This year the Palestinian Return Centre have launched the first ‘Return Week’, which aims to raise awareness about the inalienable right of return for Palestinian refugees. Return Week provides a platform to a plethora of activists, academics, and political commentators, and to elevate the voices calling for the Palestinian right of return. Return Week is a commemoration of and also falls on the dates of UN Resolution 194, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the founding of the UN Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA).
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She has served as legal counsel to the U.S. House of Representatives and as a legal advocate for Palestinian refugee rights at the United Nations. She is a frequent commentator, with recent appearances on CBS News, CNN, and Fox News, among others, and her writings have been widely published in the national media and academic journals. Noura is the author of ‘Justice for Some: Law and the Question of Palestine’, winner of the 2019 Palestine Book Awards sponsored by the Middle East Monitor
She is a first generation American, born to Palestinian immigrants and refugees, she is the first Muslim and Arab woman elected to the Colorado State Legislature. Iman is the Founder and Executive Director of the locally based non-profit, Meet the Middle East (MTME), which fosters relationships between the US and the Middle East through education and immersion travel. Iman lectured at the University of Denver’s University College Enrichment Program and taught The Israeli Palestinian Conflict: From Ancient History to Today’s Headlines, as well as Life Under Occupation: A Palestinian Perspective, and Islam 101
A resident of the village of Nabi Saleh in the occupied West Bank, Janna, regularly participates in demonstrations against the Israeli occupation. She began making videos of what was happening in her village when she was only seven
He received a B.A. from Yale University in 1970 and a D. Phil. from Oxford University in 1974, and has taught at the American University of Beirut, and the University of Chicago. He was President of the Middle East Studies Association, is co-editor of the Journal of Palestine Studies. He served as an advisor to the Palestinian delegation to the Madrid and Washington Arab-Israeli peace negotiations from October 1991 until June 1993. Khalidi is author of eight books, with his most recent book being ‘The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine: Settler-Colonial Conquest and Resistance, 1917-2017’ (2020)
He is considered by many to be one of the clearest voices calling for justice in Palestine, support of the Palestinian call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, (BDS) and the creation of a single democracy with equal rights on all of historic Palestine. He is the author of “The General’s Son, Journey of an Israeli in Palestine," and “Injustice, The Story of The Holy Land Foundation Five.”
She writes frequently on Palestinian issues in The Guardian, The Nation and Journal of Palestine Studies. She is a fellow and lecturer at the Institute of Arab & Islamic studies at University of Exeter. Her many publications include her acclaimed memoir, In Search of Fatima, chronicling her family's expulsion from Palestine to Britain in 1948
She specialises in supporting children traumatised by violence. She grew up in the Dheisheh Palestinian refugee camp near Bethlehem, where she experienced and saw violent acts, and her own children were traumatized by a shooting incident in which her husband was shot in his car on an Israeli army checkpoint.
He is the founder and initiator of the Great March of Return in Gaza. Born in Rafah, in 1984, Abu Artema is a refugee from Al Ramla village. He has written hundreds of articles in Arabic and International websites. He has travelled around the US and Europe, speaking about the Palestinian right of return.
Assala is immensely passionate about her connection to Palestine and uses this passion to assist her in working closely with diverse communities and closely with refugees from different backgrounds locally and globally; including Jordan, Palestine, Indonesia, and Australia.
President of the General Union of Palestinian Students of Chile, an outspoken activist of the BDS movement in Chile, and is an Anthropology student of Palestinian descent. She is part of the Palestinian community in Chile, which is the largest Palestinian community outside the Arab world.
He is a Palestinian refugee from Syria, born in the suburbs of Damascus and lived there for over 10 years. Osama was educated in UNRWA schools, however had to relocate to the UAE and then the UK. He is now working as a structural engineer in the UK.
She is an architect, self taught artist, poet, filmmaker and activist. She uses her art to call for the Palestinian right of return. She is also the winner of multiple international awards in filmmaking, writing and art, including the Plural + Film Award and the, “i am a migrant,” (IAAM) campaign.
She first started painting at age 13. During the 51 days Israeli military assault on Gaza in 2014. Forced to stay inside for her own safety, she felt a compelling need to release all of her fear, anxiety and sheer terror. She started painting with art supplies from her school, basic watercolour on paper. This opened up a world of self- expression for her. She has now produced over 300 paintings, and exhibited her art all around the world.
He is a former rugby player with much popularity in Italy and considered a true media phenomenon and icon thanks to the TV show, ‘Unti e Bisunti’ aired in over 80 countries by the Discovery Network. Rubio is dedicated to preserving and promoting traditional and regional cuisine in order to fight taste standardization and globalisation of agricultural products. Rubio is also a long-time supporter and activist of the Palestinian cause, against the Israeli occupation and apartheid. He recently travelled to Gaza with an Italian non-governmental organisation, where he led a cooking class for the inmates of a local prison.
She is a graduate of and a Guest Comedian in Residence at Arizona State University. Maysoon is the co-founder/co-executive producer of the New York Arab American Comedy Festival and The Muslim Funny Fest. She has most recently appeared on CNN’s New Day, 60 Minutes, and ABC News. Maysoon had the most viewed TED Talk of 2014 and was named 1 of 100 Women of 2015 by BBC. She is the author of the bestselling memoir, “Find Another Dream” and is the creator of the “Book of Bay Ann” children’s graphic novel series.
His work revolves around economic empowerment of disenfranchised communities through connecting diasporas to entrepreneurs back home. Most notably known for his ground-breaking song, Jerusalem Freestyle.
He has been creating rap music since 2005 and has produced over 130 songs. He is a Palestinian refugee born in Algeria, raised in a refugee camp in Lebanon, and now living his life between Algeria, Lebanon, Egypt, Tunisia, Japan, Malaysia, Indonisia and now in Turkey.
Salman Abu Sitta was just ten years old when the Nakba in 1948 happened, forcing him from his home. Abu Sitta has spent 40 years digging for any detail of information about or related to Palestine before, during and after al Nakba, the destruction of Palestine. Abu Sitta's work has encompassed not only documenting the Nakba in which over 800,000 Palestinians were largely driven from their homes and villages, but also ensuring that "the memories and identity of the occupied homeland are never lost".
He has written hundreds of articles and spoken on the topic all over the world. He is the author of One Country, A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse (2006) and The Battle for Justice in Palestine (2014).
She is co-founder of the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) and the former chairperson of the Free Gaza Movement, which, in 2008, sailed the first two boats across the Mediterranean to confront and challenge Israel’s illegal blockade on the people of Gaza. She was one of the primary organisers of the Gaza Freedom Flotilla and was sailing with it when it was lethally attacked by the Israeli navy on May 31, 2010. She currently practices law and organises in Detroit, Michigan. Recently, Huwaida served as a 2020 Bernie Sanders delegate to the Democratic National Convention.
In 2016 she founded Native Liberty Productions, a not-for-profit media production company, that aims to re-humanize the Palestinians and draw attention to the injustices they face. She is also the founder of oceansofinjustice.com, an online educational platform with news from the Israeli-occupied territories. Nabulsi has been invited to screen her work and speak at various notable events including the United Nations Headquarters in New York.
He is the author of five books on Palestine including, “My Father Was a Freedom Fighter”, “The Last Earth” and his latest “These Chains Will Be Broken: Palestinian Stories of Struggle and Defiance in Israeli Prisons” (Clarity Press, Atlanta). Baroud is a Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA), Istanbul Zaim University, and at the Johannesburg-based Afro-Middle East Center (AMEC). His website is www.ramzybaroud.net.
BADIL is a Palestinian human rights organization established in 1998, dedicated to defending and promoting the rights of Palestinian refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs), regardless of their geographic location, according to the frameworks of international humanitarian, human rights and refugee law. BADIL is one of the leading and respected resources on historic and contemporary forcible transfer and the Palestinian refugee and IDP issue. As a Palestinian human rights defender/activist, Shomali has a bachelor’s degree in Molecular Biology and a Masters of Business Administration from the University of Michigan. Born in Palestine but raised in the USA, Shomali relocated with her family to her hometown in the West Bank in the summer of 2008. She worked with Beit Sahour Municipality for three years as their International Relations Officer before signing on with BADIL Resource Center in 2012.
Team member at Zochrot, an NGO working to promote acknowledgement and accountability for the ongoing injustices of the Nakba, and the reconceptualization of the Return as the imperative redress of the Nakba and a chance for a better life for all. She was a founder, an active member and spokes person of several Palestinian and international campaigns such as "Love in the Time of Apartheid". In the past few years she has been interested in the creation of global freedom movements and has been engaged in the coordination of political tours for international solidarity delegations such as Dream Defenders.