Update About Efforts to Support Mohammed in Pursuit of His Education at WWU

Yesterday I shared an update about the latest with Mohammed's situation on the site for his online petition, "Support WWU Scholarship Recipient Mohammed's Evacuation from Gaza & Education at WWU."  For a number of weeks, signatures had stalled, not quite reaching 1,000. We are still trying to do everything we can to get the word out about this petition, and to find more support for Mohammed. Today we happily passed the 1,000 mark, and at the time of this writing we are at 1,065. I am very grateful to everyone who has signed, and everyone who is helping us find more supporters.

In case there might be someone who has not yet signed the petition but wants to help, I am also cross-posting most of the information I shared in the petition update here, and letting anyone who might be reading this what the latest news is regarding these efforts. Below are excerpts from the petition update:

January 22, 2026

Winter quarter at WWU began on January 6, 2026 and Mohammed is still in Gaza. His scholarship has been deferred to spring 2026, and we are re-doubling our efforts to demand that the barriers preventing Mohammed from accessing his education at WWU be dismantled.

There is currently an application pending with the federal government requesting that they grant Mohammed Emergency Humanitarian Parole, which would allow him the U.S. to help facilitate his evacuation, and permit his legal entry and temporary residence in the U.S. even without a visa, on the basis of having secured sponsorship, which he has, and in the case of facing "urgent humanitarian crises" and/or for a limited duration for the purposes of something that constitutes a significant public benefit.

The application we submitted is strong in all of these areas, and was complete with documentation that could support our case. We are also hopeful they may also consider a request to expedite its processing, due to the time sensitivity of this opportunity for Mohammed, and the urgency of the ongoing emergency he is experiencing in Gaza.

All of this to say: there is a pathway forward that would allow Mohammed to come to Bellingham, Washington, receive the scholarship he has been awarded, and complete his undergraduate degree at Western Washington University.

Having a show of support in the form of this petition will further strengthen the requests and the application currently pending, and it will also encourage decision-makers to voice their support and give their approval in due haste. Over the next four weeks, we would really like to get as many signatures as possible, and we are asking for your support in helping us with this effort.

Please join us in trying to do all we can to make sure that Mohammed doesn't have this opportunity taken from him. To lose this scholarship would be yet another cruelty and injustice, and it is one we must try to prevent. Please share this petition with as many potential supporters as you can.

Here is the direct link to the petition: https://www.change.org/p/support-wwu-scholarship-recipient-mohammed-s-evacuation-from-gaza-education-at-wwu

________________________________________

NOTE: The "Take the Next Step" button at the bottom of the petition update page on the Change.org site will ask you to make a donation to support this petition, but you do not have to do this. You can skip this and go directly to the petition. There have already been a number of generous people who have done this, to whom we thank. But further donations to this platform are not necessary or required, and if you do want to make a donation, you can also support Mohammed via a donation to his survival fundraising campaign.

And you can also learn more about Mohammed and how special he is by reading an earlier post of mine called  "Mohammed: The Student Who Teaches Me." 

This is a Long One

Someone I know in Gaza, someone I’ve known for a long time, someone who is not part of the families I have been connecting to my local community but who is nonetheless important to me, posted on Twitter explaining how there are many people in Gaza who have survival campaigns, but the number of donors is very very small. He noted how every family in Gaza needs help. And he acknowledged that we may be feeling fatigued by this, and he apologized for any burdens that are on us because of this.

I responded by saying that any feelings of fatigue and exhaustion we may feel are not ours to feel, and that any apologies for this are not his to give. I said that it is the world that owes the families in Gaza everything, and that it is on us to do more. And that I appreciated all that he and others are doing to keep going, to survive.

While he is right about how there are not enough donors, it shouldn’t be this way. When you look at the numbers, there shouldn’t be this discrepancy. There are more than enough people of means in the U.S., let alone throughout the world, to adequately provide for every single family in Gaza. It is not the resources that are limited. It is the number of people who will actually help. (Just as we could disrupt all of our systems and end the genocide with a national strike, an action that though lacking the pageantry and spectacle of people wearing costumes and dancing in the streets, would be more effective than some of the demonstrations likely to attract large numbers of those who believe that all the horrors of the world only began with our current president.)

Yes, the needs of the families in Gaza outstrip the number of people outside of Gaza who have been and are still doing what they can to raise and send funds to the families trying to survive, the families who have been abandoned by this world. There are many of us who are working together, outside and in spite of our corrupt systems, to care for each other and help keep people alive, but our numbers are too few to meet the scope and scale of what is actually needed. And it doesn’t have to be this way.

After over two years of this, I can’t help but feel that it actually requires more effort to look away than it does to see what is in front of our eyes. And blaming the Western media propaganda machine can only carry us so far when Palestinians have been doing everything they can to reach us, to tell us, to get us to understand, despite the risks they face in doing this. And while there are many outside of Gaza, myself included, who have been changed forever, who have committed to unlearning the prejudice and bias and discrimination we have grown up immersed in, of pushing back against this wherever we find it-- for the most part, the efforts of the Palestinian people who continue to give us so much while also doing all they can to survive the genocide, have largely been met by people who speak over them, ignore them, insult them, disbelieve them, or lie about them. Again and again and again. And even among their so-called "supporters and allies," they have faced skepticism, racism, disappointment, betrayal, inconsistency, misunderstanding, and broken promises.

Yesterday, at an event that had the makings of an anti-imperialist rally, (while also unfortunately containing some of the damaging costumed theatrics and other trappings of the pro-establishment ‘indivisible’ nonsense), a woman stopped to ask me about the families featured at my table. I tried to explain how they were all families in Gaza who I am personally connected to, who I’ve been trying to connect to the local and area communities, in an attempt to raise more awareness and support for their survival. I explained how I’ve been doing this partly through presentations created in collaboration with the families. I said the support we had raised in Bellingham and beyond has been helping these families survive.

“Has it?” she demanded incredulously.
“Yes, it has,” I tried to smile.
“But how do you know?”
“Because I do,” I said, still smiling, “I talk to them every day. And I have seen the impact of what we have been sending.”
“But how do you know? Have you been there? How can they even get the money? How do you know it is getting to them?”
“Because in many cases, I am the one sending them the money myself. Or I am familiar with the people and the families who are transferring funds. And I talk to the people who are receiving the funds every day. I just sent a transfer to one family two days ago, and another one just this morning. This is not an issue. They are receiving the money and it is helping them buy food and water and warm clothing. It is helping them receive medical treatment."
“Well, I hope that’s true, but I just don’t know,” she said, still skeptical.
“It is true.” I told her, still trying to smile but feeling myself growing increasingly exasperated.
“Well, I hope it is. But I just don’t see how it could be. How does the money even get to them? I just don’t see how that is even possible.”

I started trying to explain that sometimes it was via international wire transfers, but that there were other methods too, that it could be challenging, and it varied depending on the family and what they had access to, but we managed to find a way. I explained how I had friends here locally who are also helping me with this, and I was about to explain a little more, but she cut me off by saying,

“Well, I just don’t see how that could be!”

“I don’t know what to tell you then,” I responded. “I do see how it can be. Because it is. And I am directly involved with this. I have been doing this for a long time. There are people all over the world doing this, without enough support or help, while others would prefer to just ask questions and do nothing.” I think my smile had faded by this point.

“Well I am sorry, this is all new to me, I just don’t understand. I don’t understand how they can even get the money. How can they get it? Are there any banks? Are there even any banks!?! These are the questions people should be answering!”

Over two years into this intensified genocide. And these are the questions people should be answering. 

I sighed heavily and loudly at this point. I felt my eyes and feet sinking into the ground beneath me. I felt my chest constrict and as I tried to look around at my surroundings and take a deep breath. I saw a mixture of people and faces, many familiar and many not. And it struck me, harshly, how far we still have to go, as a country, as a world, to move away from this place where the default for the vast majority of people is to center themselves individually as the focal point of all knowledge and the beneficiary of all responsibility. Where genuine curiosity is all too rare, and community care and communal responsibility is an after-thought accompanied by suspicion, if it is even a thought at all. Where listening is replaced by one’s need to assert their opinion, as though their opinion should apply to everyone around them. As though because something is new to them, it is therefore the responsibility of those of us around them to carry the burden of their ignorance, while we also shoulder the weight of trying to address the injustice they don’t yet understand.

There was once a time when “all of this” was new to me too. But there are ways to learn that center those who we are learning about, and there are ways to learn which make demands upon the very communities we claim to want to understand and support. And sometimes ignorance is used as an excuse to do nothing. And sometimes doing nothing is exactly what enables violence and suffering and injustice to thrive. 

I will spare you the rest of our exchange in more detail, while mentioning briefly the part where she questioned the validity of my telling her about how a number of people in this community had helped me raise emergency funds in less than 24 hours the previous day, enabling one of my friends to receive life-saving medical treatment, and how I spoke with my friend when he was in the hospital receiving the antibiotics he needed to fight a serious infection. And in response to all of this she did not ask me about my friend. She did not inquire about how he was doing now, whether he was ok now. She did not ask if he had what he needed to recover. She didn’t express any concern over his well-being or interest in him as a person, or regard for his family. Instead, she said she did not see how this could be true because she had not seen with her own eyes that there were any hospitals left in Gaza. So how could he have even gotten the treatment?!

This exchange was during the closest thing to an anti-imperialist rally Bellingham has ever had. And it was among people who are supposed allies to those working to challenge systems of oppression in support of collective liberation. Among so-called progressives who claim to care. But when it comes to Americans thinking about people who are not in the United States, there is a certain kind of pervasive nihilism that seeks refuge in a despair rooted in selfishness. And while I am still trying to reach as many people as I can, I will admit, I am losing my stamina for dealing with people like this. I just don’t have it anymore.

I've encountered something similar lately when I have tabled in public places. Sometimes it is like this, taking the form of those who stop to pepper me with questions they don’t actually want the answers to but who want to assert their own views while being resentful of my answers which challenge their own perceptions and beliefs. And sometimes I see it in the faces of the people who take great and obvious pains to make sure it appears they cannot see me as they walk by carrying their lattes, trying not to accidentally glance in my direction, lest I ruin their day by causing them to think for a moment about the genocide. And I also see it when someone casually says something like “Good for you!” with a patronizing smile or even an occasional thumbs up as they pass by me without stopping.

I’ve been thinking a bit about something Steven Salaita said during his remarks, The Meaning of Honesty in Academe, from the 2025 James Baldwin Memorial Lecture at UMass-Amherst this past April. Towards the end, he mentions how a question people frequently ask him is, “But what can we do?” And then he breaks down what he sees as being possible attributes of the person asking the question, noting that there may be some overlap among these categories, but explaining them as follows:

“1) They’re being disingenuous; 2) they’re seeking validation for a preexisting opinion; 3) they’re overwhelmed or confused by the gravity of the moment; or 4) they’re motivated and want to act on some issue of justice,” adding that he suspects some kind of combination between number three and number four are most common.

He goes on to explain that he thinks the people: “...who care enough to want to do something to improve the world in lasting and meaningful ways know deep-down exactly what needs to be done. They’re looking for ways for that action to be somehow compatible with job security, with personal freedom, or with notions of civic responsibility…” And he talks about how one thing we need to do is give up on the idea of “safety,” in the United States, noting that: “It doesn’t currently exist for opponents of U.S. imperialism (to say nothing of its victims). And it won’t exist until U.S. imperialism is defeated.”

Today I am very tired. I am weary. I am exhausted. But as I said to my friend in Gaza who apologized to us for our weariness, this fatigue is not the fault of the Palestinian people, or of any oppressed people throughout the world. And it is not the same as the exhaustion, weariness, or fatigue of those in Gaza, who have every reason and right to feel this way. My tiredness is of a different nature, one that I both feel and am part of, because since I live here, I am also part of this country. And I am tired because of this country, and because of the people in this country, and also the people in my local community, who are choosing every day to look away rather than take any responsibility. Or any action. Or even any ownership over their own learning. I am exhausted by those who are so concerned about  their own comforts, they cannot be bothered to contribute to the survival of those whose lives are in danger because of this country. I am tired from the people I encounter in my daily life who refuse to recognize that what comforts we may have in this country come at someone else’s expense, and that we are not the ones who are "helpless." We are the ones who should be changing this. 

For as many wonderful and amazing people there are who I have known and met, who I care about and rely upon and can count on to be here to help support the families they now care about too, there are still so many more people who do not care, who do not want to know, who do not want to even have to think about this, who would actually prefer to just give up and believe that everything is hopeless, because then they can justify doing nothing at all, nothing besides wallowing in their own feelings of how bad things are.

I am not trying to sound cold or negative, despairing or hopeless. I am at my core none of these things. I am just tired today. Sometimes it just hits harder than others. But I am also rooted in my resolve to continue. And I am grateful to those who are in this place with me, whether in Bellingham or elsewhere in this state, country, or around the world. And I am especially grateful to those in Gaza.

And if you have read all the way or skipped to the end of this, please consider making a donation to my friend Mahmoud and his family, who helped inspire my words today. And please also remember and give to the families I have been fundraising for as much support for as you can. 

Starting the New Year in Gaza by Cutting Off More Support

In addition to continuing the illegal blockade designed to inflict further harms upon Palestinian families in Gaza, Israel (with support and backing from the United States), is now implementing a ban on aid and medical organizations that have been operating within Gaza, further limiting what was already a severely restricted and hampered presence of support, in order to further isolate Gaza and increase its genocidal pressure and violence.

Families in Gaza need our support more than ever before. Direct donations raised by people outside of our systems and governments are even more critical than they have been these past two years. 

But in addition to contributing to these donations, we also need to do more to raise our voices in every space and every way to exert the pressure that is required to change what is being done by our government as it expands its support for the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people. I hope 2026 will bring with it more Americans who will finally recognize and act upon their own responsibility, and understand that what comforts we may have come at a price of harms done to others throughout the world, others who are suffering because of actions taken by the United States government. And I hope this awareness will also be accompanied by a commitment to do more to change this. 

I hope that demonstrations held by Americans in 2026 will extend beyond our own immediate environments, will go beyond our talk of 'no kings,' will abandon the exclusively U.S.-centric focus on "domestic" policy, and that we will finally understand the inherently irresponsible fallacy of this framing, which is so reliant upon navel-gazing, and that we will then alter our actions accordingly.  It was almost a year ago when I expressed similar sentiments in our local daily newspaper, and I pray a year from now things will be very different. 

This morning I shared something online that ended up being one of the most popular re-posts I have ever published, which I took to mean it resonated with many many people. It was an article written by the Palestinian reporter Hind Khoudary called "What Being a Woman in Gaza Means in this Genocidal War." I shared the article with this quote excerpted from it: 

"Women screaming into the void, bringing life into the world while surrounded by death and destruction. And to think, if there were enough political will among Israel’s Western allies, none of this would be happening."

I have been thinking about this, this and the stories and descriptions of the women she included in her article. I have been thinking about this all day today, on this first day of the new year. I have been thinking about my friend Dina, sister of my friend Ashraf, and the many hardships and losses she has experienced, yes as a Palestinian in Gaza, but also as a woman. She has been going through things that would have completely broken me. And she has been living in extreme pain for months now, ever since the shrapnel wound to her jaw she sustained when they had to flee their shelter amidst gunfire and shelling during their last violent forced displacement. She literally had to grab her baby girl and run for her life, while the shrapnel entered her jaw and her face bled profusely. 

She still needs surgery for this injury, and she is in constant pain. And we cannot even raise enough support through her current survival campaign for her to buy food and clothing for her daughter Areej, let alone have surgery. 

And now, with medical organizations being banned from providing any assistance, the already targeted damaged medical infrastructure in Gaza will be even more fragile, more expensive, more inaccessible. "And to think, if there were enough political will among Israel’s Western allies, none of this would be happening."

I do think about this. I am thinking about this. And I will try to keep doing more than merely think about this. And I hope if you are reading these words, you will too.

May 2026 bring us an enhanced awareness, a renewed commitment, and new actions that will cause change. And may support for the families in Gaza who are trying to survive the unendurable grow. They have been surviving for so long now in the harshest most devastating circumstances, without enough support, without any justice, and without their most basic needs being met. May this change soon.

Upcoming Event: Jan. 3, 2026 - Write for Rights, Dr. Safiya, & 'Eight Families in Gaza'

Amnesty International's Local Group 270 hosts their annual 'Write for Rights' at the Bellingham Central Library Lecture Room on Saturday, Jan. 3, 2026 from 2:00 - 4:00pm, and they are inviting us to join us in taking action, along with hundreds of thousands worldwide, calling for the release of prisoners of conscience, supporting human rights defenders in need, and seeking justice for human rights abuses. 

There are nine cases from around the world, along with several Urgent Actions, and there will be information about these actions, in addition to a screening of the Fault Lines documentary, The Disappearance of Dr. Abu Safiya, and information about Amnesty International actions and writing in support of his release. They have also kindly invited me to table and host letter-writing on behalf of the families in Gaza whose voices I have been trying to amplify. The event is free and open to the public, and I hope to see you there. 

For information about this event, please email: amnestyinternational270@gmail.com. (This event is not sponsored or endorsed by the Bellingham Public Library.)

Winter Holidays and End-of-Year Realities & Reflections

 

Today my morning messages from friends in Gaza were filled with kindness and warmth; supportive, encouraging, and generous words from people to whom I feel everything is owed. This past week, I have been telling local friends who are here in Bellingham, that it isn’t me who is giving support to the families in Gaza–it is they who are giving support to me. They are the ones who have taught me what it means to love, to persist, and to keep searching for light in the darkness. And my heart is overflowing with love and appreciation for them.

As 2025 winds down, I find myself wondering how it can possibly be that this is the third winter holiday season since the intensified, accelerated, genocide against the Palestinian people began? How has another year passed, another year of human-made famine and forced starvation, forced displacement, violence, destruction, loss and suffering– all of which have not yet ended, despite what some in the United States might want you to believe?

I have no answers to these questions, but a lack of answers does not change this harsh reality. Another year has passed. And the genocide has not ended.

There is still no safety, rest, or reprieve for the families in Gaza who are still struggling to survive. There is still no assurance of when or how things will improve. And there is still an overwhelming need for us to do more than what we have been doing. Because everything we have done so far has not been enough to change this.

To those who are somehow able to celebrate the holidays with friends and loved ones, I wish you well, and I hope these times bring you comfort and joy. And I also hope you will keep room in your hearts for the families in Gaza who are still doing everything they can to survive, to be here, to keep going, even in the midst of extreme hardship and suffering, hardship and suffering that is being deliberately inflicted upon them, with the violence also still ongoing, and with the United States bearing the responsibility for this, not just by allowing it to continue, but by actively participating and expanding the scale and the scope of this genocide. Those of us who are living in relative comfort, safety, and security in this country also bear responsibility because of this, even though we did not choose or want this.

The winter weather is intensifying, and another major storm is predicted to hit Gaza this weekend, while shelters, caravans, construction materials and supplies are still being deliberately and actively blocked by the U.S. and Israel from entering into Gaza. Meanwhile, Israel is continuing to destroy, demolish, and bomb the few remaining structures that are still standing, and damaged buildings are also collapsing as conditions worsen.

"The United States’ shielding of Israel has led to exposing civilians in the Gaza Strip to a heightened risk of death under coercive living conditions. In December alone, around 18 civilians died as a result of severe storms, including five children who died from extreme cold. During the same period, wind and rain destroyed more than 27,000 tents and caused the collapse of over 20 homes previously damaged by bombardment, where residents were forced to live due to the absence of alternatives. Israel continues to block the entry of temporary shelter solutions, including caravans, and prohibits the entry of equipment and materials required for reconstruction and rubble removal.

Israel is exploiting the current situation to continue implementing its policies in the Gaza Strip, having directly killed nearly 400 Palestinians since the ceasefire was declared on 10 October. In parallel, the Israeli army is accelerating the systematic destruction of what remains of buildings east of the Yellow Line through bulldozing, demolitions, daily airstrikes, and artillery shelling, intending to consolidate effective military control over around 53 per cent of the Gaza Strip, reshaping its geography and demography in a manner that serves genocide and leads to the physical erasure of Gaza’s population as a protected group.” (from Euro-Med Monitor’s Dec. 22, 2025 article, "United States’ shielding of Israel perpetuates status quo and genocide in Gaza.”)

There is no ceasefire. There is no safety. There is no justice. And the genocide has not ended. So as we look ahead to 2026, I hope it is with the understanding that much much more is required of us. More support for the families who are trying to survive and being forced to endure what no one should ever have to, and much more in terms of our commitments and actions for justice and accountability to prevail.

Thank you to everyone who is reading this, to all who have been giving your support, to everyone who has reached out to me with your kind words, your encouragement, your emails, your messages, your donations for the families, and also with your friendship. I end this year grateful to have met so many amazing people these past 12 months, in Bellingham, in Washington State, in Gaza, and throughout the world. And it is this community of compassionate and caring people who give me the hope and strength to keep going and to never stop trying, to keep doing everything I can, alongside so many of you.

_____________________________________________________________

To make a donation to the families in Gaza who are connected to the Whatcom County, Bellingham, and Washington State local and area communities, you can donate directly via their online Chuffed or GoFundMe campaign pages, or you can send or transfer funds to me (via postal mail, Zelle, or VenMo), which I can then post on your behalf. If you would like more information about how to do this, please email me at clarissjanae@gmail.com 

Dec. 20th Winter Solstice Gathering for 'Eight Families in Gaza'

 

Join me at the Bellingham Public Library* Downstairs Lecture Room on Saturday, December 20 between 1 and 4pm for a chance to come together in support of the 'Eight Families in Gaza' who have become important to our local and area communities. Stop in even if it is just to say hello, and then feel free to stay for as little or as long as you would like during the time we have reserved for this gathering. [*required note: This event is *not* sponsored by the Library.]

Those who want to will have a chance to leave a written message or draw a picture for the families in Gaza on a fabric banner we are making, and to talk and brainstorm ideas with me of things we can do in the months ahead to support these families. I will also share more about some of the projects I am working on, in case you are interested in finding out more about hot to become involved and offer your help.

During this time I will share a looped slideshow on the large screen which will rotate through  a series of slides showcasing some of the photos and written words from each of the different families, and I’ll also bring the latest updates which I can share verbally through conversation with those who are interested.

I'll have on hand some of the leftover books and handmade items from previous fundraising events, and a kettle for hot water along with an assortment of teas. If you have funds to donate, we welcome this, but it is not required or essential, so please don’t let that be a barrier for you if you would like to come. Feel free to bring yourself, your friends, your ideas, your questions, or any supplies for making arts and crafts, and together we can create a space for cultivating connection, creativity, and support.

This event is open to anyone but I will admit, I have not had much time to really promote it because I have been trying to deal with a number of ongoing emergencies in Gaza, and to somehow counter the continued slow-down of donations, so I am really not sure if anyone will show up at all, but I will be there regardless and I hope you can make it too!

For Majd - More Than a Writer

I’ve recently found myself reflecting upon many things in my mind and heart and memory of these past two years, reviewing the impressions and stories and connections, thinking about how I met certain people, how one relationship has led me to another. And as I’ve tried to trace back various pathways and intersections, it struck me that my friend Majd is the one person in Gaza who I did not meet through anyone else. He is the only person I can't trace back a connection to other than what first drew me to him, which were his words. His writing. The way his words affected me. How they made me respond, caused me to reach out to him directly with my own words, despite not knowing him and not knowing how he would respond.

When I first messaged him, I was trusting a feeling that was more than a feeling–it was almost as though I was acting without thinking, without analyzing–just moving in a direction that was pulling me, magnetically, organically, naturally. As though carried by a rushing river with the strength of a current that was somehow lifting me forward, bolstering me, keeping me afloat until I arrived in a different place. A place of meadows and flowers and illumination.

Reflections and memories about Majd have been ever-present with me in a particularly strong way these recent weeks, stronger than usual, I should say. He has been collaborating with me on the two recent live reading events for “Read Palestine Week” we hosted in the town where I live. He has done this despite being sick, despite dealing with the innumerable challenges and injustices that are part of daily life and survival in Gaza. I’ve been thinking a lot about how no matter what we see or hear or think we know, for those who are being forced to withstand the unbearable, forced to endure what is beyond my capacity to comprehend–for those who are being asked to demonstrate a faith and persistence and willingness to survive, despite the constant presence of death, loss, and violence– there is a gap we cannot close. As another friend once said to me, "You know what I tell you. But I know what I am living."

I have often said that Majd’s writing is a gift to an undeserving world, a gift for which I am very grateful. His writing is not only clever, powerful, and technically-skilled, it holds depths beyond what is apparent at first glance, containing multitudes, carrying a rich vastness of understanding, emotion, insight, and feeling.

He has told me before that he just writes what he feels. And this is something I think about a lot. Beneath everything he says and does, there is also a foundational vision rooted in compassion, integrity, and justice. I am frequently overcome with emotion by what he shares, how he writes, and the way he captures a feeling, a truth, an observation, a devastation, a moment of joy. He is a writer who is more than a writer. He is an educator who is more than an educator. A translator who transcends the limitations of language, who crosses barriers and borders and hindrances of proximity, time, and materiality.

Majd possesses both a mastery of language and an instinct for understanding how to combine what is said with what is left unsaid–how to use words which simultaneously confer and infer. How to combine insight with humor–humor that can sting with a kind of realism that brings home the harshness, reality, absurdity and injustice of a situation–yet still somehow offers a strength that emerges out of this understanding. Always clever and never contrived, Majd’s writing is a reflection of him. And the way he writes emerges naturally, through him, of him, carrying with it a sensitivity and a kind of integrity that is core to his being.

There is also a precision in his writing that is unique and profound, a way in which he offers subtle clarity on a point that needs elucidating, bringing light to something that has not only been obscured, but whose very obfuscation had altogether eluded me before he not only casts his light, but also shows me where the shadows are lurking. I find myself returning to his words, again and again and again, always grateful for this chance to go deeper into an understanding that changes me and helps me stay afloat when the river of the darkness of this world threatens to subsume me.

No matter how much I strive to know, to comprehend, to understand, I know I am still removed. There is a distance. And I miss many things. But I am always changed by Majd’s writing, and his words bring me closer, collapsing that distance. And I have seen first-hand the transformation of other people who read or hear or see his words. And no matter what words I choose now, no matter what I say, nothing will be enough to adequately convey the depth of my regard, appreciation, love, and admiration for my friend Majd, for the connection we have that emerged from his writing, his words, his voice. A connection that is sustained because of our friendship. How grateful I am to him for his beautiful, wise, caring heart, for this love I have the privilege of experiencing.

Majd is a writer who is more than a writer. He is also a colleague, a teacher, an educator. He is a brother, a son, a friend. He is all of these things and so much more. He cares deeply about his family and his community. And his commitment to education and his determination to do all he can to support his students, to counter the many ways the world has betrayed both him and them, is unlike anything I have ever observed in any educator I have ever known. He is a kindred spirit, a beautiful soul, a man who cares and feels things deeply. We have talked before about writing as a means of coping, survival, resistance and resilience. A point of connection. A demonstration of determination to continue, to exist, to keep moving through the darkness towards whatever light can be created or made visible.

And all of these things I share about Majd, these glimpses and descriptions and inadequate attempts to capture so much that cannot be captured–I offer them now as just one small piece of something to reflect back just a fraction of what he has given me. How grateful I am to him for his friendship; how lucky I am to know him. Sometimes the distance of time and proximity does not feel vast. It is as though there is a connection despite these barriers, a magnetic beam of light stretching across these limitations. I feel its gentle pull. I see its shimmer in the darkness. And I know it will remain, now and always.

____________________________________

If you are reading these words and would like to make a contribution in support of Majd and his family, you can do this via their survival fundraiser on GoFundMe.