Palestinian student Huda Abu El-Roos enrolled at Bethlehem University in the occupied West Bank in 2003. But Abu El-Roos, who lives in the Gaza Strip, has never set foot inside the campus.
Citing security reasons, Israel has prohibited the 21-year-old and nine colleagues from attending classes on occupational therapy in the biblical town.
Instead, the students listen to lectures via a video conference link from Gaza’s al-Aqsa University.
They are among hundreds of students from the Gaza Strip who have been barred from West Bank universities. Israel’s high court — referring to the case of the 10 students — recently challenged that sweeping ban and gave the state until mid-December to explain its policy.
”We feel lost,” Abu el-Roos said.
”The Israeli army has displaced an entire people. It is not difficult for them to displace 10 students and prevent them from studying at their university,” she said.
Israel placed heavy curbs on Palestinian travel between Gaza and the West Bank — which are separated by the Jewish state — when a Palestinian uprising erupted in 2000 following the collapse of peace talks.
Those rules, which Israel says aim to stop suicide bombings, have been tightened since the Islamist militant group Hamas formed a government in March after winning elections.
The students, who are in their final year, said it was hard to learn occupational therapy from a screen. Bethlehem University is the only one in the Palestinian territories offering the course.
Occupational therapists treat people with disabilities, helping them develop or regain skills that could enable them to find work. It’s a profession in great demand in Gaza, where years of conflict with Israel have taken their toll on life and limb.
Gaza has just one expert in this field, according to Israeli human rights group Gisha, which has challenged the ban in court.
Student a ‘threat
The students said the army had rejected several applications for them to travel through Israel to the West Bank, which has better educational facilities than Gaza, a poor, arid strip of land that is home to around 1,4-million Palestinians.
Permission to enter the West Bank from Jordan had also been denied, they said.
Practical training provided by foreign occupational therapists had dried up because of a wave of kidnappings of aid workers and journalists in the past 12 months.
And there is the distraction of constant violence in the coastal strip: Israeli military assaults, internal fighting between rival Palestinian factions or ordinary crime.
Last week, an Israeli artillery barrage killed 18 civilians in the Gaza Strip in the deadliest military strike in four years. Palestinian militants vowed revenge and Israeli leaders voiced remorse for the killings.
Shlomo Dror, an Israeli Defence Ministry spokesperson, said the students were not being targeted, but that no Palestinians were allowed to travel between Gaza and the West Bank because of broad security concerns.
”We know there have been attempts to smuggle explosives and infiltrate into Israel. Students can pose a threat because they are younger and have less to lose and are easily approached by terror organisations,” Dror said.
The dispute was taken up by Israel’s high court after Gisha challenged the ban on behalf of the 10 occupational therapy students.
Looking abroad
Lawyer Sari Bashi, a director of Gisha, said the court rejected the state’s argument that the students were potentially ”dangerous” in a hearing on November 2 and demanded it explain why applicants shouldn’t be considered on an individual basis.
Another occupational therapy student, Mohammad Azaiza, said the group had once gone to Egypt for practical study.
”The problem is that if we cannot get to the West Bank, we will need to go again to Egypt. But that is not guaranteed,” Azaiza said.
Palestinians cross into neighbouring Egypt via the Rafah terminal in southern Gaza. That has been closed often this year, especially since militants abducted an Israeli soldier from Gaza in June, triggering an Israeli offensive in the strip.
About 24 000 disabled people in Gaza need the help of occupational therapists, Gisha said. Many were hurt in Israeli offensives, especially since the start of the Palestinian revolt in 2000 while others are victims or internal or gangland violence.
Gisha said Israel, which controls Gaza’s borders, was obliged to ensure occupational therapy services were provided.
”Since the uprising, the handicapped have crowded health centres. We need to rehabilitate these people and enable them to practice a normal life as much as possible,” Azaiza said.
While the occupational therapy students have persisted in their studies, Abu el-Roos said many other students simply opted to study abroad.
”Some students were able to get to foreign countries. But they cannot get to a university in their homeland,” she said. ‒ Reuters