Mondoweiss Culture Editor Mohammed El-Kurd interviews Palestinian writer, actress, and political activist Raeda Taha.

What role does literature play in the Palestinian liberation movement? Though the question itself isn’t subversive, it feels that way. There are many considerations, but it’s hard to imagine what a poem can do in the barrel of a gun. 

In her one-woman show “Where Can I Find Someone Like You, Ali,” Raeda Taha recounts her life as the “daughter of a martyr.” On May 8, 1972, Taha’s father, Ali Taha, and three other armed Palestinians were killed during a botched airplane hijacking. Taha was 7 at the time. So began her life as the daughter of a Palestinian “shaheed” (“martyr” in English)—a term that signifies a special place in Palestinian society. Taha provided her audiences with a touching, at times heart-breaking but never sentimental, glimpse into the lives of Palestinians who have lost family members at the hands of the Israeli military.