From Palestine to Edinburgh

As a young girl growing up in the Palestinian city of Qalqilya in the West Bank, Roza Masalmeh always remembers wanting to do something related to science.

“I loved science,” says Roza, a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Institute of Genetics and Cancer. “I wanted to be an inventor or discoverer. I was always doing experiments at home, sometimes behind my mother’s back if it was dangerous – such as trying to melt two metals together to see what would happen.

“My parents brought me up to believe I could do anything I wanted and that nothing was impossible for me. They have always believed I am going to do something great in my life.

“I also had a lovely teacher at school who brought fun into science. Everything was about experimenting, finding things out for yourself.”

After leaving school, she won a scholarship to study Chemistry at Birzeit University in Ramallah – the first higher education institution to be established in Palestine.

“At that time, I was fascinated by atoms and I decided to do Chemistry but I had Biochemistry electives and I became fascinated by cells,” she says. “While I was studying, my aunt had cancer. I felt I was helpless – I couldn’t do anything for her. I wanted to use the knowledge I was going to gain to make people’s lives better. I said ‘This is what I want to do – use my knowledge to do cancer research and find a cure for cancer’.”

She did a Masters in Applied Chemistry over three years while working full time as a science teacher to fund her studies and towards the end she came across Higher Education Scholarships for Palestinians (Hespal) which funds students to do a postgraduate course in the UK.

“I loved the look of Edinburgh so I applied and got the scholarship. I consider myself very lucky to get one. When I applied, there were just ten positions for all Palestinians.”

Having arrived in Edinburgh in 2015 with her journalist husband Menwer, who she met while doing her undergraduate degree, she started her four-year PhD with Duncan Sproul in epigenetics and colorectal cancer, after which she moved to work on brain cancer with Margaret Frame which is where she is now focusing her research.

“I have found what I want to do,” she says. “I have just submitted a manuscript and my aims are to get this published and apply for a Fellowship. We also have data for another manuscript so we’re working on that.”

She says she has only been able to achieve all this with the support of her husband – and her colleagues at IGC.

“My husband has been really essential in making this happen. I had my first son Amr while doing my PhD and my second son Zaid while doing my PostDoc. My husband had to change jobs in order to be able to juggle childcare with what I’m doing. When you have a child, one of you might have to sacrifice more than the other. Everyone needs to find the right way for them.

“Having a supportive supervisor also helps. Duncan trusted me to find a way to make things work and find a balance when I had my first child during my PhD, and during my Postdoc, when I had my second child, Margaret was really supportive.

“It makes you feel ‘I can juggle my life and my passion – my work’. It’s not easy of course, but it’s doable. Having examples of women who have made it work, helps you feel you can do it too. I would say to all young girls and budding scientists, if you see someone who inspires you, reach out to them and talk to them. You can always make things work but you have to find a balance that suits you.”

As well as juggling a busy career with raising two young children, now seven and three, Roza is preoccupied with what is happening in her home country. It has been almost two years since they were last able to visit her parents and two brothers in Qalqilya and her husband’s family in Ramallah, and even when they do manage to visit, it’s not an easy process.

“We fly to Jordan and get a taxi to the first check point. There are three security checkpoints to go through: in Jordan, Israel and Palestine. When you’re travelling with young kids, and have already had an eight-hour flight, having to wait hours in a queue at the checkpoint can be really difficult, especially in summer when it’s quite warm.”

In response to Donald Trump’s suggestion about resettling two million Palestinians from Gaza in neighbouring countries, she says he is only putting into words what has already happened to them in the past as well as the ongoing attempts to drive them off their land by making daily life as difficult as possible.

“Our cities are surrounded by walls and gates,” she says. “It’s like living in a big cage. To go to work and then back home people have to wait at checkpoints for two hours every day.

“We had finally got a ceasefire and people were starting to go back and then hearing this, that uncertainty about what’s going to happen, must be really difficult. People are not toys to move around. This is their land. The whole world should respect that this is a basic human right.”

She says it is also a distraction from what is currently going on in the country.

“Things are escalating in the West Bank and there are air strikes not far from where our parents live,” she says. “Houses are being bombarded and no one is discussing it.”

Despite these challenges, Roza wishes to contribute to initiatives that support researchers in Palestine.

“I have been privileged to conduct research at one of the top universities in the world, and I hope one day to be in a position where I can improve scientific education and research in Palestine.”