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In the Palestinian territories, science struggles against all odds

Travel restrictions and paltry funding hamper researchers, who are trying to build a scientific base.
  1. Alison Abbott
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Image on left is a Palestinian scientist at work, image on right is a security checkpoint

Left: Abdul-Rahman Sawalma extracts DNA from a blood sample at Al-Quds University in the West Bank. Right: Palestinians cross the Qalandiya military checkpoint to enter Jerusalem in the early morning. Credit: Heidi Levine for Nature

Dalal Saeed is very clear about what she wants from life: an academic research career in geochemistry. But there are no PhD programmes in the natural sciences in the Palestinian territories. So, every workday, she travels from her West Bank village, across the concrete wall that divides her homeland from Israel to the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, where she has just started her doctoral work.

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Nature 563, 308-311 (2018)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-07350-9

Updates & Corrections

  • Correction 29 November 2018: An earlier version of this story located Mohammad Herzallah at the wrong campus.

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