'Beautiful universe ... no borders, no fences, no wall'

KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip - Suleiman Baraka's journey could be measured in light years: the eldest of 14 children of a butcher, he rose from humble beginnings in violence-wracked Gaza to become an astrophysicist, space weather expert and researcher for NASA, the US space agency.

Now, at 45, he is back home with a new mission: to teach kids to look up from their blockaded, beaten-down surroundings and into the limitless beauty of the universe.

He has procured the first known telescope in Gaza, a donation from the International Astronomical Union, and plans to introduce astronomy in Gaza's three universities. He also dreams of building an observatory and a geomagnetic research station.