Part Two: ‘I Don’t Want to Forget Who I Am’

By Mahmoud Al-Shaer

ed. Wiam El-Tamami

Mahmoud Al-Shaer is a Palestinian editor, curator, poet, and cultural organizer. He is an active and influential member of the cultural field in Gaza, founding and leading initiatives such as Majalla 28 and Gallery 28, and coordinating the cultural program at Al-Ghussein Cultural House. Both Gallery 28 and Al-Ghussein Cultural House have since been destroyed, and Mahmoud and his family have been displaced multiple times. He is currently living in al-Mawasi, in the south of Gaza, with his wife Hadil and his three-year-old daughter Nai. His young son, Majd (the twin brother of Nai), had to be evacuated to Turkey with his grandmother, Mahmoud’s mother, for emergency medical care. Both are now receiving critical medical treatment in Ankara; the family has been separated for almost one year.

And yet, despite overwhelming odds, Mahmoud Al-Shaer continues, insistently, to write, to try to reach out and connect, to communicate what is happening since his whole world fell apart. Below is an edited selection of texts that Mahmoud has been publishing as updates on his fundraising campaign.

The first half of these texts ran on Tuesday, November 5. -WE.

August 23, 2024

This is who I am now: a body carrying memories that words cannot fully contain, a soul adrift, searching for meaning amidst the rubble.

Which memories should I keep close to my heart? Should I cling to the life we lived under siege, before the onslaught of this war of extermination? Or should I embrace the memories forged in the fire of this war? Which are more vital? The pain is so deep, it’s hard to tell which of my emotions are still mine, untouched, and which have been twisted by the horrors of this genocide.

I dream of standing on a small stage in a quiet place—perhaps in the warmth of Gallery 28, within the historic walls of Al Ghussein cultural house, in the open-air courtyard of the Press House, or in the multi-purpose hall of the Qattan Cultural Center. I long to open one of 28 Magazine’s events in these cherished spaces, to stand before my friends and the community that fills my heart, to watch as poets and artists breathe life into their works—poetry, music, paintings, films—sharing them with the people they love.

I dream of returning home in the evening, to find Majd, Nai, Hadil, and my mother waiting for me. All of them, safe and whole, their laughter filling the air, their presence a balm to my soul.

This is who I am now: a body carrying memories that words cannot fully contain, a soul adrift, searching for meaning.

What do I want to write about? I’ve always feared the weight of writing, the way it forces you to confront your brokenness. I’ve claimed to live in a state of poetry, but have I truly written it? I don’t want to remain silent, but I don’t know where to begin. Should I write about my mother’s and my son Majd’s journey to Turkey, about how I didn’t realize their absence would stretch into nine long months, with no end in sight? Can I even begin to capture the pain of a farewell that never happened?

I was born on April 24, 1990, and my father was taken from me on October 23, 1990, by the bullets of Israeli settlers at the border of the Gaza Strip.

Majd and Nai were born on October 11, 2021—too soon, at just 31 weeks. For four weeks, they fought for life in the incubator before they could finally come home. Our celebration of their survival was immense, far greater than any other family’s celebration of a new birth in our neighborhood. In those first six months, my experience with my children illuminated the places and moments that I never knew I had with my father.

For nine months, I’ve been redefining my father’s absence through my understanding of what Majd misses from me. And I say understanding because I still have Nai—his twin—beside me. I can see so clearly the difference between Nai’s life with me and Majd’s life without me. Now, I fully grasp the depth of what was stolen from me when those settlers’ bullets took my father from my life.

This is who I am now: a body carrying memories that words cannot fully contain, a soul adrift, searching for meaning.

This genocide has killed over 40,000 Palestinian souls. I feel as though I knew each one of them, as if their lives were woven into mine. I wish life would grant me the time and space to grieve for them, to cry out their names and honor their memories.

August 9, 2024

Life has a way of pushing forward, even when the weight of grief, pain, and helplessness seems too heavy to bear. The mornings keep coming, time continues to fold itself away, and somehow, amidst the darkness, life finds a way to persist.

Since October 7th, 2023, my people and homeland has been ravaged by a genocide war of extermination, and every day since has been a fight for survival. The toll is immense, both physically and emotionally.

Your messages, however, have been a beacon of light in this overwhelming darkness. Every word of solidarity, every expression of love, has given me strength to keep going. In a world that seems to have forgotten us, your support reminds me that we are not alone. Your words have lifted the weight of loneliness and rekindled a sense of hope in my heart.

March 4th, 2024

In the midst of this wreckage, where can I find meaning? Preliminary reports indicate that the Israeli army’s military operations inside the Gaza Strip have led to the destruction of 80% of the infrastructure and buildings within the territory, and that rebuilding this devastation will require many years. And I still don’t know from what level of loss and defeat the healing and restoration phase will begin.

I don’t want to forget who I am, after a hundred and fifty days of deprivation. It doesn’t matter whether you like the food provided to you or not; what matters is not dying of hunger. It doesn’t matter if the water is as you prefer for bathing; what matters is not contracting diseases caused by lack of personal hygiene. It doesn’t matter if you choose where to go and what to do today; what matters is finding drinking water.

I don’t want to forget who I am, five months of the place disappearing, and the vanishing of the living space within the house and its surroundings, just paths of drinking water and food, no markets, no shops, no clinics, no restaurants, no cafes, no community events, no music concerts, and wedding ceremonies. Even the shape of the funeral they stole from us; a person is killed here, and perhaps finds no one to bury them or to bid them the last farewell.

I don’t want to forget who I am, a writer and a cultural activist within a community suffering from a suffocating siege since 2007. I spend my days seeking self-organized spaces that provide young writers and artists of both genders a platform to present their creative works to their local, regional, and global audiences. Over the past ten years, I have been writing, sharing, and experimenting in cultural production through 28 Magazine, Gallery 28, and the Beit Al-Ghussein Cultural Center. It has been a life full of challenges, yet despite everything, we could find hope, joy, and achievement amidst it all.

I don’t want to forget who I am, the wreckage before me is immense, wreckage in the sky and in the black clouds, wreckage in the songs of birds, wreckage in the wind, wreckage in the imagination, wreckage in our memories, wreckage in my relationship with society.

I don’t want to forget who I am, a young man from Gaza, 33 years old, married with two children, dreaming of the opportunity of a life in a place where the possibilities of destruction do not threaten him. A young man born in Gaza, wishing fate would give him the chance to discover life without sieges and wars. A young man from Palestine searching for a real place where he can feel the meaning of things around him; a normal sky where birds and civilian aircraft fly; an ocean or a river where warships do not stand like scarecrows; land, fields, and trees not bordered by watchtowers and tanks.

I don’t want to forget who I am. In the face of despair, I hold onto my will to choose life.

Please support Mahmoud Al-Shaer in any way that you can. In his words: “ I ask you to share our story, to spread the word about the ongoing devastation in Gaza. Let the world know that we are still here, still fighting, still in need of your voices and your support.

I urge you to keep providing support. Your interaction and conversations with me are a lifeline for dealing with the crises that I am experiencing. I will always remain open to creating any shared projects with artists and writers, or simply for reflection and conversation. New levels of this genocide have begun, which I observe and contemplate, recording them consciously or unconsciously. And every time I look around and compare the streets walked by anyone outside this siege to the streets here, I see nothing in common. Everything is different within this massacre.

Come closer to me, speak with me, convey my words, speak about me, and free my words and voice from this overwhelming siege.”

Editor’s note: You can contact Mahmoud via his crowdfunding campaign.