Make Reading an Act of Solidarity

Read Palestine week starts tomorrow, November 29th. As you engage with Palestine, keep Sudan in your hearts, minds and on your bookshelves as well.

Believe it or not, news from Palestine has receded into the background, even in those few handful of places that have prioritized it. In a different context, this would be a welcome change and might have heralded the end of suffering for Palestinians. Yet, in the over 40 days that have passed since a ceasefire was declared, the genocide has continued. At this point, Israel has violated the ceasefire over 400 times and over 300 Palestinians have been killed in air strikes. Violence has spiralled in the West Bank too as settler attacks have increased with 32,000 Palestinians displaced from their homes since January, according a report by Human Rights. War crimes, detention and torture, and ethnic cleansing continues unabated.

Just over a thousand miles from Gaza, another catastrophe is unfolding. News from Sudan has shook the world as we reckon with thousands slaughtered, starved and women and girls being raped in El Fasher. Palestine and Sudan have found their fates interlinked in haunting and horrifying ways in the past two years. And finally, solidarity with Palestine and solidarity with Sudan has started to merge. Efforts to fundraise, generate awareness, organize strikes and protests, and amplify boycotts simultaneously learn, engage and overlap strategically from Palestine and Sudan.

Palestine and Sudan are overwhelming crises. Long histories of imperialism are inscribed upon the bodies of these nations and their people. The sheer numbers, the extreme brutality, the complex set of actors on the ground, the utterly racist media narratives, and the shocking global complicity when it comes to both Palestine and Sudan are designed to create an intellectual and emotional paralysis within us all. There is a temptation to capitulate to melancholic detachment and to carry on with our own privileged, individual lives. Why bother, we all wonder from time to time?

Peace and liberation seems excruciatingly slow to arrive but the silver linings have never shone so brightly either: the speed with which information, news and stories about these places has been moving is unprecedented in the history of our planet. The dominant narrative is changing, bending and transforming right before our eyes. All of us must gather hope and take heart from this one tangible fact.

There is a lot of focus on geopolitics, and the media is quick to cover political negotiations, meetings and deals, and write about what was said or done by a powerful president or state leader. It is imperative to stay vigilant about these unfolding events. But there is an entire realm of culture, literature, art and scholarship whose contributions and impacts are impossible to track.

It is not easy to say what books and artworks heralded the end of the divine right of kings to people-centric political systems. It is hard to know which precise novels or essays led to the belief that equality for women mattered. More and more, apartheid, colonialism, sexism and racism have become unpopular ideas. It is vital to remember that there was enormous cultural work and cultural activism that went into creating a sea shift in mindsets, and which then led to changing laws, politics and policies.

Today, Palestine is a moral cause. No matter how much the media and politicians gaslight us, Israel and its friend, the USA, is on shaky ground in the court of popular opinion. For this, we can thank the courageous writers, thinkers, artists plus all the independent media and publishers who have obstinately resisted dominant narratives, and have allowed us all to imagine an ethical and free world. They give us language, images, ideas and, above all, moral clarity,

Starting tomorrow, it is precisely these boundary-pushing narratives and ideas that we will uphold and celebrate with Read Palestine Week organized by the Publishers for Palestine, a global collective of publishers, and others who work in publishing around the world, who stand for justice, freedom of expression, and the power of the written word.

2025 is the third year of Read Palestine Week. It began in 2023 as a campaign to generate awareness about Palestine, it’s history, geography, and its culture, through the words of their own writers. As the genocide and devastation continues into a third year, people around the world are being asked to READ as part of the global resistance to the genocide of the Palestinian people.

This week, reading becomes an act of solidarity.

Publishers, librarians, booksellers and booklovers worldwide will host events, recommend books, and come together to resist occupation, apartheid and racism. A handful of generous and revolutionary publishers have made free ebooks available. This Palestine list comprises over 20 books in 8 languages and will become available first thing in the morning on Saturday, 29th November.

This year, there is also a focus on material support for writers in Gaza and there is a a list of writers’ fundraisers you can support.

If you’re unsure what you can do, here are 10 ways that you can engage.

Read to disrupt. Read to resist. But remember that readings are meant to augment and educate, and not to replace the necessary pressure that people of the world are placing on complicit governments! Keep up the pressure and participate in the BDS movement!

At the Radical Books Collective, progressive, feminist, decolonial, liberatory and anti-racist reading is our mantra. Our book clubs, podcasts and events have emphasized books with progressive agendas and have specifically worked to create visibility for books on Palestine and Sudan. We hope to be part of organizing a Read Sudan week someday soon but until then, we can draw energy and inspiration from Read Palestine week.

While we’re making lists, here are some books I passionately recommend. The list is strongly biased towards novels, cookbooks and poetry, and, of course, the English language.

From Palestine….

• Gaza Writes Back: Short Stories from Young Writers in Gaza, Palestine. Edited by Refaat Alareer (2013, Just World Books)

• Men in the Sun by Ghassan Kanafani (Written in 1962, translated by Hilary Kilpatrick in 1999, Lynne Reiner Press)

• Gaza Kitchen: A Palestinian Culinary Journey by Laila El Haddad & Maggie Schmitt (Just World Books, 2012)

• Unfortunately, It Was Paradise, selected poems by Mahmoud Darwish (University of California Press, 2003)

• Minor Detail by Adania Shibli (Written in 2017 in Arabic. Translated by Elisabeth Jaquette in 2020, Fitzcarraldo Editions)

From Sudan and South Sudan…

• River Spirit by Leila Aboulela (Saqi Books, 2023)

• Edo’s Souls by Stella Gaitano (Published in 2018 in Arabic and translated by Sawad Hussain in 2023, Dedalus Books)

• The Sudanese Kitchen by Omer Al Tijani (Almas Art Foundation, 2024)

• Home is Not a Country by Safia Elhillo (Make Me A World press, 2021)

• Literary Sudans: An Anthology of Fiction from Sudan and South Sudan (Africa World Press, 2017)

Read. Resist. Rise Up

Love and solidarity❤️‍🔥
Bhakti Shringarpure