Malala Yousafzai Donates $50K World Children's Prize To Rebuild Gaza Schools

Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai has donated all the proceeds from the $50,000 World Children's Prize to rebuild schools in Gaza, according to a United Nations agency that helps Palestinian refugees. Yousafzai said the money will be used to rebuild 83 schools that were damaged during the most recent Israel-Hamas war.

The youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, 17-year-old Yousafzai, won the World Children's Prize on Wednesday. Last week, she had donated a $100,000 cash prize she received with the U.S. Liberty Medal in Philadelphia to fund education and humanitarian relief in Pakistan. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency, or UNRWA, said, in a statement that Yousafzai made the announcement to donate the money in Stockholm, where she accepted the prize.

“I am honored to announce all my World’s Children’s Prize money will go to help students and schools in an especially difficult place – in Gaza,” Yousafzai said, according to UNRWA, adding: “The needs are overwhelming – more than half of Gaza’s population is under 18 years of age. They want and deserve quality education, hope and real opportunities to build a future.

“Innocent Palestinian children have suffered terribly and for too long. We must all work to ensure Palestinian boys and girls, and all children everywhere, receive a quality education in a safe environment. Because without education, there will never be peace,” Yousafzai said, in the statement.

Earlier this month, Yousafzai won the Nobel Prize along with Indian child-rights activists Kailash Satyarthi for “their struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the right of all children to education.”