This is the story of  Zoya, born into a world of upheaval, chaos, and strife and raised in a Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon - as was her father and grandfather. Equally important, this is also the story of a young woman's journey to transform her harsh reality into a journey of resilience, compassion, and leadership 

Our conversation  takes us from one place of conflict -   Lebanon - to another in  Ukraine, where she and her family sought refuge before the  war there drove them to seek yet another sanctuary. With extraordinary calmness and lack of self pity,  Zoya  tells us of the violence that  has dominated so much of  her life; of her people who have been without  a home for 75 years, and of her fears that the people of Gaza are in the middle of a new Nakba, that drove 800,000 Palestinians from their homes and country a quarter of a century ago. 
 
The name Zoya, in Arabic, means "loving, caring and alive to the world". And that is exactly what shines through this extraordinary young woman  who, somehow, has found  her voice in kindness, compassion, deep inner reflection - and a clear moral compass. 

So, this conversation  moves through the ongoing trauma,  to Zoya's  search for transformation: in herself, her people and for the rest of us. 

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