Over the past two years, I’ve encountered and shared the work of many Palestinian writers, poets, visual artists, dancers, filmmakers, scholars, and musicians.
Their words and art and music reflect the pain and trauma of occupation, loss of property and freedom, and genocide. But within that pain, the seeds of life continually burst forth.
These artists reflect a culture of resistance woven into everyday life. They demonstrate the power of art to resist a system of domination in a way that is decentralized and insists on the right to rage, enjoy, mock, sing, and communicate with silences, in the gaps.
On this day, the second anniversary of this brutal phase of the genocide perpetrated by Israel against the Palestinian people, I’m reposting some of the words and music I’ve featured over the past two years, and also some I’m sharing for the first time.
May Palestine finally be free, and so may we all.
with infinite love,
Shambhavi
Malak Mattar
Malak Mattar is an artist, illustrator, and author from Gaza City. She began painting at the age of 14 as a way to process the trauma she experienced due to the occupation. Look long and hard into the faces she paints.
As of 2025, Malak Mattar lives in London. She exhibits her work locally and internationally.
Hend Jouda
Hend Jouda is a Palestinian poet and short story writer from the al-Bureij refugee camp in Gaza. She is an award-winning songwriter and short story writer who is gaining in recognition internationally. Hend has published four collections of poetry: Someone Always Leaves (2013), No Sugar in the City (2017), and A Finger That Managed to Survive (2024), and Gaza: Ô Ma Joie (2025 French).
Text: Hind Jouda Translated into English as part of the project Voices from Gaza Read by: Asma Bahar
What does it mean to be a poet in war time?
What does it mean to be a poet
in war time? It means that you
apologize. You apologize
excessively to the burned-out
trees to the birds without nests
to the flattened houses to the
long cracks in the road’s
midsection to the children, pallid
in death and before it and to the
face of every grieving or
murdered mother
What does it mean to be safe in
a time of war? It means you are
ashamed of your smile of your
warmth of your clean clothes of
your yawning of your cup of
coffee of your undisturbed sleep
of your beloveds alive of your
satiety of accessible water of
clean water of your ability to
bathe and of the coincidence that
you are still alive!
Oh God I do not wish to be this poet in a time of war!
Taqwa Ahmed Al-Wawi
Taqwa Ahmed Al-Wawi is a 19-year-old essayist, poet, and editor from Gaza. She studies English literature at the Islamic University of Gaza. Her school was bombed by Israel, and she continues to study with her teachers and fellow students online.
Link to Taqwa’s poetry, essays, and her new zine »
Taqwa is also one of the founders of Coastal Lines Press, a newly formed collective of writers living in Gaza. Through Zines from Gaza, they are turning words into life-saving supplies for their families. Please visit and purchase some zines of artwork, poetry, and prose.
Ahmed Muin Abu Amsha
Ahmed Muin is a Palestinian musician and teacher based and displaced in Gaza. He is the founder of the tent music school, Gaza Birds Singing. The teachers and children of the school use music as a form of resistance, survival, and healing in the midst of the genocide.
In August, 2025, Ahmed and Gaza Birds Singing released this video of “The Drone Song,” an act of defiance, desperation, and joy. The song is composed by Zaid Hilal.
The song went viral and has birthed hundreds of remixes and covers.
Here is the original video followed by a few of the creative productions inspired by it.
Lyrics: Lift him (the martyr) gently high upon the camel’s back, Lift him — I entrust you safely in God’s care.
The martyr’s blood, perfumed with cardamom-Oh night, oh blessed night.
Woe, woe upon the oppressor - his doom, his curse, will be from God.
I keep vigil with the stars of night, calling out our martyrs name.
Alia Sharrief
A choir at the Keizersgracht Church in Amsterdam joins in
Pals for Palestine
Pals for Palestine is a group of Irish activists. They created this version of the Drone Song with sections in Irish in recognition of their shared history of oppression with Palestine.
More covers and remixes can be found on Spotify, Tidal, Apple Music, YouTube, and Instagram.
Not quite ready to fire up a paid subscription, but want to show your appreciation?
Please join Shambhavi and the Jaya Kula community for satsang & kirtan every Sunday at 3:00pm Pacific. Come in person to 1215 SE 8th Ave, Portland, OR, or join Jaya Kula’s newsletter to get the Zoom link for satsang. You can also listen to my podcast—Satsang with Shambhavi—wherever podcasts are found.