MECA is thrilled to invite you to this special event focusing on Silwan, East Jerusalem! MECA staff member Jody Sokolower is the author of the soon to be released Determined to Stay: Palestinian Youth Fight for Their Village. Join Jody and Sahar Abbasi, from MECA’s partner center in Silwan, for this virtual event celebrating the book!
Free! Register now: www.mecaforpeace.org/DeterminedToStay
Silwan is a Palestinian village just outside the ancient walls of Jerusalem’s Old City. Determined to Stay is the moving story of its people in the face of occupation. As Silwani youth and community members share their lives with us, their village becomes a doorway to Palestinian history and current reality. Written with young people in mind, Determined to Stay draws deep connections between the lives of youth in the US and Palestine—from criminalization, forced relocation and buried histories to hip-hop as resistance.
Author Jody Sokolower will read from Determined to Stay
With Sahar Abbasi, live from Silwan, Palestine, talking about the current situation
Facebook event – please share
About the Book
DETERMINED TO STAY: Palestinian Youth Fight for Their Village
by Jody Sokolower; Introduction by Nick Estes
Silwan is a Palestinian village just outside the ancient walls of Jerusalem’s Old City. Determined to Stay is the moving story of its people in the face of occupation. As Silwani youth and community members share their lives with us, their village becomes a doorway to Palestinian history and current reality. Written with young people in mind, Determined to Stay draws deep connections between the lives of youth in the US and Palestine—from criminalization, forced relocation and buried histories to hip-hop as resistance.
Jody Sokolower is co-coordinator of the Teach Palestine Project at the Middle East Children’s Alliance. Formerly managing editor of Rethinking Schools, Jody is a teacher educator who has taught middle and high school social studies and English. She was lead editor of Rethinking Sexism, Gender and Sexuality and editor of Teaching about the Wars in the Middle East.
Nick Estes is co-founder of Red Nation and author of Our History is the Future: Standing Rock Versus the Dakota Access Pipeline, and the Long Tradition of Indigenous Resistance.
“Determined to Stay” is a must-read book for all ages that stands to fill a critical gap in US standard curricula.
— Noura Erakat, author of Justice for Some: Law and the Question of Palestine
Linking the histories of settler colonialism in Palestine and the US, Sokolower uses testimonios to humanize the complex and interconnected stories of resistance, building a platform for solidarity across continents.
— Anita Fernández, director, Xicanx Institute for Teaching and Organizing
An urgent book about the impact of Israel’s occupation on Palestinian youth.
—Kirkus Starred Review
“What is life like for you?” Jody Sokolower asks the children and young people of the Palestinian village of Silwan. Her extraordinary book tells their stories . . . and she brings the stories home, documenting the parallel histories in which Israeli efforts to destroy Palestinian lives and seize their land are met with the same generations of resistance as US efforts to eliminate the Indigenous people of this land.
—Phyllis Bennis, author of Understanding the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict
Publisher: Interlink, co-published with Middle East Children’s Alliance