The ceremony was attended by a number of Palestinian and Italian officials including Palestinian Ambassador to Italy Dr. May Al Kaila, Mr. Luigi De Magistris, Mayor of Naples and Former President of Naples University Dr. Gaetano  Manfredi in addition to the President of the Palestinian Community in Naples Dr. Shafeeq Qartam.

The ceremony was moderated by Dr Rafael Porta from Naples University and started with a speech by Mr. De Magistris who talked about the twin relationship between the cities of Naples and Nablus  the and expressed his pride of the Palestinian passport awarded to him by the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

In turn, Dr.Al Kaila started by expressing her gratitude for the Italian parliament’s recognition of the State of Palestine and for the Italian people’s solidarity with the Palestinians. She also stressed the importance of academic cooperation between An-Najah and the University of Napoli.

At the end of the ceremony, Prof. Natsheh spoke about an-Najah’s recent academic achievements and how it’s thriving despite the political hardships.

The ceremony also included speeches by Dr. Qartam, Former President of University Professor Dr. Massimo Marelli, Dr. Carlous Fuza, Head of the Cardiac Surgery Unit at Napoli University and Ms Suzan Fatayer from the Palestinian/Italian community in addition to Drs Jihad Abdullah and Jean Luiji, Coordinators of Nutrition and Food Technology MA joint programme and Mr. Mohammad Sabbah and Dr. Manfreddie.

It is worth mentioning that Professors Jihad Abdullah, Hassan Abu Qaoud and Samer Mdallal from the Faculty of Agriculture and Veterinary Medicine at An-Najah will be teaching three short courses to Italian students enrolled in the MSc in Agriculture  programmes at the University of Napoli through the Erasmus Plus programme.