Shireen’s murder took place just days before Palestinians were set to commemorate the Nakba: our collective experience of ongoing dispossession and military occupation that has now lasted seventy-four years. The timing has therefore made Shireen’s martyrdom an embodiment of a larger systematic condition Palestinians continue to survive and resist, which also conditions the direct and intimate forms of pain and subjugation we have all experienced. Her loss demonstrates the relationship between structural violence and the intimate ways Palestinians experience it.
Testament to this systematic design of death and destruction, the same day Shireen was martyred, eighteen year old Thaer Musalt Al-Yazuri was killed with a shot to the heart in the Ramallah outskirt of Al-Bireh while in the early morning hours of May 15, 2022, and Abd Al-Rahim Yousef Kokash, a Palestinian teen from Ureif just south of Nablus, was kidnapped by a guard at the Yitzhar Settlement. Twenty-three year old Walid al-Sharif, who was shot with a rubber-coated bullet during the Israeli attack on the Al Aqsa Mosque on April 22nd, suffered a coma and was in critical condition until his death. On May 16th, Israeli soldiers attacked Palestinians at his funeral procession, injuring over 71 people. Far from an aberration, these cases demonstrate the consistency of Israeli killing sprees and captivity which have become quintessential characteristics of the Palestinian catastrophe since 1948.
Each year, around the time of the Nakba anniversary, Palestinians experience an uptick in Israeli state and settler-vigilante violence. Shireen’s assassination took place the morning of May 11, 2022, which also marks the one-year anniversary since the 2021 Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip, and simultaneous attacks on worshippers at Al-Aqsa Compound, and the attempted forced expulsions of Palestinians in Sheikh Jarrah, Silwan and other parts of Palestine. Rather than commemorating the historic moment of collective insurgency that classified May of 2021 as the “Unity Intifada,” a period of tremendous agency, resilience, and worldwide dissent, Palestinians were left to contend with yet another catastrophe. Placing celebration of triumph aside, once again, Palestinians were forced into another state of mourning.
The psychic challenge Palestinians experience when we mourn our dead is that it is often compounded with the unresolved grief over many other losses. For many Palestinians today, Shireen’s martyrdom is triggering grief of other losses that we could never quite get past. Most notably, Shireen was violently murdered outside of the Jenin refugee camp which she has spent over twenty years covering as a site that has borne the brunt of egregious Zionist incursions, sieges and war crimes, such as the 2002 Jenin massacre. Until today, the international community has denied Palestinians the dignity of acknowledging the events of 2002 as a massacre: many of the dead have not been properly laid to rest, and their loved ones cannot reconcile such tremendous loss as a result.
Despite the harrowing sorrow that resides in the Jenin camp, it has also served as a site that has sustained profound displays of steadfastness and resistance in the face of such assaults: just last year Palestinians celebrated the triumph of the Jenin 6 prison break from the Gilboa High Security prison. It is precisely this tenacious dedication to life and liberation that has made Jenin a target: just two days after Shireen was assassinated, Israeli soldiers raided the camp, arrested senior Palestinian leaders, and fired live ammunition which injured 13, among them Al Aqsa Brigades leader Dawoud Zubeidi–whose brother Zacharia was among the Jenin 6 Prisoners –and who later died in Israeli custody on the morning of May 15, 2022.
Shireen’s longstanding coverage of Jenin demonstrates the integrity of her journalism and her commitment to the everyday people of the places she had reported on, understanding that the violence does not settle when other news agencies decide the story is not worthy. Her coverage of Jenin was guided by a deep sense of reciprocity and appreciation for the lessons of liberation its residents shared with her as well:
To me, Jenin is not a one ephemeral story in my career or even in my personal life. It is the city that can raise my morale and help me fly. It embodies the Palestinian spirit that sometimes trembles and falls but, beyond all expectations, rises to pursue its flights and dreams. And this has been my experience as a journalist; the moment I’m physically exhausted and mentally drained, I’m faced with a new, surprising legend. It might emerge from a small opening, or from a tunnel dug underground.