2006 Echoing Green Fellow Sari Bashi’s issue received New York Times front page coverage today in an article “Confined, Gazans Lose Their Funds For Study in U.S” The article profiles students who are trapped in Gaza and therefore, unable to pursue their academic studies around the world. In particular, seven Palestinian students who received a Fulbright Fellowship were informed yesterday that their prestigious grant was cancelled. One of those students was Hadeel Abukwaik, 23, an engineering software instructor, who was studying in Gaza because the costs are low. Separated from her parents, who are in Dubai, she said she “stayed to get her scholarship…Now I am desperate.”

Sari Bashi, Founder and Executive Director of Gisha, believes that the students' education abroad is not only good for Palestinian territories, but also for Israel. Sari's quote:

The fact that the U.S. cannot even get tax-payer funded Fulbright students out of Gaza demonstrates the injustice and short-sightedness of a closure policy that arbitrarily traps 1.5 million people, including hundreds of Palestinian students accepted to universities abroad.”