Report
Italy grants student visas to Palestinians but denies them to their young kids
The inquiry highlights that the consulate is violating Italian laws, particularly the Consolidated Immigration Act, which protects family unity and recognizes the right of minor children to accompany their parents.
The ground shook again on Monday morning in Gaza. A dull boom, then a column of black smoke rising from the exact location of the Ghaith School. Reem ran with her heart in her throat, her shoes sinking into the now-dry earth, across a strip of land where no safe place remains. She ran, thinking that the end had come for her child.
Instead, by some miracle, she found him not far away: in shock, covered in dust, but alive. He had narrowly escaped yet another massacre. Reem voiced her cry of despair and relief in a post on social media on Monday. But her words are not just yet another chronicle of the hell inside the Strip. They are the dramatic follow-up to our article in this newspaper just a few days ago denouncing this state of affairs, when we asked you to close your eyes and imagine the institutional sadism of a state that grants a scholarship to a mother, only to force her to abandon her own child under the bombs.
As I write this, I am seeing videos of the bombings taking place in the Al Mawasi area. People are being burned alive; the dead are mostly children. Today, that inhuman blackmail sounds – if possible – even more brutal. How many more times will little Baraa – the child who greets Italy in his videos by saying, “Hi, my second family” – narrowly escape death?
For Reem, a divorced mother and the sole center of her son’s world, the offer from the Catholic University of Milan and the Asilo Mariuccia Foundation remains frozen by a diktat relayed over the phone: she can leave to attend the Master’s program in Helping Relationships, but Baraa must stay in Gaza.
The same fate befell Karam and Ola Dahman, a couple who both won scholarships to LUMSA University in Rome, whose young daughter Silla was denied a visa with a blunt and literal “No” sent via WhatsApp by Italian officials. And the exact same tragedy is already unfolding for Maram, another Palestinian student who arrived in Italy to attend Rome's Tor Vergata University. Forced by consular restrictions, she had to leave alone so she would not lose her scholarship, with the sole hope of securing family reunification as soon as possible. Today she lives in Rome, torn apart by guilt, knowing that her three young children, Kareem, Mohammed and Kenan, remain stranded in Gaza, exposed to death every single second.
But after the silence and the outrage sparked by our reporting, Italian diplomacy can no longer hide behind a telephone receiver. An announcement is expected shortly regarding a parliamentary inquiry addressed to the ministers of Foreign Affairs, the Interior and higher education. The text challenges the government’s actions as a clear violation of the pillars of international and European law, starting with the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, which mandate that the best interests of the child must be the primary consideration in every decision.
The inquiry highlights that the consulate is violating Italian laws, particularly the Consolidated Immigration Act, which protects family unity and recognizes the right of minor children to accompany their parents, as well as the law on administrative transparency. That law has been trampled upon by denials communicated only verbally, without any written notice that would allow families to defend their rights.
Civil society, universities and foundations have already guaranteed full financial and logistical support for these children, eliminating any burden on the state. The ministers must now explain the reasons for this psychological torture and clarify whether they intend to order an immediate review of the cases to issue visas for Reem's son and the Dahman family's daughter, as well as an urgent humanitarian evacuation for Maram’s children. Because the right to an education cannot come at the price of sacrificing a child, and Italy cannot continue to sign the death warrants of children who already call us family.
Originally published at https://ilmanifesto.it/baraa-e-vivo-per-miracolo-litalia-gli-apra-le-porte on 2026-05-26