War Paws

🐾💛 Samira Update💛🐾 Our lovely girl Samira was spayed a few days ago, and she has been an absolute perfect lady since arriving with us just over a week ago. She is so friendly, always happy to see us, and her tail never stops wagging 🥹🐶 We’ve now introduced her to Section 5, and it won’t be long before she’s made lots of new friends. We still feel desperately sad for her that she lost the home were she was very clearly loved but we will do our best to make sure that she feels all the love in the world here with us. Samira is a reminder of how quickly a dog can settle when they feel safe and loved 💛 #warpaws #shelterlife #dogs

🐾💛 Meet Gloria & Gaynor💛🐾 Yesterday, while Louise and Shamus were walking the driveway, they spotted this brave mum and her single pup. We couldn’t find any other puppies, and sadly we believe they didn’t survive. Other dogs were bothering her, but she valiantly protected her baby until we were able to reach them. Now they are both safe inside the shelter. Mum is such a beautiful, friendly girl, but it’s clear she has been forced to have litter after litter for a long time. That ends now. Gloria will be vaccinated, spayed, and will never have to give birth again. Her little pup, Gaynor, is safe by her side where she belongs. They are the perfect example of why we MUST save the shelter — because without it, dogs like Gloria and Gaynor would have no future. 💛 💛 Donate today and help us save their home 🐾 🔗 𝐋𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐬 𝐭𝐨 𝐝𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐞 👇 justgiving.com/campaign/warpa… cuddly.com/donate/4958780… mygivingcircle.org/war-paws/free #warpaws #freeroamingdogs #dogrescue #dogs

🎟️🐣 Only 10 Days Left to Enter! 🐣🎟️ There are just 10 days left to enter our Easter Raffle — and we have some amazing prizes up for grabs! 💛 ✨ Luxury vegan & non-vegan Easter eggs 🧸 Collectible Sergei & Bo Sheep plush 🦷 Oral-B Pro Vitality electric toothbrush 🐱🐶 Cat & dog hampers 🎫 Tickets are just £1 and every penny goes towards our Save the Shelter Fund 👉 raffall.com/412849/enter-r… Don’t miss your chance to win — get your tickets now! 🌍 Open to entrants worldwide

🐱💛 Caturday Biscoff Update 💛🐱 Beautiful Biscoff has been with us for almost 2 weeks now, and what a delightful little girl she has turned out to be. Every day her confidence grows, and we can honestly say she is one of the most loving cats we’ve ever had in the clinic, we are all smitten 💘Her favourite thing in the world is to be held and cuddled, closely followed by food and playtime! 🥹 We cannot stress enough how important your votes on @MyGivingCircle are for cats like Biscoff. With the shelter under an eviction notice, it’s hard not to think about what will happen to cats like her if we don’t reach our funding target. 🗳️ A vote is FREE 💛 Donations = extra votes 📅 You can vote once every week We are still over 3000 votes behind 1st place with just 10 days left in this round. Can we hope for a miracle and get back to the top spot? 🙏 mygivingcircle.org/war-paws/free #warpaws #cats #caturdayvibes #catrescue

📰✨ We’re incredibly grateful to @YahooNewsAU for publishing an article about our shelter today and helping us raise awareness of our mission to Save the Shelter 💛 au.news.yahoo.com/dog-rescuer-nu… Please keep sharing our fundraisers far and wide — there are 8.3 billion people in the world, and we only need around 300,000 people to donate just £1 to make this happen Links to Donate 👇 🇬🇧 justgiving.com/campaign/warpa… 🇺🇸 cuddly.com/donate/4958780… Together, we can do this 🙏

🐾🌧️ A driveway stroll before the storm! 🌧️🐾 We managed a walk in the driveway just before the rain hit last night — and now we’re facing 10 days of rain, thunder, and lightning. This morning the entire area is a mud pit… but the dogs don’t seem to mind one bit! 😅🐶 On a more serious note, we’ve slipped into 2nd place on @MyGivingCircle and now need to make up over 4000 votes to get back into 1st and win £2500 for our *Save the Shelter* fund. 💛 Don’t forget — donations = extra votes, so if you can, please donate as well! 👉 mygivingcircle.org/war-paws/free #warpaws #dogrescue #fridayfeeling #dogs

As the holy month of Ramadan comes to a close, we want to extend our warmest wishes to all of our supporters who have been observing. May this special time bring you peace, reflection, and renewed strength. Thank you for the compassion, generosity, and kindness you continue to show—values that truly embody the spirit of Ramadan. Wishing you and your loved ones a joyful and blessed Eid. Eid Mubarak 🌙✨ #warpaws #Eid #blessings

🏃‍♀️🐾 Running for War Paws 🐾🏃‍♀️ On 19 April 2026, War Paws Trustee, Helene, will be running the Manchester Marathon in memory of her beautiful dogs Evie, Maz & Rowan 💛 — and to help us save the shelter Helene is aiming to raise £1000, and every single donation — no matter the size — makes a real difference. Every £1/$1/€1 helps us get one step closer to securing a future for hundreds of animals who rely on us. 💫 Please support Helene’s incredible effort 📖 Read her story & donate here justgiving.com/page/mazar Let’s come together and help her smash her target 🐶💛

🐾 Happy Feet Update 🐾 In just under a week since starting PRP treatment we’ve already seen a huge improvement in Happy Feet’s wounds — and we’re feeling really hopeful that we’ll see full resolution! 🙏 Happy Feet absolutely loves her clinic visits… mainly because she knows she’ll be rewarded with plenty of Scooby snacks and cuddles for being the goodest girl 🐶 PRP isn’t widely used for animals here in Iraq. While the platelet-rich plasma itself comes from her own blood so is free, the specialist tubes needed to process it are not cheap, but for Happy Feet, it’s worth every penny and we will continue to go the extra mile for her because she truly deserves every chance to heal 🐾. #warpaws #vetlife #dogs #prp #shelterlife

The first draw of 2026 on @benefactgroup #movementforgood takes place in just 5 days — and with your help, we could be one of 100 charities to win £1000! 💛 That £1000 would make a huge difference to our Save the Shelter fund. It only takes 1 minute to nominate us, it’s completely FREE, and the more nominations we receive, the better our chances of winning! Nominate us here 👇 bit.ly/4dbnLBF Please take a moment to support us — it really could change everything for the animals in our care 🐶🐱

We’re giving $10k to animal rescues this month, and YOU decide who gets it! Where does the money come from? Google made $225 billion last year. We wondered: what if there were a search engine that donated ad revenue to save dogs? So we built it - DogDog.org How to vote: ❤️ Like 🔁 Retweet to spread the word 💬 Comment with the rescue or shelter’s name (tagging them is best) Every unique comment = 1 vote for that rescue. The 10 rescues with the most comments get $1,000 each. No catch, no fine print. (And try searching on DogDog just as you would on any search engine — every search helps raise money for shelters) Voting ends 3/31. Full rules: dogdog.org/contest-rules #DogDogGivesBack #SaveTheDogs #AnimalRescue

🌧️🐾 A Stormy Night at the Shelter🐾🌧️ We had a huge storm last night, with rains of epic proportions coming down on us. It was a miserable night for both the dogs and the humans at the shelter. Our video today shows the rain shortly after it started yesterday afternoon — but it got much worse as the night went on. Poor Malak even got caught in flooding on her way home, and what should have been a 45-minute journey took almost 3 hours. This morning we’ve done a full walk-through of the shelter, inside and out. There’s now a massive puddle in front of the solar farm that could easily double as an Olympic practice pool, and many of the plastic dog houses are inches deep with water. That means today will be a very busy one for the whole team as we empty out houses, remove the soaked straw, and replace it with clean, dry straw so the dogs can stay comfortable. The good news is that the forecast promises a few days of sunshine before the rain returns on Thursday and brings another few weeks of storms. For now, it’s time to roll up our sleeves and start drying things out. 🐶💛 #warpaws #extremeweather #climatechange #shelterlife

🐱💛 C😻turday Introduction! 💛🐱 We love C😽turday, especially when it means introducing a newbie to you all! Meet Biscoff, who was rescued by a British contractor in Basra and arrived with us a few days ago. Believe it or not, she’s a younger sibling of Maisie, who has been with us for a while now. Thankfully their mum has now been spayed so Biscoff is the last of the kittens. Right now Biscoff is understandably a little worried, but she’s already starting to come around to cuddles and good food, and we’re sure it won’t take long before her confidence grows. Biscoff would also like to remind everyone how important your free weekly vote on @MyGivingCircle is and that donations of any amount help move us one step closer to saving the shelter. mygivingcircle.org/war-paws/free Welcome to the War Paws family, little Biscoff. 🐾💛 #warpaws #caturdayvibes #cats #catrescue

@HedgehogCabin Thank you for posting about this beautiful little girl, sadly she did not make it but we truly appreciate you advice and support

This is a Long Eared Hedgehog, a native of Iraq. This dear brave little girl self admitted into the grounds of a charity animal hospital in Iraq, managing to evade many hungry homeless wandering dogs. As you can see, compared to our European hedgehogs they are much more delicate, and lighter in colour. Those huge ears contain a network of blood vessels which dilate in high temperatures, allowing blood to cool down as it passes through the thin skin before circulating back into the body. This incredible design helps regulate the hedgehog's body temperature, preventing overheating in soaring desert temperatures. The wonderful and valiant charity is War Paws, who care for and treat the forgotten animals of war. I've been advising the lovely Louise at @WarPawsIraq, and other animal charities in war-torn countries, for a few years now, and profoundly admire their extraordinary courage and commitment. They desperately need to build a new shelter for the hundreds of animals they save, and who have been dumped, so if you'd like to help a little, here's the donation link: t.co/zBkG24gA98

Maybe you want to head over to our facebook page and see for yourself the work we do? We are 100% transparent about what donors money pays for, our accounts are published and more detailed than a lot of orgs and you will have a hard time finding a dirty concrete slab with starving dogs at our shelter, in fact everyone who visits out shelter always asks how we keep it so clean and not stinky with so many dogs and that is credit to our incredible staff who work around the clock to ensure the dogs in our care are happy and healthy. We pride ourselves on the work we do in Iraq and whilst we agree that there are some less than honourable orgs out there we can assure you we are not one of them.

If you donate it is going straight to leftist who will funnel it to Islamic organizations. Let the people where the organization "works" donate . Those people will be able to SEE what they do with the money. See if the "shelter" is a conccrete dirty slab with starving dogs they use for pictures. Find out where they are housing the animals they "save". What country. Turkey is burying dogs alive with bulldozers. No one is saving them. Animal scams are the new tactic of the left. Eko (sign petitions) is another left front. Never give these people your email or credit card.

🐾💔 Meet Samira 💔🐾 Samira came into our care last night as an owner surrender. Her owner told us she was a deeply loved pet, but his neighbours were threatening to shoot or poison her, even though she stayed within his private garden. We have no space and we are currently facing eviction from the shelter… but how was I meant to say no? Samira is incredibly friendly, but right now she is heartbroken. She spent the whole night crying and howling, calling for the family she has lost. It was truly heartbreaking to hear. Every dog that finds their way to us has a story, and every one of them deserves a chance to be safe and loved. That’s why your votes and donations on @MyGivingCircle mean so much — not just to us, but to dogs like Samira. 🗳️ Please cast your free weekly vote 💛 Donate if you can this weekend mygivingcircle.org/war-paws/free Together, we can keep helping the dogs who need us most. 🐶 #warpaws #dogrescue #dogs #shelterlife

🐾A Tough Night — and an Update on Happy Feet🐾 Once again we had a very noisy night at the shelter. Around 11:30pm we heard three large explosions, and the dogs were understandably very unsettled. They barked and paced for hours afterward, and it meant that no one got much sleep. Nights like this are difficult for everyone — humans and animals alike. Today we want to talk about one of our long-term residents, Happy Feet. Happy Feet has been with us for years after she arrived with severe chemical burns on all four of her paws. The damage to one of her back legs was so bad that we had no choice but to amputate it. Since then, every single day for years, we’ve carefully applied creams to her remaining paws to keep the scar tissue soft and comfortable. A few months ago, however, one of her front paws developed a wound. Despite our best efforts, we have not been able to get it to heal. We are now reaching the limits of what we can do — so today we have started PRP therapy(platelet-rich plasma). We took a sample of Happy Feet’s own blood spun it down to concentrate the platelets, and applied that healing plasma to the wound with an alginate dressing. We are hoping with everything we have that this treatment will help her paw finally heal. If the PRP does not work, our last remaining option would be a skin graft. Performing a graft in our environment carries significant risk, but if we have to try it, we will. If we cannot resolve this painful wound, we will sadly face the heartbreaking decision that no one ever wants to make — because we cannot allow her to live with a painful, non-healing injury forever. Please keep Happy Feet in your thoughts today. She has fought so hard for so many years, and we are hoping this treatment gives her the relief she deserves. 💛🐶 #warpaws #vetlife #rescuedogs #prp

@systemnutte @MONlKA_K Many also left their dogs at the border or in locked homes when they left.

@WarPawsIraq @MONlKA_K Many Ukrainians literally risked their own lives to take their pets with them. I don't understand why you have to smear them.

Since the war in Iran started we have been inundated with messages and calls about pets being abandoned in Dubai as people flee the country. We wish we could say this was an isolated incident. It isn’t...... We saw it happen in Afghanistan. We saw it happen in Ukraine. And we have seen it over and over again in Iraq over the years. Now we are seeing it again in Dubai and other parts of the Middle East affected by this war — and unless systems change and attitudes change, we will see it happen again somewhere else in the future. The reality is that moving animals internationally is expensive. In some cases, it costs thousands of pounds, dollars or euros to get an animal on a flight. Airlines charge extraordinary rates for pets travelling as cargo — it is not unusual for a 25kg dog in a large crate to cost £2,500+ just for the cargo fee. Then add export permits, import permits, customs clearance and other paperwork. But this is exactly why responsible pet owners should always ensure their pets are ready to move if needed — blood work, vaccinations, paperwork in place, and money set aside. In a very affluent place like Dubai, where expats are not struggling financially, too often the issue is not ability or lack of funds — it is mindset. “It will never happen.” “We’ll deal with it if it does.” Until it does. Some owners do try to move their pets and then hit another barrier — transport. They arrive at borders only to be told their animals cannot board buses, coaches or flights. Faced with the prospect of returning to a war zone, self-preservation takes over and the pets are abandoned. It is something we will never understand. To us, pets are family........And family is not disposable. When I left Afghanistan I had a choice — leave my animals behind or stay until they had met the legal requirements to travel to the UK......I stayed. For three months I lived in a friend's outbuilding with my cats and dogs. I had no job, no income, and had to fundraise the £16,000 it cost to get them home. Leaving them behind was never going to be an option no matter the situation I was in or how dangerous it was for me to be there. Some people place their animals into boarding facilities or rescues when they leave, believing the animals will somehow be fine there. Let us be clear — no owned pet enjoys being in kennels or shelters. They miss their family, their home, their routines. They have no idea why the people they trusted, the people they loved, the people who were the centre of their universe have disappeared. War Paws would love nothing more than to step in and help the rescues currently drowning under the weight of this crisis. But the reality is that our own situation in Iraq means we are powerless to do anything this time. Our resources are already stretched to their limits caring for the animals we have, and we are facing our own eviction. We simply do not have the capacity to extend our reach further right now — no matter how much we wish we could. Which raises bigger questions...... Should governments and transport providers be required to put better provisions in place so that people fleeing war have viable and affordable options to move their pets? Should there be emergency quarantine stations at borders where animals can be tested for transmissible diseases? Should transporters be required to allow animals to travel during humanitarian evacuations? Should vets be stationed at borders to conduct health checks so animals can travel safely? And what about accountability? Most countries require pets to be microchipped and registered — but how often are owners actually held accountable when animals are abandoned? Right now rescues across the Middle East are overwhelmed with abandoned pets. Those are the lucky ones — the ones that made it to rescues or were picked up from the streets. There will be many more left behind at borders who will never be found. Some veterinary clinics are even seeing owners request euthanasia for their pets before they leave. As distressing as that sounds, there are times when a humane death is the kinder option. Because one of the worst things imaginable is a once-loved family pet suddenly finding itself alone on the streets — terrified, confused, and with no idea how to survive. This is not just an animal welfare issue. It is a human responsibility issue. -Louise-