Sumud: Palestinian resilience and its impact on the world | Event series
Featuring lectures and panel presentations from world-leading scholars and journalists, film screenings, and artistic performances.
Location
University of Auckland B201-440
10 Symonds Street Auckland, Auckland 1010 New ZealandAbout this event
Sumud: Palestinian resilience and its impact on the world
Against a background of what some have described as ongoing apartheid and an unfolding genocide, this series of public events explores the resilience of Palestinian people, and the intersections between this resilience and political action around the globe.
Through evocative and informative depictions of life in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, the series examines how governmental actions have inhibited discourse on Palestine and contributed to scholasticide. Featuring lectures and panel presentations from world-leading scholars and journalists, film screenings, and artistic performances, the series celebrates the concept of sumud, and the ways that Palestinian people sustain community against adversity.
The events take place each Thursday from 6-8.30pm, from 31 July to 21 August at Waipapa Taumata Rau University of Auckland.
/!\ Please click on links below to RSVP for the event
Film screening: The Doctor’s Wife
Thursday 31 July, 6pm
University of Auckland, B201, 10 Symonds Street, 201-393
A feature-length documentary film by Paula Whetu-Jones.
After retiring from a distinguished career as a cardiac surgeon in New Zealand, Dr Alan Kerr led a Kiwi team to Gaza and the West Bank to operate on children with heart disease. What started as a two-week visit became a 20-year commitment to Palestine, involving 40 medical missions to Gaza and the West Bank and hundreds of operations.
Dedicated to the health of Palestinians living under occupation, Dr Kerr was instrumental in the establishment of an independent Palestinian cardiac unit. He trained the first Palestinian paediatric cardiac surgeon, and has since been recognised as the ‘Father of Paediatric Cardiac Surgery' in Palestine. However, he couldn't have achieved this on his own—his wife, Hazel Kerr, travelled with him, bringing a different kind of healing to the people she met in Palestine.
The screening of this film is followed by Q&A with Alan and Hazel Kerr, and Paula Whetu-Jones.
/!\ Please click on links below to RSVP for the event
MORE INFO AND LINK TO RSVP
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Where irises grow: public lectures on sumud
Thursday 7 August, 6pm
University of Auckland, B201, 10 Symonds Street, 201-393
Resilience has many faces. This event features lectures and a Q&A with leading scholars and journalists from Aotearoa New Zealand and around the world, including Lana Tatour, Gideon Levy, Ghassan Hage, Alison Phipps, Kim Alley, Treasa Dunworth, John Minto, Nicholas Rowe, Ritesh Shah, Saleh Albalawi, Adam Hanieh and Rand Hazou. They explore the impact of sumud on Palestine and the world and provide diverse insights into the enduring power of the Palestinian community.
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Resolutions: cultural performances as sumud
Thursday 14 August, 6pm
University of Auckland, B201, 10 Symonds Street, 201-130
Within Palestinian society, performance has remained a key vessel for cultural expression and political resistance. Reflecting on the artists who continue to practice under apartheid, this event celebrates Palestinian culture: the lifeblood of sumud. Throughout this evening of performances of Palestinian music, drama and dance, patrons will enjoy first-hand insights into the thriving contemporary performing arts scene in Palestine. When faced with violence and the risk of death, expressions of vitality through art and culture allow for an ongoing resolution to echo out—a promise to live.
/!\ Please click on links below to RSVP for the event
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Film screening: A State of Passion
Thursday 21 August, 6pm
University of Auckland, 20 Symonds Street, 423-342
A feature-length documentary film by Carol Mansour and Muna Khalidi.
After 43 horrific days working round the clock under constant bombardment in the emergency rooms of Gaza’s Al Shifa and Al Ahli hospitals, British-Palestinian reconstructive surgeon, Dr Ghassan Abu Sittah, emerged to find himself as a face of Palestinian resistance.
With news footage of him pale and shell-shocked reverberating around the world, he spoke of a catalogue of horrors: lacerated bodies, amputations without anaesthetics, orphaned children with no surviving family, and the deliberate targeting of medics and hospital facilities.
This was Ghassan’s sixth and most horrific Gaza “war”. Why does he do it? Where does he find the strength to face it again and again? How does it impact his family? How do they process the risks he takes? The answer lies in their shared love: Palestine.
Filmmakers Carol Mansour and Muna Khalidi, close friends of the Abu Sittahs, share that same passion. Waiting anxiously for Ghassan to return from Gaza, they began filming him the moment he passed through the door. Following him to Beirut, Amman, London, Kuwait, and Dubai, together they explore their common State of Passion.
/!\ Please click on links below to RSVP for the event
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