Literature of Resistance Festival To Be Held In Honor Of Ghassan Kanafani
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- Published on Monday, 09 July 2012 10:54
PNN
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) has announced that a literature festival will be held next week to celebrate the contributions to the field of Arab resistance literature made by Palestinian writer Ghassan Kanafani. Yesterday, the 8th of July marked the 40th anniversary of the death of Kanafani, whose had been a prominant writer and political leader with the PFLP. The Mossad assassinated Kanafani in July of 1972 in Beirut using a car bomb. Kanafani's fierce political writings and novels made him an icon of Palestinian resistance throughout the 1960s and early 70s and after his death his legacy has continued to grow and inspire new generations of Palestinians who see his revolutionary ideals and messages emboldened through his novels such as Men in the Sun and Returning to Haifa.
The PFLP have moved to celebrate Kanafani’s contribution to Arab resistance literature through the festival, which is entitled the Kanafani Literature of Resistance Festival. According to the PFLP website “the Al-Hadaf Center in Bil’in and the Tanweer (Enlightenment) Forum in Nablus have organized a network of Palestinian cultural institutions to launch the Kanafani Literature of Resistance Festival, to be held as an annual festival each year in one of Palestine’s governorates.”
The festival comes at a time when the spirit and ideals of resistance Kanafani embodied are needed more now than ever with the Palestinian Authority escalating its security crackdown on political dissidents. Yesterday in the Dheisheh refugee camp just outside of Bethlehem the PFLP held a march to commemorate the anniversary of Kanafani’s death. Around 70 people took part according to the party’s website. In a break from past marches and demonstrations those participating wore masks or balaclavas to conceal their faces. No doubt this attention paid to concealing their identities has arisen from the security crackdown that the Palestinian Authority, who have in the past targeted members of the PFLP. Just last month the IDF also conducted a raid on the camp, arresting Mohammad Yousef Zghari, 20, a student in al-Quds University and detained him, according to a PNN report.
The Kanafani Literature of Resistance Festival will be held on Saturday the 14th of July. Details of a venue to still to come.
