SIt’s nine in the morning, ten o’clock Beit Jala, a Palestinian town opposite Bethlehemin the West Bank. Farah Fatafta connects with her smartphone from her carparked in front of the hospital where he works. Once the interview is over, your turn will begin.
At twenty-eight, she is the “first and only psycho-oncologist in all of Palestine” he says. He takes care of the emotional suffering of children suffering from cancer, doubly traumatized, because in addition to the disease they have to deal with a life context marked by violenceharassment and threats from Israeli soldiers and settlers. «No patient can arrive from Gaza. All access points to the Strip are closed” says Farah.
Graduated in psychology from the University of Ramallahwith a specialization in sociology and business management, was included in August 2024 by Humanitarian Foundation Soleterre within the team of the pediatric oncology department of Beit Jala Hospital (“the only public hospital left in Palestine for the treatment of childhood cancer” says the Italian NGO), to give psychological support to young patients and support to their parents.
At 28, Farah Fatafta is the first pediatric psycho-oncologist in all of Palestine
«After October 7, 2023, with the start of the war, I left Ramallah and returned to live in Hebron, my hometown, to be close to my parents. Many people ask me why I don’t leave Palestine, but I love my landits landscapes, its culture. We are a very resilient community. Staying here, helping others here, is also part of my journey of transforming pain into personal growth. I go abroad, but on holiday or for study reasons.”
Farah Fatafta, from the West Bank to training in Milan
In mid-April, via SoleterreFarah came to Milan for a week to attend an advanced training course at the Catholic University on “narrative exposure therapy”. «A technique – he explains – which is based on the chronological reconstruction of the person’s history, which includes both traumatic and pleasant events».
How does your day start?
The first thing I do when I wake up is check the news on my phone. We have a group for updates on the roadblocks imposed by the army: I need to know whether I will be able to reach work that morning or not. It takes me almost an hour from Hebron to Beit Jala. Usually I have to go through military checkpoints, but sometimes the soldiers are not present and therefore there are no queues. When I arrive at the hospital, I greet the medical staff, then I begin the group or individual psychological support sessions, aimed not only at children with cancer but also at those who have suffered violence and trauma linked above all to the Israeli occupation. The patients I follow are up to 14 years old. I’ll tell you what happened to one of them, a 13-year-old girl who lives in Hebron.
Please.
He had an appointment at eight at the hospital for chemotherapy. There are about thirty kilometers between his house and the hospital. She left with her mother in a taxi at five in the morning to be able to arrive in time. After waiting a long time in line at the checkpoint, when the taxi arrived in front of the gate the soldiers closed it. The taxi driver, trusting in their compassion, tried to approach with the car to explain that it was a cancer patient who needed to go to hospital for treatment. But the soldiers reacted by throwing tear gas. The mother and daughter started coughing and struggling to breathe, the taxi driver immediately went back and started looking for alternative routes. Only around 11am did they manage to reach the hospital. This is what unfortunately can happen. Maybe we take the same route, I leave an hour early and nothing happens to me, the patients an hour later and find themselves facing horrible things which they then describe to me. We live in uncertainty, we never really know how long it might take us to get from one place to another. Every now and then, to make it easier for families to travel, I send them a message on their mobile phone with directions on the roads to take and those to avoid. Once a patient who lives near me called me and told me that the checkpoints were closed and she didn’t know how to get to the hospital, so I went to pick her up and drove her in my car. Psychologists could not have relationships with patients outside of the therapeutic setting, but here in Palestine this type of support is part of the treatment.
Farah Fatafta works in Beit Jala hospital, in the West Bank.
Do you have enough food and medicine for everyone?
The situation here is more stable, different from that of Gaza, where there is a shortage of food, there is neither water nor electricity. But many people here no longer have the money to buy food or pay for transport to the hospital in case of need. After October 7, Palestinian men employed in Israel, almost all of them in construction, which was the majority, lost their work permits, depriving many families of their only source of income. And then yes, there is a shortage of drugs in the hospital, even anticancer ones. Soleterre has launched a fundraiser to provide the therapies that are needed.”
How does it help children deal with a double trauma: that of having a serious illness such as cancer and that of military attacks that they may directly suffer or of which they are spectators?
We start by talking about what scares them most: what they experienced at the checkpoint, along the road, or hair loss due to chemotherapy. They ask me when they will be able to go home, to school and play with their friends, if their hair will grow back. I help them to give voice to the feelings they experience, to recognize the internal resources they have to manage difficult situations, to process the meaning of the experiences they have lived, to strengthen their resilience. I use tools such as playing and drawing to help them express emotions. I also taught them the “safe place” technique: when they feel in danger, imagine a space in which they feel protected, invented or real, such as the playroom inside the hospital, to regain calm. It’s important for us to know that we are a very supportive community. When soldiers raid homes, terrorizing women and children, as soon as they leave, all the neighbors rush to reassure the family and offer help. Staying together helps overcome the trauma, because one of the main feelings experienced after abuse is loneliness.
Farah Fatafta With Damiano Rizzi, president of Soleterre
The last question is for you. Despite being very young, he bears the burden of many sufferings and injustices every day. Where does he find relief?
The greatest reward is when the children I follow get better and heal and knowing that I too, together with the doctors, have contributed to this result. I also have a supervisor, who vouches for me Soleterrewith whom I discuss the cases and moods they generate in me. In my free time I distract myself with what I like to do: walking in nature, reading books, drawing, dedicating myself to skincare and shopping.
The Soleterre organization, in Bethlehem, near the Beit Jala Hospital, inaugurated the Soleterre Children Centera space dedicated to the treatment of childhood psychological trauma linked to loss, displacement, violence, inequality and war. While in Ramallah, by next autumn, the construction of the first hematopoietic stem cell transplant unit in all of Palestine will be completed, allowing patients with leukemia and other serious blood diseases to be treated in their own territory, “without having to support expensive and complex transfers abroad” underlines the NGO. Finally, in Gaza, inside the Nasser Hospital Soleterre participates in the distribution of medicines and food.