Category Archives: News

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Campaign, News, Womens Scholarship Fund

Scholarship Fund 10th anniversary newsletter

“I am proud of what we have done together” Mona El Farra in Gaza tells Julia South, our newsletter editor. 
The Scholarship Fund is proud of what we have achieved in our first ten years, starting with three students in 2007 to supporting 39 in 2017-17. Our special 10th anniversary newsletter includes interviews with students who have graduated and how supporters of the Fund have raised money and awareness throughout the year.
With special thanks to Dr Mona El Farra and Wafaa El Derawi in Gaza and for Julia South in Sheffield for writing and editing the newsletter.
Read what a difference your support has made and then come and celebrate these achievements at the 10th anniversary event on Wednesday 8th March in Sheffield Town Hall from 7-9pm. See our flyer: International Womens Day Sheffield March 8th 2017
With all the troubling news in the headlines, this is a chance to celebrate solidarity and social action – we can make a difference!
Campaign, Cultural event, News, Womens Scholarship Fund

Celebrate International Women’s Day with Palestine Women’s Scholarship Fund

To mark Sheffield Palestine Women’s Scholarship Fund 10th Anniversary, we are holding a celebration event on International Women’s Day, March 8th 2017 in Sheffield Town Hall at 7pm.

Full information here: International Womens Day Event

Hosted by the Lord Mayor, Denise Fox, with songs from Sheffield Socialist Choir, stories from our scholarship students, speeches from Sheffield PSC activist Musheir El Farra and Palestinian woman speaker Kholoud Al Ajarma on the power of women’s education.

All welcome to celebrate how Sheffield has shown its solidarity with Palestinian women students in Gaza, Palestine.

Event is part of SheFest

Fundraising, News

Kholoud Al Ajarma at benefit meal Sheffield 28th Jan

Kholoud+Al+AjarmaKholoud Al Ajarma is a Palestinian refugee from Aida Camp, Bethlehem and is coming to Sheffield next week to speak to us about her experience of working with refugees.
She has lots of experience working with young refugees, encouraging them to speak out and assert their rights. She worked in the Lajee Centre, Aida Camp, and in other camps across the West Bank developing programmes for the youngsters, particularly in media and photography. She has travelled with the Lajee dancers on international tours and acted as compere, giving voice very strongly to the political significance of dance, an act of cultural resistance to occupation and oppression.
She’s a great speaker and knows the value of Children’s Centres, the cause we’re promoting in this Benefit– come and meet her

 

Fundraising, News, Womens Scholarship Fund

2017 is 10th anniversary year for Scholarship Fund

Sheffield Palestine Women’s Scholarship Fund sponsored its first three women students into university in Gaza in 2007. This year we are celebrating our 10th Anniversary  and aiming to reach the target of sending out a total of £100,000 over 10 years.

To reach this target we need to raise £23,000 by June 2017. We have raised £19,000 to date, so are well on the way. There are events planned during the year including an International Women’s Day celebration in Sheffield Town Hall on Wednesday 8th March at 7.00pm. The event is being hosted by the Lord Mayor’s Office.

Come and join us to celebrate the students who have gained degrees and those we are currently supporting. Hear their stories and see their achievements.

10th Anniversary Flyer

News

Events to look forward to in 2017

Already Sheffield PSC is planning a full calendar for 2017. You can get an overview here. When more details are available they will be published on our events page.

Don’t forget first Saturday of every month: boycott HP action. January action details here

 

 

Cultural event, News

Not long till Cinema Palestino

Sheffield’s cinema Palestino film season has been a fixture for 8 years now. This year we are showing 3000 Nights, an award winning film set in a Israeli women’s prison  contratsing the britality of her treatment with the care given to new life and community

We are also showing a documentary by Hind Shoufani about her father, Elias Shoufani, academic, activist and exile. Winner of Best Non-European Documentary at the European Independent Film Festival, Paris  this film is a personal, poetic and political archive and interview journey to discover family history.

More about these films is here;

 

News, Protest

Palestinian Children who visited Sheffield face military court

lajee dancer peace gardens
Lajee dancers spend some time off in the Peace Gardens

 

On 9th July this summer, over a hundred people saw at Sheffield’s Broomhall Centre a performance by 20 Palestinian teenagers, from Aida refugee camp near Bethlehem.

The previous day, Sheffield’s Deputy Mayor had welcomed the group, the Lajee Dance Troupe, at the Town Hall. On Wednesday, salibaOctober 5th, three of the 14-year- old dancers, Mustafa Bdair, Mutaz Barakah and Omar Radi were arrested by masked Israeli soldiers.

Attacks by the Israeli army on the Lajee centre have escalated since Celtic football fans raised over £170,000 divided between Medical Aid for Palestine and the Lajee Centre in Aida Camp.

These night raids by Israeli soldiers fit into a pattern of reprisals that have followed international gestures of solidarity with the Centre under an Israeli military occupation that the UK and other governments consider to be illegal.

Israeli soldiers attacked the Lajee Centre with teargas and rubber bullets on 19 Sept while the children were inside. The following night they forced open the gate of the centre, threw teargas grenades inside and closed the gate, trapping the children inside, forcing them to inhale toxic teargas.

Mutaz, Mustafa and Omar have been released on bail but will be tried by an Israeli military court where defendants are routinely found guilty.

In total, 440 children under 18 are currently held in military detention almost two-and- half times the number imprisoned a year ago. According to the Defense for Children International–Palestine (DCIP), no other country in the world systematically prosecutes hundreds of children in military courts each year.

Sheffield Palestine Solidarity Campaign are urging Sheffield MPs to call on the Foreign Office to condemn the Israeli government’s campaign of intimidation against the Lajee Centre and to press for the dropping of the charges against the teenagers.

News, Womens Scholarship Fund

This year’s Scholarship Fund students announced

Sheffield Palestine Women’s Scholarship Fund is supporting 41 Palestinian women into university in Gaza this year. The students are studying a range of subjects from medicine to English Literature, from Law to Sociology. See the full list here and watch the video of students who have received funding this year: جمعية آفاق جديدة – منحة شيفلد

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Students sign for their scholarship cheques

There are some this changes this year as we have been asked by the organising committee in Gaza to alter how much we pay for each scholarship. One university has reduced its fees to $500, others remain at $600 but medical and health related courses vary from $1-1500. By paying the additional fees for the medical and health related subjects, we are able to support Palestinian women to aspire and achieve.

However on top of this, the exchange rate this year has been very poor. This means that though we sent out more money than last year, it is worth less in dollars. Therefore, this year we are sponsoring 41 students (in 2015/16 we sponsored 43 students).

Please join us in wishing our students an enjoyable and successful year.