On Sunday the 2nd of April, the Journalism Department released a photograph exhibition and a book entitled “Students Under Occupation - Take a Stand”, in cooperation with the “Right to Education Program” at Birzeit University. The library’s lobby was packed with students who were gathering to participate in the opening. The event began with a speech from Prof. Maher Natsheh, Vice-President for Academic Affairs, who spoke about the right to education of all those university students suffering every day on Israeli checkpoints. Dr. Samar Shunar, Head of the Journalism Department, said that this exhibition reflects the hard conditions our students have to face in order to get access to their education. Some of them are detained -some others are killed- during their struggle to get their education, the same way students everywhere else in this world have theirs. Mr. Saed Abu Hijleh, Director of the Public Relations Department, mentioned the last student who died, Asem Yousef, a student from the Journalism Department.
The photographs are all taken by students from both An-Najah National University and Birzeit University, who have come together to work on the Right to Education Photograph Project. The goal consisted in documenting the students’ life and the obstacles Palestinians have to face under the occupation, through the artistic expression of their own ideas and experiences. Heinrich Boll Foundation funded the Project.
It is worth mentioning that the loss of university students over the past five years is immense (more than fifty-two), beside hundreds of wounded and detained students and two University faculties damaged in the town of Tulkarem.