Palestinian Nariman Salem Irheem, 20, spent months sending emails and WhatsApp messages to Spanish universities she had access to, hoping someone would “listen” to her, while bombings continued in her city, Gaza, and power outages occurred in the hospital where she could sometimes connect. She thought of Spain because she was looking for an “environment” that would understand her, where she could live with “freedom and security” to continue her education. Finally, the Universitat Politècnica de València (UPV) responded to one of her messages, and six months later, Nariman explains her difficult experience this Thursday, sitting next to her 19-year-old sister Roba, in the rectorate of the campus. Both have been granted scholarships to study at the academic institution, after living a true odyssey to reach Valencia and escape the hell their homeland has become due to Israeli attacks.
The “circumstances in Gaza are terrible,” homes, schools, and universities “are destroyed,” people are hungry, there is hardly any light or water, says Nariman. But she doesn’t intend to talk only about widespread destruction or genocide; above all, she wants to convey a message of “hope,” the word she reiterates most often.
“There are many young people who hope to have this opportunity. We deserve to have a normal life. To study, to train ourselves. Now the two of us have hope. I never lost it, although I cried a lot; all doors were closed to me, and I can understand that, but you have to persevere and be patient. I am already thinking not only about surviving day by day, but about continuing and achieving my dreams,” comments the student, who completed a year of Cybersecurity Engineering at the University of Applied Sciences in Gaza, in very fluent English. Now, she would like to study Computer Engineering at the UPV once she passes the UNED university entrance exams, which her sister will also take.
“But the most important thing is not what I’m going to become,” insists Nariman. “My main message is to give hope to the people of Gaza. People outside Gaza might think that we are not well in the head, that we don’t have dreams, but we are very intelligent and we have many dreams and we want to be doctors, engineers, professionals… We are normal people, but we are in an environment we don’t deserve. I would like to rebuild, but not through hatred or war, but through dignity, education, and hope,” says the young woman, who takes the lead as she speaks English better than her younger sister. Both grew up in a family of doctors, who instilled in them from birth the importance of education and study. Both are smiling, happy, eager to fulfill the requests of photographers and cameramen, constantly expressing their gratitude, also in nascent Spanish.
“They are two brilliant students,” adds the rector of the UPV, José Capilla, who thanks the efforts of the Ministries of Childhood and Youth, Science and Universities, and Foreign Affairs, as well as the European Union, the diplomats of the Spanish legations in Jerusalem and Amman, and also the officials of the Israeli embassy in Spain.
In total, five young Palestinians, four women and one man, managed to cross the Kerem Shalom border crossing, traverse the West Bank to reach Amman, and from there fly to Madrid, where they arrived last Monday. Two students have settled in Valencia, two at the University of Jaén, and one at the University of Santiago de Compostela. “It has been very complicated, a very intense bureaucratic and emotional job,” recalls the Vice-Rector for Internationalization and Communication of the UPV, José Francisco Monserrat, who accompanied them from the capital of Jordan to Valencia.
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The University of Jaén (UJA) already received a group of five students from Gaza in December last year, in the first contingent of students evacuated from the strip managed by Spanish diplomatic authorities, which also included a student enrolled at the Autonomous University of Barcelona and another at Carlos III University of Madrid.
The Valencian university officials avoid going into details of how the Israeli embassy offered to help against the backdrop of the bitter confrontation between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Spanish President Pedro Sánchez, one of the first leaders to denounce the genocide. “In the end, we are all people and there is humanity,” points out the rector. “We contacted the Israeli embassy… It happened, which is what’s important,” maintains the vice-rector, who recalls that they also had to obtain the approval of Hamas, which governs the strip. A group of Palestinian students heading to Italy shared a bus at the Gaza crossing with the contingent bound for Spain.
“It’s the best day of my life,” Nariman said, sketching a big smile despite “four hours of sleep since Sunday night” upon crossing gate 10 of Terminal 4 at Adolfo Suárez-Barajas airport last Monday, recounts the vice-rector. Both she and Roba have the status of invited students by the UPV, with aid granted by its Governing Council, and arrive endorsed by their good curricula, certifies the UPV. Nariman graduated from Tawjihi in 2023 with an average grade of 9.91, and Roba also obtained one of the best grades in Second Year of Secondary School.
When the UPV received Nariman’s WhatsApp message, which included her CV and requested guidance for admission given her exceptional humanitarian situation, the institution “began an arduous process full of difficulties of all kinds,” which has concluded with the two sisters in Valencia.
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