January 15, 2021 at 11:33 am For the 170 pupils in Al-Maleh village in the West Bank, the three-hour journey to school was arduous. Sometimes it took three hours after they had navigated the Israeli security checkpoints, some on foot and others on donkeys. Eventually, many of them simply stopped going. In mid-2019 Mahdi Daraghma, chairman of the local council, set up two tents which served as a makeshift school for the children in the hope that having it close by would encourage pupils to attend classes. It worked, but there were other challenges. In the winter months the pupils shivered and rubbed their hands together – so Mahdi appealed to international organisations for funding. When it arrived a year or so later, he used the money to build four classrooms, each room 15 by 20 square metres, with brick walls and a tin roof.