Doaa Al Zamel

Doaa Al Zamel (born 9 July 1995 in Daraa, Syria) is a Syrian refugee and one of 11 survivors of the 2014 Malta migrant shipwreck that killed approximately 500 people.

In 2012, fleeing the Syria civil war, Al Zamel's family moved to Egypt, where she got engaged. After Abdel Fattah el-Sisi took over Egypt, her fiancé Bassem and Al Zamel paid people smugglers to flee to Europe in 2014. They boarded a crowded boat with 500 other migrants and refugees. The boat capsized after being rammed by the smugglers. All but eleven of the 500 people drowned, including Bassem. Al Zamel survived four days at sea, holding two infants and was rescued, taken to Greece and then resettled in Sweden.

Early life Al Zamel was born in Daraa, Syria, two hours away from Damascus and grew up with her five sisters and one brother. Her father was a barber. She was six years old, when demonstrations against president Bashar al-Assad started, and 16 when the Syrian civil war broke out in 2011. After her father's shop was destroyed, the family fled to Egypt, in November 2012.

Egypt In Egypt, Al Zamel got engaged to a man called Bassem. After the change of Egyptian leadership from Mohamed Morsi to Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, circumstances deteriorated for refugees like Bassem and Al Zamel and they decided to flee to Sweden for a better quality of life. To start that journey, Bassem paid people smugglers his life savings of US$2,500 with approximately 500 other refugees and migrants. Steven Spielberg bought the rights to make a film about the story. In 2018, the producers received criticism for commissioning white American writer Lena Dunham to adapt the novel for the screen, being accused of whitewashing.

Al Zamel was featured in the 2019 documentary Beyond Borders, produced by Craig Templeton Smith, along with fellow Syrian refugees Ayesha, Fewaz, and Hani Al Moulia.