Schoolgirls in Bradford are parcelling up gifts of hair accessories and stationery for needy youngsters in the Lebanon.

The plight of Palestinian refugees has touched the hearts of classmates at Belle Vue Girls' School in Bradford.

They were inspired by the visit of Claudia Bradshaw, a university worker who is spending her summer teaching girls at a school in a Palestinian refugee camp in North Lebanon.

Claudia, 24, of Manningham, will take presents and letters from the Bradford class with her when she flies out to Beirut on July 11.

"The girls' contributions are a great bonus for the project," she said. "The refugees I'll be working with are very isolated from the outside world, so the letters will give them an insight to life in another place."

Claudia, who is a former Peace Studies student at the university and a former Student Union president, will be based at a UN school and will organise games and activities for the schoolgirls as well as helping them with their English.

She will live in the same squalid conditions as them, in the overcrowded refugee camp.

"It's not everyone's idea of an ideal holiday destination, but for me it's really exciting to have this wonderful opportunity to go and meet these people, whose lives have been characterised by struggle," she said.

"We can't change their situation but we can show them there are people far away who care about what happens to them."

She said the girls at Belle Vue, who are predominantly Muslim, had taken the plight of the Palestinian children to heart.

"They were really energetic and enthusiastic and decided they wanted to send presents."

Claudia had hoped to be placed at a school in the West Bank or Gaza by the aid agency Unipal, which organises educational exchanges between British and Palestinian people. But the situation there was too dangerous.

Instead she will be based at the Nahr al Bared camp in North Lebanon.

"There is no danger, but conditions in the camps are pretty appalling and there are things like open sewers," she said.

She hopes to bring back replies from Palestinian schoolgirls, for the classmates at Belle Vue.