

£10 hosts a child at iftar

Health & disability

Medicine and doctor's visits for children who can't afford them, eye glasses, and regular visits to centres for deaf and autistic children, the elderly and a children's cancer hospital.

Paid case by case

Choose what your gift becomes.

Pick an amount to see what it does, then donate by bank transfer using the reference shown so we can put your money exactly where you intended. No amount is too small.

Art that helps children heal.

Khulood Da'mi is a renowned Iraqi artist, an art teacher by profession and a former trustee of IWAF. Since the 1990s she has trained and worked in therapy through art with children affected by war and violence.

She returns to Iraq to spend weeks at a time running at least four workshops a day for children aged 6 to 15 in orphan schools, refugee centres and centres for children with special needs. They make Ramadan lanterns, kites and butterfly wings, and they write in cuneiform, the script their ancestors invented.

Three decades, one promise.

1995

IWAF is founded in the UK to support impoverished Iraqi orphans, widows and displaced families with food, medicine, shelter, counselling and education.

2021

Through Covid, volunteers keep visiting families. Eid presents for the children, school uniforms, and a 16-home building project for widows and orphans north of Baghdad.

Concrete being poured for the homes built for widows and orphans north of Baghdad

2022

An urgent clothing appeal for close to 700 children at Kafil Al-Yateem school (now Al-Farah), and art workshops with children at the autism centre in Karbala.

2024

Iftar for 280 orphans and a pioneering school trip to the Iraq Museum, where children met their own history for the first time.

Schoolgirls on their first visit to the Iraq Museum

2025

Iftar for 250 children in Ramadan, then five weeks in Baghdad in November and December: workshops, family visits, healthcare and trips to Babylon and Al-Wattar House.

Boys from the orphan school at the Ishtar Gate in Babylon

2026

Ramadan food baskets for all 80 children of Al-Farah 5 orphan school and their families, each with rice, oil, flour, lentils, chickpeas, sugar, tea, milk, eggs and chicken.