Mosab Abu Toha, the award-winning Palestinian poet, writer, and librarian (who, in November 2023, was kidnapped by Israeli forces as he tried to get his young family out of Gaza) has released a statement confirming the destruction of the Edward Said Public Library—Gaza’s first English language library, which Abu Toha himself founded in 2017.
In the statement, published to the author’s social media accounts, Abu Toha details the labor of love that was the building of the Edward Said library, and condemns the brutal Israeli assault on Gaza’s cultural, educational, and religious institutions:
All the dreams that I and friends in Gaza and abroad were drawing for our children have been burnt by Israel’s genocidal campaign to erase Gaza and everything that breathes of life and love.
The destruction of the Edward Said Public Library is just one war crime committed against Gaza and Gazans in the past 15 months. The obliteration of Gaza’s universities, schools, cultural centers as well as religious sites must be condemned. Moreover, the world of culture and literature must respond to this atrocity by publicly it and by boycotting Israeli cultural institutions and anyone coming from that part.
He goes on to demand that the American Library Association (ALA) “issue a statement condemning the destruction of the Edward Said Public Library in Gaza and boycott Israeli libraries and cultural institutions,” and urge American libraries and authors to “stand in solidarity with the libraries in Gaza and to express their commitment for a protected cultural life in Palestine.”
Here is Abu Toha’s statement in full:
My name is Mosab Abu Toha and I’m a Palestinian poet and writer from Gaza.
Today morning with a heavy heart I received the news of the destruction of the Edward Said Public Library in Beit Lahia, north Gaza. The news and pictures came through just three days after Gazans were allowed to return to north Gaza.
Starting 2016, I started collecting books from around the world to build Gaza’s first English language library. With the endorsement and support of authors and intellectuals around the world, I raised the needed funds to open the library in the summer of 2017.
It took me around eight weeks to receive each box of books that friends and supporters were sending from the United States and Europe. A few people were sending a selection of books from their own home libraries, and I was planning to name certain shelves in the library in Gaza after them.
In September 2019, a second branch was opened in Gaza City. News of the horrible damage done to the branch was relayed to me a few months ago.
All the dreams that I and friends in Gaza and abroad were drawing for our children have been burnt by Israel’s genocidal campaign to erase Gaza and everything that breathes of life and love.
The destruction of the Edward Said Public Library is just one war crime committed against Gaza and Gazans in the past 15 months. The obliteration of Gaza’s universities, schools, cultural centers as well as religious sites must be condemned. Moreover, the world of culture and literature must respond to this atrocity by publicly it and by boycotting Israeli cultural institutions and anyone coming from that part.
I demand that the American Library Association (ALA) issue a statement condemning the destruction of the Edward Said Public Library in Gaza and boycott Israeli libraries and cultural institution. In January 2020, and as part of the ALA Midwinter Meeting in Philadelphia, I delivered a presentation about the struggle libraries in Palestine face, and I told the story of the Edward Said Public Library.
I also urge American libraries and authors, some of whose books were on the shelves of the library, to stand in solidarity with the libraries in Gaza and to express their commitment for a protected cultural life in Palestine.
In December 2023, Do’a Al-Masri, the librarian at the Gaza City branch of the library, was killed in an air strike with her mother and siblings in Tuffah neighborhood.
Lastly, I’m committed to rebuilding the library, its two branches, and even expand the project to build one in Rafah and another in Khan Younis. My only two concerns now are whether I can get books into Gaza and also whether I will find children who are convinced that this is safe and important to visit the library, especially after all the trauma and losses each of us experienced.
Mosab Abu Toha
Author and founder of the Edward Said Public Library, Occupied Palestine
