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PROFILE
GAZA-BORN DOCTOR SPREADS A MESSAGE OF HOPE
By Lisa Evans
Palestinian-Canadian Izzeldin Abuelaish is an advocate for peace, despite the various tragedies he has encountered in his life, and strongly believes that education is the key to long-lasting peace in the Middle East and around the world.
Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish was the first Palestinian doctor to work in an Israeli hospital. Tragedy struck on January 16, 2009, when Abuelaish’s three daughters and niece were killed in his own home by an Israeli tank fire attack.
While one would assume that such a devastating tragedy would cause a father to want to seek revenge on those who took the lives of his beloved daughters, Abuelaish turned his grief into hope and has become an advocate for peace and for the education of girls in the Middle East. Over the years, his message of peace and hope in response to the devasting loss of his children has earned him several humanitarian awards worldwide.
He now resides in Toronto with his remaining five children, has authored a book called I Shall Not Hate, and is the founder of the Daughters for Life Foundation, a registered charity that creates accessible education opportunities for young women from the Middle East through strategic partnerships with academic institutions and empowers them to bring lasting change to their communities.
Life as a refugee
Abuelaish was born and raised in Jabalia Refugee Camp in the Gaza Strip. Life as a refugee was a constant struggle, but Abuelaish found hope in the camp. “In life, there are two types of disasters: natural disasters and man-made disasters,” he says. Abuelaish realized that the challenges he was facing were the latter, and he had the power to challenge them. He discovered that education was the only way to escape his circumstances.
Abuelaish was educated in refugee camp schools and earned a scholarship to study medicine in Cairo, Egypt. He later received a diploma in obstetrics and gynecology from the University of London, UK. From 1997–2002, he
completed his residency at the Soroka University hospital in Beer Sheva, Israel, followed by a sub-specialty in fetal medicine in Italy and Belgium, and a Master’s degree in Public Health from Harvard University. He was the first Palestinian doctor to work at an Israeli hospital and up to the devastating loss of his daughters, he worked as a senior researcher at the Gertner Institute in Sheba Hospital in Israel.
January 16, 2009: The date that changed everything
On January 16, 2009, an Israeli tank fired through the wall of Abuelaish’s home, killing three of his daughters (Bassan, 20, Mayar, 15 and Aya, 13) as well as his 14-year old niece, Nour.
For the gynecologist and father of eight children who had lost his wife to cancer only four months prior, the deaths of his daughters caused him, he says, to temporarily lose faith in humanity. “The world was watching what was going on and just considering the Palestinians as numbers,” he says. “I will never accept my children to be numbers. Each of my daughters was one world. Each of them had their own plans.”
In spite of the tragedies that have befallen him, Abuelaish says he has never felt anger in the negative way of hatred. “Hatred is a disease. It’s a contagious destructive disease that impacts the one who is carrying it. Hatred makes me incapable, stagnant, paralyzed, blind. It’s a toxin; a fire that burns the one who is impacted by it,” he says. “I needed to be strong physically and mentally to overcome this challenge and to keep my daughters alive, not with hatred, but with good deeds,” he says.
Daughters For Life Foundation
Abuelaish turned his grief for his daughters into a beacon of hope for many young women in the Middle East. He created the Daughters for Life Foundation, a registered Canadian charity that provides scholarships for aspiring young women living in the Middle East, enabling them to pursue undergraduate and graduate education opportunities in Canada, the US and UK; education that would otherwise be unattainable.
Abuelaish strongly believes that education is key to long-lasting peace in the Middle East and the world. To date, the Foundation has supported more than 500 young women in their education. “I created this charity to keep my daughters alive,” says Abuelaish, who hopes that the young women who receive the scholarships will be able to go back home and serve their home countries.
A Canadian future
Abuelaish’s path to hope included a decision to relocate himself and his remaining children to Canada, in July 2009, after receiving a job offer as an Associate Professor at the Dalla Lana School of Public Health at the University of Toronto. Although part of him wanted to stay close to the graves of his daughters, as a newly single father of five, Abuelaish couldn’t deny his children the opportunities that Canada could provide. “One of the wisest decisions that I am proud of is that I decided to come to Canada,” he says.
Abuelaish describes Canada as a very social and friendly place; something he felt from the first day of the family’s arrival. Upon meeting their new neighbours on their first day in Canada, Abuelaish says the two families, who had children around the same ages, decided to take down part of the wooden fence between the two houses, allowing the children to play together whenever they wished. This gesture reinforced to Abueleish the social and community values that he had hoped for his family and for the world.
Providing his children with the education opportunities that he knew were rare for many children around the world was also top of mind. Abuelaish is proud to say that two of his daughters have now graduated from the University of Toronto’s engineering program. His son graduated from Rotman School of Business and his youngest son has recently been accepted to Schulich School of Business at York University.
Education, says Abuelaish, is key to fixing the problems in the world. “In life someone can take anything from you, but no one can take your education or prevent you from dreaming or achieving your dreams by working hard,” he says. This is the message Abuelaish has spread to his children. It’s the message he hopes to spread to all Canadian newcomers, and to the young women who have received education through his Daughters For Life Foundation.
