The Archives & Heritage for Palestine series is a joint initiative of the Middle East Librarians Association (Archives & Heritage for Palestine Advocacy Sub-Group), the Archives & Digital Media Lab; and sponsored by the Lebanese Library Association, CUNY’s Archival Technologies Lab, Library Freedom, we here, Interference Archive, and up//root. 

The series responds to the urgent need to act in solidarity with Palestinian colleagues and institutions in Palestine and the Shetat (Diaspora) to safeguard the heritage, history, and memory of the Palestinian people under settler colonialism and genocide. Through education and advocacy, the series works to surface, connect, amplify, and promote the efforts already underway by Palestinians and supporters in Palestine and around the world in the archives and heritage sectors.  

Dr. Salman Abu Sitta in conversation with Ghada Dimashq

We were honored to host renowned scholar and historian, Dr. Salman Abu Sitta, Founder and President of the Palestine Land Studies Center (PLSC) at the American University of Beirut, in conversation with Ghada Dimashk, PLSC librarian and archivist, for the first installment of Archives & Heritage for Palestine. “Against Genocide: Mapping the Future of Palestine, One Archive at a Time,” in Public Source includes a transcript of the main presentation; edited. More Details

susan abulhawa

susan abulhawa, author of the globally beloved novel Mornings in Jenin, founder of Playgrounds for Palestine, and director of the Palestine Writes Literature Festival, spoke at the second installment of Archives & Heritage for Palestine. 

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Dr. Rana Barakat

This session of Archives & Heritage for Palestine draws upon Dr. Rana Barakat’s extensive work in writing a historiography of Palestine, which situates the Palestinian narrative outside of colonial frameworks in a celebration of indigenous resistance and nationalism. 

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Dr. Areej Sabbagh-Khoury 

We are pleased to announce the 4th instalment of Archives & Heritage for Palestine, featuring  Dr. Areej Sabbagh-Khoury, and hosted by Dr. Jamila Ghaddar and Tam Rayan, in defence of Palestinian life, land, liberation, and return. This session will draw upon Dr. Sabbagh-Khoury’s extensive work in reading against the grain of kibbutzim records to narrate Palestinian history from the fragments found within settler colonial archives.

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Dr. Salim Tamari 

This session draws upon Dr. Tamari’s research into the archives, biographies, and diaries of Palestinians pre-dating the Nakba, to discuss how Palestinian society was reshaped through Israeli settler colonialism and its manifold, relentless violences. Against the colonial myth of “a land without a people for a people without a land,” Dr. Tamari’s work tracks a continuous line between Palestine’s rich cultural and political landscape during the Ottoman and British Mandate eras to the present. 

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Dr. Abdul Latif Zaki Abu Hashim 

Drawing on Dr. Abu Hashim’s extensive scholarship and archival interventions, this session will highlight the real history of Gaza as a center of learning, culture, and history as captured in its archival heritage. It will also showcase the incredible work that has been done throughout the wars on Gaza to safeguard the rich manuscript culture and archival heritage of the Strip, including over the last month as people began returning and resuming their archival interventions. 

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Dr. Haidar Eid 

As a leading Palestinian scholar at Al-Aqsa University in Gaza, Dr. Eid has been outspoken in advocating for liberation that is uncompromising on the Palestinian right to self-determination, return, and equality. This session draws from Dr. Eid’s recent book, Decolonizing the Palestinian Mind (2025), an urgent and uncompromising call for Palestinian liberation from the river to the sea, grounded in a fiery rejection of Orientalism and normalization, and a profound engagement with the South African experience.

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