Published: 12 October 2026
Last updated: 12 October 2026
My story with medicine began long before I entered medical school. In fact, I believe it began when I was only seven years old, when my grandfather became ill.
He was one of the kindest and most loving people in my life, and I was deeply attached to him. I remember seeing him in pain and feeling completely helpless. I was a child, and I did not understand much about illness, but I understood one thing very clearly: someone I loved was suffering, and I could not do anything to help him.
I began to wonder what illness was, why people suffered, what happened inside the human body, and whether one day I could become someone capable of helping people when they were in pain.
I grew up in Gaza and, like thousands of Palestinian children, I was surrounded by circumstances that taught us from a very young age that education was one of the few things we could truly build for ourselves.
My father often told me: “My son, focus on your education. As a Palestinian, the only way you can build a better life is to become educated.”
I carried those words with me throughout my childhood. I studied hard, and medicine gradually became more than a childhood dream.
When the time came to choose where to study medicine, my decision was influenced by the difficult financial circumstances of my family. Studying abroad was not easy for us, and Russia was one of the countries where Palestinian students could relatively and realistically pursue medical education. So, I made the decision to leave home and begin a completely new chapter of my life in Russia.
After completing my studies, I returned to Gaza with the intention of building my medical career and giving something back to the place where I had grown up.
