Her father beat and burned her, and she went through hell at home. "Violence has no nationality."

Paulina Socha-Jakubowska, "Wprost": Have you talked after all these years to the journalists who in the past quite unanimously supported your father, a violent man who destroyed the life of his family?

Zeinab Hashmat-Pache: I never managed to meet anyone involved in this whole affair. I found one of the journalists on Facebook, we exchanged messages, and I told her I was writing a book because I wanted to tell this story from my perspective. She simply wished me luck.

Many adults have let you down.

Many factors undoubtedly contributed to this. The language barrier, for example. My father didn't speak Polish, had a translator, and everything he said passed through the filter of another person. Besides, he was an artist, a professor, an erudite, a person who inspired trust, and he knew how to manipulate people. At some point, the media believed him because he did everything he could to convey his longing for his family.

But the narrative around your case hasn't been like this from the beginning.

No. At first, the media was against my father. The narrative was tabloid. Then, at some point—though I don't quite remember when, as I was a child—the tide turned. My father earned the trust of institutions, journalists, and authorities. He was a member of the Association of Polish Visual Artists, which was not without significance. I know he was also in contact with the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights.

An abusive father became a hero in the fight for custody of his children.

This was one of the first high-profile international cases. Perhaps the Poles, the journalists covering our history, wanted to show that Poland was already open to otherness?

At one point, the whole storm became so huge and so unsettled that – even though I lived in an orphanage – my father got permission to send the children on “leave of absence” to his family home, and since he was in Cairo, that’s where he took my siblings.

Before we get to their departure… Many adults existed in your orbit, from neighbors to teachers at school, but ultimately they did nothing to help you. Only Alfred's grandmother made an attempt.

In retrospect, I think that too many adults... Grandma, with her stubborn nature and bravery, tried to shout, but in reality, it was only Grandma, the stereotypically treated "old lady", who stood against everyone, and me, the child.

You can guess what the reactions were.

You were not believed.

In addition, there was a belief that the grandmother was doing it out of spite, because she didn't accept her son-in-law and his culture. This wasn't entirely unfounded. When the media recorded her, she was very emotional and, unfortunately, verbalized this racism.

On the other hand, there was my father, who calmly, like a great actor, responded to subsequent accusations while standing in front of his book collection, reinforcing the belief that the highly educated artist had been wronged in Poland.

As an image and communications specialist, I now see the significant dissonance between these two attitudes and how they were portrayed. My father would say in front of the cameras, "I don't know why my mother-in-law hates me so much. She's hated me since we first met, and I love her."