Mourid Barghouti, the Palestinian Poet

In 2000 Mourid Barghouti published I Saw Ramallah, the acclaimed memoir that told of returning in 1996 to his Palestinian home for the first time since exile following the Six-Day War in 1967. I Was Born There, I Was Born Here takes up the story in 1998 when Barghouti returned to the Occupied Territories to introduce his Cairo-born son, Tamim, to his Palestinian family. Ironically, a few years later Tamim had himself been arrested for taking part in a demonstration against the impending Iraq War. He was held in the very same Cairo prison from which his father had been expelled from Egypt to begin a second exile in Budapest when Tamim was only a few months old.

Palestinian poet Mourid Barghouti gives a reading (Al Jazeera, 2010)

Mourid Barghouti in conversation with Githa Hariharan (2016)

Mourid Barghouti reads his poems at The Prague Writers' Festival 2009

As always, edited by Ian Anderson (@starsalwayslost), with special thanks / credit to Sina Rahmani + The East is a Podcast. Robin Brickner is our social media coordinator. Our Twitter presence is @AntiImpArchive, and if you would like to reach out directly we have an email address at: [email protected]

We have AIA business cards with QR codes - please email or DM us to have one mailed to you