A young Palestinian woman has described her new life in Dublin as “a miracle” but said she feels “stuck between two worlds” as most of her family remains in Gaza.
Ghada Ashour (24) moved to Ireland in August, after securing a scholarship to undertake a master’s degree at the Business School in Dublin City University.
“I’m considered to be a genocide survivor of 700 days,” Ashour said.
A number of her relatives have been killed during the war, including her brother Mohammed last year. She remains “terrified” that more of her family will be killed.
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After surviving 23 months of violence in Gaza, Ashour said she is very grateful for her newfound freedom in Dublin but is still adjusting to the “normalcy” of her life now.
The simple act of waking up and having access to fresh food is a luxury to her after surviving on canned food for almost two years.
“When I came here to Ireland, when I saw bananas for the very first time [in two years], I almost screamed because it was impossible for us to get fresh food in Gaza.”
She speaks to her parents over the phone every day but said it is “very difficult” to tell them about her new way of life while they remain in danger.
“It’s not realistic for me to share with them how normal my life has been, given how abnormal their lives have been ...
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“It’s hard for me even to share with them that I’m going to university and I’m attending my lectures. It is hard for me to normalise the normalcy of my life.”
Her sister Heba also lives in Dublin. She recently graduated from Dublin Business School and is looking for work. Heba moved to Switzerland to study in September 2023, just before the war broke out, moving to Ireland to further her studies last year.
Shortly before her video interview with representatives from DCU in August to secure her scholarship, Ashour found out her cousin had been killed.
“Almost one hour or two hours before the interview, the life-changing interview, I received the heartbreaking news that one of my cousins was killed while he was trying to seek American humanitarian aid.”
Everyone around her was crying and she had to go outside to find an internet signal to make the call.
“In Gaza you don’t have time to process the grief, literally,” she said.
“I felt like while I’m trying to build my life, some lives are being taken. Some lives are being taken in a blink of an eye, and I might have been one of them.”
Her family are from Khan Younis but were internally displaced in the Gaza Strip and spent most of the last two years living in a refugee camp. After the latest ceasefire came into effect on October 10th, they returned to Khan Younis.
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Their home was “destroyed, it was levelled down to the ground”.
Ashour said she was “over the moon” when the ceasefire was announced, but her hope was short-lived as the violence continued.
Recalling a recent phone conversation with her late brother’s children, she said they told her they were happy there was a ceasefire but asked “Does that mean that our father will be back?”.
“How can you reply to this question?”
Ashour said there will only be a “real” ceasefire “when houses are being rebuilt, when hospitals are being rebuilt, when children can go back to school”.
More than 69,000 Palestinians have been killed in the last two years, Gaza health officials say, including 20,000 children.
