For Refaat

Telling his story

May 03, 2024

I wrote these words months ago, but I need to share them now.

Here is a poem by Refaat Alareer, a poet, professor, thinker, and human who was assassinated on December 6th, 2023, along with his brother and his nephew, by an israeli missile. He posted this poem on October 14th, 2023. Refaat continued to write and post poetry during the genocidal campaign following October 7th, and his poem, “Death 247 in Gaza”, is full of the love and radicalism that he embodied.

Refaat Alareer was killed for his ideas and for his humanity. He was outspoken and clear-headed, something that zionists could not accept. For simply pointing out the absurdity of an israeli lie about Hamas, he was targeted by prominent zionist and former New York Times columnist Bari Weiss, who drew attention to him and invited her genocidal followers to threaten and target Refaat. Following Weiss’s tweet, Refaat tweeted “If I get killed by Israeli bombs or my family is harmed, I blame Bari Weiss @bariweiss and her likes[,]” with a screenshot of the numerous threats that he was receiving due to Weiss’s spotlight. The screenshot is filled with clear examples of the bigotry and inhumanity that zionists baselessly accuse Palestinian freedom fighters of, from homophobia to threats of sexual violence.

I mourn Refaat through the specificity of our shared love of literature, especially Refaat’s exuberant love for Shakespeare. I watched one of his lectures on Shakespeare a few days after his assassination and let his humanity wash over me. I could see my own love of literature in the memes Refaat filled his slides with. I could see the professor who ignited my love of Shakespeare in Refaat’s reasoning behind his own love of Shakespeare’s works. Refaat can no longer share this love with the world. On October 15th, 2023, he connected Hamlet’s most famous soliloquy to Palestinian reality:

“With my students we focus on how the very soliloquy by Hamlet is an act of life and thus even if he was contemplating death/suicide/revenge, Hamlet chose life/art over the authoritarian death machine (his uncle). Many see Hamlet being a symbol of Palestine and Claudius Israel.”

This connection of canonized literature to revolutionary resistance is exactly why Refaat was assassinated. As George Jackson says in Blood in My Eye, “It isn’t revolutionary or materialist to disconnect things.” Refaat’s connection between Shakespeare’s words and Palestinian resistance is the kind of radical connection and analysis that pokes holes in the paradigm that created israel. The soliloquy from Hamlet that Refaat speaks of is one of the most quoted pieces of writing in the history of the world, and Refaat’s understanding of its radicality could not be allowed to exist. Refaat’s use of a quote from Hamlet in “Death 247” is another example of his beautiful understanding of the power and importance of language. It is our duty to carry this analysis with us, and to prove that the attempted silencing of Refaat is a failure.

It is soul-crushing that there are tens of thousands of Palestinians who I cannot grieve as specifically as I can Refaat. Refaat spoke and wrote in English, and he studied and taught in subjects that I also study. There are tens of thousands of Palestinians who I cannot hear as fully as I can hear Refaat. Thousands who were never even allowed to speak. The humanity that I can so fully see and feel in Refaat reminds me of the humanity of every soul that israel has extinguished. The precision with which Refaat was targeted proves the genocidal intent of every bomb and missile and bullet that has taken a life in Gaza since October 7th. Refaat’s steadfastness in the face of this onslaught, his consistent defiance and confidence in his own words, must be an inspiration.

I want to end with something that Refaat said in one of his lectures, which are recorded and uploaded to YouTube. Refaat can no longer speak for himself, so let us spread his words to those who can listen. When speaking about Fadwa Tuqan, a Palestinian poet well-known for her accounts of the Palestinian plight and the accompanying resistance, Refaat said:

“We always fall into this trap of saying, ‘She was arrested for just writing poetry.’ We do this a lot, even as believers in literature. ‘Why would israel arrest somebody or put somebody under house arrest, she only wrote a poem?’ So we contradict ourselves sometimes; we believe in the power of literature changing lives, as a means of resistance, as a means of fighting back, and then at the end of the day, we say 'She just wrote a poem!' We shouldn't be saying that. Moshe Dayan, an Israeli general, said that, 'The poems of Fadwa Tuqan are like facing 20 enemy fighters.' Wow. She didn't throw stones, she didn't shoot at the invading Israeli jeeps, she just wrote poetry. And I'm falling for that again—I said she just wrote poetry.... And the same thing happened to Palestinian poet Dareen Tatour. She wrote poetry, celebrating Palestinians' struggle, encouraging Palestinians to resist, not to give up, to fight back—She was put under house arrest, she was put into prison for years. And therefore, I end here, with a very significant point: Don't forget that Palestine was first and foremost occupied in Zionist literature and Zionist poetry. When the Zionists thought of going back to Palestine, it wasn't like 'Oh, let's go to Palestine.' It took them years, over 50 years of thinking, of planning, politics, money and everything else. But literature played one of the most crucial roles here....Palestine in Zionist Jewish literature was presented to Jewish people around the world... [as] Palestine is a land without a people for a people without a land. Palestine flows with milk and honey. There is no one there—so let's go… [but] there were people—there have always been people in Palestine. But this is an example of how poetry can be a very significant part of life.”

Here are the places where I found Refaat:

POEM

For Refaat

Telling his story

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