Words for Palestine
2024-08-07 16:00 - 18:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | Virtual
Join our monthly online series “Words for Palestine” which aims to center and highlight Palestinian voices during this devastating time. Featured readers include Abdelrahman ElGendy, Jessica Abughattas and Hind Shoufani. Summer Awad will be moderating this August iteration.
“Words For Palestine” is co-sponsored by Al Nadwa Freethinking Society, Mizna, Palestine Writes and RAWI, and is free with RSVP. We encourage you to make a donation to support the work of Palestine Legal and Palestine Children’s Relief Fund (PCRF). Palestine Legal is an organization dedicated to protecting the civil and constitutional rights of people in the U.S. who speak out for Palestinian freedom. PCRF is the primary humanitarian organization in Palestine, providing crucial and life-saving relief and humanitarian aid in Gaza.
Meet the Readers
Abdelrahman ElGendy is an Egyptian writer, translator and activist from Cairo based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. A former six-year political prisoner in Egypt, ElGendy writes about counter-narratives, state-manufactured archival silences and abolishing empathy as an extension of colonial violence. His writing appears in the Washington Post, Foreign Policy, Guernica, AGNI, Mizna, The Markaz Review, Truthout, Mada Masr and elsewhere. ElGendy is a 2024-25 Steinbeck fellow at San Jose State University, a 2022 Dietrich fellow at the University of Pittsburgh’s Nonfiction Writing MFA, and a Heinz fellow at Pitt’s Global Studies Center. His work has received awards or scholarships from Logan Nonfiction Program, Tin House Workshop, Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Sewanee Writers’ Conference, and Community of Writers Workshop. He is the winner of the 2024 Courage to Write award by the de Groot Foundation, the 2024 Turow-Kinder Award in Fiction, and was a finalist for the 2021 and 2023 Margolis Award for Social Justice Journalism.
Jessica Abughattas’ debut book Strip won the Etel Adnan Poetry Prize and was published in October 2020. Her poems are forthcoming or have appeared in POETRY, The Kenyon Review, The Nation, The Yale Review, and elsewhere.
Hind Shoufani is a multidisciplinary Palestinian filmmaker & writer, who grew up in the Leftist communities in the liberation movement. Hind once lived all across the Arab world and is now exploring Brooklyn, again. Her film work has garnered a BAFTA win and an Oscar nomination for the film The Present and her latest documentary, Heavy Metal, premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in 2023. Her award-winning first feature film Trip Along Exodus has screened in over 30 countries. Hind has published creative essays, prose and poetry in international journals, magazines and anthologies, and has been a director, producer and editor of documentaries for over 25 years, globally. She is currently attempting a Coming-Of-Middle-Age hybrid-genre lust and politics memoir, her second feature film, and some semblance of purpose and meaning in the zeitgeist.
For questions, e-mail Rewa Zeinati at rzeinati@accesscommunity.org

Words for Palestine
2024-10-09 16:00 - 18:00, 2024-11-13 16:00 - 18:00, 2024-12-12 16:00 - 18:00, 2025-03-27 16:00 - 17:15, 2025-04-24 16:00 - 17:15, 2025-05-29 16:00 - 17:15, 2025-06-26 16:00 - 17:15 | Virtual
Join our monthly online series “Words for Palestine” which aims to center and highlight Palestinian voices during this devastating time. Featured readers TBA.
“Words For Palestine” is co-sponsored by Al Nadwa Freethinking Society, Mizna, Palestine Writes and RAWI, and is free with RSVP. We encourage you to make a donation to support the work of Palestine Legal and Palestine Children’s Relief Fund (PCRF). Palestine Legal is an organization dedicated to protecting the civil and constitutional rights of people in the U.S. who speak out for Palestinian freedom. PCRF is the primary humanitarian organization in Palestine, providing crucial and life-saving relief and humanitarian aid in Gaza.
For questions, e-mail Rewa Zeinati at rzeinati@accesscommunity.org

Palestine on Paper
2024-10-18 14:30 - 18:00 | Virtual
5:30-9 p.m. ET Friday, October 18, 2024
Palestine on Paper
Free with RSVP
Register for in-person event; Register for livestream
Join Visualizing Palestine as they launch their debut book via a panel and one-day exhibit, coupled with the late Rajie Cook’s exhibition, Waiting for Peace, at AANM. More details to come!

National Book Award Winner: Lena Khalaf Tuffaha
2024-12-06 19:00 - 20:00 | Elliott Bay Book Company, 1521 10th Avenue, Seattle, 98122, United States
Lena Khalaf Tuffaha reads from Something About Living, her National Book Award-winning third poetry collection.

This event is free and open to the public. Please help us plan for audience size by RSVPing here.
It’s nearly impossible to write poetry that holds the human desire for joy and the insistent agitations of protest at the same time, but Lena Khalaf Tuffaha’s gorgeous and wide-ranging new collection Something About Living does just that. Her poems interweave Palestine’s historic suffering, the challenges of living in this world full of violence and ill will, and the gentle delights we embrace to survive that violence. Khalaf Tuffaha’s elegant poems sing the fractured songs of Diaspora while remaining clear-eyed to the cause of the fracturing: the multinational hubris of colonialism and greed.
This collection is her witness to our collective unraveling, vowel by vowel, syllable by syllable. “Let the plural be a return of us” the speaker of “On the Thirtieth Friday We Consider Plurals” says and this plurality is our tenuous humanity and the deep need to hang on to kindness in our communities. In these poems Khalaf Tuffaha reminds us that love isn’t an idea; it is a radical act. Especially for those who, like this poet, travel through the world vigilantly, but steadfastly remain heart first. —Adrian Matejka, author of Somebody Else Sold the World
Lena Khalaf Tuffaha is a poet, essayist and translator. She is the author of Water & Salt (Red Hen), winner of the 2018 Washington State Book Award, Kaan & Her Sisters (Trio House Press), finalist for the Firecracker Award, and Something About Living (UAkron, 2024), a finalist for the 2024 National Book Award and winner of the 2022 Akron Prize for Poetry. Her writing has been published in journals including Los Angeles Review of Books, Michigan Quarterly Revie, the Nation, Poets.org, and Prairie Schooner and in anthologies including The Long Devotion and We Call to the Eye and the Night. She was the translator and curator of the 2022 series “Poems from Palestine” at the Baffler magazine. She is currently curating a year-long subscription of Palestinian poetry books with Open Books, Seattle’s poetry-only bookstore. For more about her work, visit www.lenakhalaftuffaha.com

Love Letters in the Slanted Season — A Celebration of Palestinian Poetry
2025-02-14 19:00 - 22:00 | Open Books, 108 Cherry Street, Seattle, WA, 98104, United States
“the way love takes you inside its slanted season” — Nathalie Khankan
We can’t stop thinking about the books from last year’s Palestinian poetry subscription, so we decided to have a reading to celebrate them together! On Valentine’s Day, join us to share the love, to read from twelve months-worth of exquisite poems with the series curator Lena Khalaf Tuffaha and Tatreez artist Hala Saleh. And because love is a verb, there will be an opportunity to raise funds for people in Gaza as well.

Conversation with Angela Davis: Collective Struggle in Critical Time
2025-02-21 18:00 - 21:00 | Olympia Capitol Theater, 206 5th Avenue SE, Olympia, WA, 98501, United States
Rachel Corrie Foundation, Olympia Film Society, Jewish Voice for Peace Tacoma, Evergreen Tacoma, Jewish Voice for Peace Olympia, and Palestine Action South Sound present:
A Conversation with Angela Davis:
Collective Struggle in Critical Times
Featuring spoken word by Terrance Turner, aka C.A.U.T.I.O.N.
GA $28.25 & OFS $23.25 (available online and at the door)
$13.25 Student (available for purchase at the door only)
All Prices Include Service Fees
6pm doors / 7pm show

From prison abolition to Palestine liberation, Angela Davis has been at the forefront of radical intellectual work and political activism for decades. Her public rise in the Black Power and Women of Color movements made her an outspoken advocate for racial, gender, and economic justice. She is the author of many books, and a founding member of Critical Resistance, a national organization dedicated to the dismantling of the prison industrial complex

Community Book Reading with Lena Khalaf Tuffaha
2025-02-28 18:00 - 19:30 | Register for Location
Join us for a special evening with poet and essayist Lena Khalaf Tuffaha, as she reads from her acclaimed collection, Something About Living, on Friday, February 28, at 6 PM on the UW Seattle Campus. Something About Living, which chronicles the history and experiences of Palestinian diaspora, was awarded the 2024 National Book Award for Poetry. The event is open to all Seattle-area students, staff, and community members. Food is provided, and more information on location will be sent after RSVPing at bit.ly/LenaTuffahaReading 📚✨

Lena Khalaf Tuffaha with Gabrielle Bates — 'Something About Living: Poems'
2025-05-12 19:00 - 21:00 | Third Place Books – Lake Forest Park, 17171 Bothell Way NE #A101, Lake Forest Park, WA, 98155, United States
Tuffaha’s poems interweave Palestine’s historic suffering, the challenges of living in this world full of violence and ill will, and the gentle delights we embrace to survive that violence
Third Place Books is honored to welcome Lena Khalaf Tuffaha to our Lake Forest Park store for a reading and discussion about Something About Living, winner of the 2024 National Book Award for Poetry.
Tuffaha will be joined in conversation by poet Gabrielle Bates, author of Judas Goat. This event is free and open to the public.
“Something About Living opens with a single bird and ends in a dazzling meteor shower, and in between lies something of a marvel—an electric and sobering song crackling with possibilities for a homeland fractured and besieged by Empire. Lena Khalaf Tuffaha writes, ‘Love is paying attention,’ and this impressive collection serves as a powerful exemplar of devotion—brilliantly rendered in surprising forms—and profoundly teaches us ‘a million ways to love.’”
—Judges’ citation, National Book Award for Poetry
For important updates, RSVP is highly recommended in advance. This event will include a public signing and time for audience Q&A. Sustain our author series by purchasing a copy of the featured book!
This event is in partnership with MENA Heritage Month. Join us in coming together with the Middle Eastern & North Africa community to celebrate and share our various cultures, in April 2025 and beyond
Having trouble accessing Eventbrite? Click here.

Radio Gaza
2025-05-24 19:00 - 2025-05-25 01:00 | Mosswood Loft, 932 12th Avenue, Upper, Seattle, WA, 98122
Get ready to get down for a cause!
@intisaarband presents: RADIO GAZA — a disco-fueled benefit for Palestine!
One week from Saturday — May 24th, 7PM–1AM — at @mosswoodloft!
Live grooves from @bijoux_seattle & @intisaarband
Dancefloor heat courtesy of @i.s.h_dj
Soulful vibes with poetry & Tatreez art by @halasalehtatreez
Henna magic from @ineedasandwich
Palestine merch by @sweetmalson
All proceeds go to the Palestine Children’s Relief Fund @thepcrf
Flyer by the brilliant @ryanjgill_gillco
$20 at the door or in advance — scan that QR and show up loud, proud, and ready to move.
See you under the mirrorball!

A Night with Mx. Yaffa: Conversation // Reading // Book Signing
2025-06-04 17:30 - 20:00 | SWANA Rose Culture + Community Center, 2942 NE MLK Jr. Boulevard, Portland, OR, 97203, United States
(Open to all, no registration required)
Join us in celebrating the release of Yaffa’s latest book, Sage. Sage is a poetry collection that acknowledges all transphobia is systemic but the pain of everyday interpersonal violence is still felt in our bones. A collection that highlights challenges and joy within interpersonal relationships from the perspective of a queer and trans Palestinian living at the margins of displacement, disability, immigration & ongoing genocide. Sage is a beacon of light, shedding light to wounds that have festered and rotted, and finding the paths forward as fascism claims more of who we are.
Available now in ebook and print!
The CSPP Library will be open! Get a library card, check out + return a book, and support the only community run SWANA Library.
Books will be for sale along with prints, shirts + herbal medicine from the community.
All proceeds go to Trans folks most affected by ongoing gen0cides.
Masks provided and required at @swanarosepdx – community care is a verb

Six MENA poets at Elliott Bay Book Company
2025-06-21 19:00 - 20:00 | Elliott Bay Book Company, 1521 10th Avenue, Seattle, 98122, United States
menaheritagemonth

Join us at Elliott Bay Book Co as six poets from the local MENA (Middle Eastern & North African) community read selections from their own selected work followed by a talkback panel and Q&A session. Featuring Shaudi Bianca Vahdat, Parisa Akhbari, Sahar Fathi, Jamal Gabobe, Raanah Amjadi, Samar Abulhassan.
Saturday, June 21
7 – 8 PM
Downstairs

Workshops 4 Gaza: Cryptids and Creatures: Mythology in Poetry
2025-10-04 10:00 - 12:00 | Virtual
What role do cryptids and creatures like the Minotaur, the Mapinguari, or the Little Mermaid play in a poem? What do they allow writers to communicate about the myriad costs of being in this world characterized by colonial violence and slavery?
This workshop engages works by poets like Traci Brimhall, Natalie Diaz, and Summer Farah, whose mythical creatures unsettle understandings of loneliness, intimacy, sacrifice, and our relationships between past and present.
This will be an interactive space, where participants will write and share poems as cryptozoologists, architects, and memory workers. This workshop benefits the Sameer Project’s North Gaza campaign.
Maya Salameh is the author of HOW TO MAKE AN ALGORITHM IN THE MICROWAVE (University of Arkansas Press, 2022), winner of the Etel Adnan Poetry Prize, and the chapbook rooh (Paper Nautilus Press, 2020). Her work has appeared in The Offing, Poetry, Gulf Coast, The Rumpus, AGNI, Mizna, and the LA Times, among others. She can be found at @mayaslmh or mayasalameh.com.

She Stands With Gaza: Poetry Reading
2025-10-25 11:00 - 13:00 | Douglas Truth – Seattle Public Library, 2300 E. Yesler Way, Seattle, WA, 98122
She Stands With Gaza
West coast (Turtle Island) feminist activists welcome you to join us as we hold a poetry reading and solidarity event with Gaza.
Indigenous two-spirit poet Chrystos will be reading her poems from visiting in Palestine.
We will present the work of Nima Hasan, the Gazan poet whose new collection I Bequeath Life to You, for We Die without Life Knowing Us: Nima Hasan Writing from the Ends of the Homeland has recently been translated into English.
Seba Abudaqa & Tom Kellner will speak about the material needs of women in Gaza. and the work that Clean Shelter is doing. to provide water and sanitary solutions to thousands of displaced Palestinians in Gaza.
Last but not least, Dominique Christina will join us virtually to read some of her work.
We would love to have you joining us for a day of beautiful poetry as we come together to show our solidarity with the people of Palestine.
I Bequeath Life to You, for We Die without Life Knowing Us: Nima Hasan Writing from the Ends of the Homeland. Compiled and edited by Rania Jawad, translated by Malaka Shwaikh, Published by Arablit, july 2025
Cosponsors: Fertile Ground, Communities that Protect and Resist (CPR), Blue Earth Defense (BED) and Vancouver Women In Black for Justice & Peace (WIB YVR)

Seattle Arts & Lectures Youth Poetry Reading
2025-12-12 19:00 - 20:00 | Elliott Bay Book Company, 1521 10th Avenue, Seattle, 98122, United States
Join us for a celebratory poetry reading featuring SAL’s talented Youth Poetry Fellows. This reading marks the end of the program, and you are invited to come celebrate their genius with us!

Registration is not required, but helps us anticipate audience size. If you’d like to RSVP, please do so here!
About SAL’s Youth Poetry Fellowship (YPF):
The Youth Poetry Fellowship serves a cohort of young writers committed to poetry, performance, civic and community engagement, education, and equity across the Puget Sound region. Over the course of the school year, fellows meet regularly for workshops with the Youth Poetry Fellowship mentors. Fellows also have numerous public opportunities to share their voices, leadership, and love of Seattle throughout the course of the year. One of the fellows serves as the Youth Poet Laureate and writes a poetry collection published by Poetry NW Editions.
Ahsenti Alfedil (she/her) is a first-generation American of Ethio-Sudanese descent and a student at the Bush School. A multidisciplinary Piscean, she moves fluidly between poetry, acrylic/oil painting, and movement—always led by curiosity and feeling. When not overwhelmed by her academic workload, she finds joy in braiding hair, spending hours adorning herself and loved ones in henna, skating to her favorite playlists, and research as a leisure activity. As a writer, Ahsenti turns most often to poetry. Her work shows resistance to categorization because she follows her intrigue; the fleeting moments that spark inspiration to create. Through her writing, she hopes to make space for those navigating layered identities, vulnerability, and for stories that make people feel seen in their most intricate and unspoken parts.
Nadia Najam is a senior at Liberty High School in Renton, Washington. She finds joy in reading any good book she can get her hands on and spending time in nature. Through YPF, Nadia hopes to grow more confident in sharing her writing with the world and to challenge herself to explore new themes and styles in her poetry.
and more.
