Madeeha Hafez Albatta (1924-2011), born in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, became a teacher while in her teens and a principal in her mid-twenties, the youngest in Gazan history. She was among the pioneers to rally the Palestinian community to guarantee the right to education for thousands of refugee children arriving in Gaza after the destruction of their homeland in 1948. The events of her life took her and her family across mandatory Palestine to Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon and Canada.