We Are Not Numbers (WANN) is a project established in 2015 by Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor to provide English-language writing workshops for young Palestinians in Gaza. It provides each participant with six months of training and mentoring with experienced English writers, professional authors, reporters and communicators. The features, stories, news reports and social media content produced as part of the program have been featured by various media outlet, among them ''

HuffPost ''HuffPost'' (''The Huffington Post'' until 2017, itself often abbreviated as ''HPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and covers p ...

'', '' Mondoweiss'', ''

The New Arab ''The New Arab'' or ''Al-Araby Al-Jadeed'' () is a London-based pan-Arab news outlet owned by Qatari company Fadaat Media. It launched an Arabic-language website in March 2014 and an Arabic language daily newspaper in September 2014. The Engli ...

'', ''Palestine Chronicle'' and '' +972 Magazine''.

History

WANN was launched in February 2015 to provide mentorship for young writers from Gaza on English-language content creation. The project originated in the personal mentorship by Euro-Med Monitor's Pam Bailey of a depressed Gazan youth, identified as Ahmed Alnaouq, who had lost a brother and close friends in an Israeli airstrike. Bailey encourage Alnaouq to write about his experiences, which he did. The receptivity of international outlets for the resulting article became a "turning point" for Alnaouq that led him to found WANN together with Bailey. Writer and professor Refaat Alareer was one of the organization's founders.

Activities

The program provides each participant with six months' training with native English-speaking mentors, and began in 2015 with around 40 young people from Gaza writing on an English-language blog while receiving mentoring from experienced authors and journalists. The aim was to open a window to "the people behind the numbers in the news". Within a few months of launching, it had raised over $8,200 using the

crowdfunding Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising money from a large number of people, typically via the internet. Crowdfunding is a form of crowdsourcing and Alternative Finance, alternative finance, to fund projects "withou ...

platform

Indiegogo Indiegogo is an American crowdfunding website founded in 2008 by Danae Ringelmann, Slava Rubin, and Eric Schell. Its headquarters are in San Francisco, California. The site is one of the first sites to offer crowd funding. Indiegogo allows peo ...

. Mentors including Ali Abunimah, Susan Abulhawa, Ramzy Baroud, and Laila El-Haddad. A year later, '' Mondoweiss'' reported, the project had grown to involve more than 75 writers from Gaza, and mentors included Miko Peled, Alice Rothchild, and Ben Norton. "Days of Palestine" reported that Bailey was denied entry to Israel in August 2016, despite having a permit to enter Gaza, due to her "illegal" work. She said that an Israeli lawyer suggested she had been added to a blacklist of Palestinian and international NGOs involved with human rights advocacy. In 2019, a collection of works from the project was published in German as the book ''We Are Not Numbers: Young Voices from Gaza'' (). The following year, WANN launched a Hebrew-language website called We Beyond the Fence to provide Israelis with access Palestinian articles, poems and personal essays about life in Gaza. In 2021, WANN was involved with 30 NGOs and other organizations, and had at that point mentored 300 young Palestinian writers. WANN had also expanded into providing virtual online tours of Gazan cities, sponsoring talks by Palestinian intellectuals and activists, and providing mental health support to its writers. In 2023, the program accepted its 17th cohort of prospective writers.

Content and aims

WANN is a platform to encourage creativity and writing among the youth in Gaza by having them share their stories and experiences. WANN distinguishes itself by encouraging its writers to focus on the everyday lives and challenges of people rather than the narratives of war and conflict that dominate mainstream news cycles. While some WANN stories are political, the primary aim of the stories is to shed a personal light on the conflict, blockade, poverty and despair that define the lives of the writers. They also explore themes of hope, resilience, and the power of storytelling as a means of resistance. Despite living under difficult circumstances, the writers find solace in their Palestinian identity and use writing as a way to challenge stereotypes and misconceptions about Gaza. The project has gained attention from international readers and media, amplifying the voices and experiences of young Gazans beyond their borders. In contrast to the political calls to armed resistance in Gaza, WANN's writers draw inspiration from non-violent advocates such as

Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister, civil and political rights, civil rights activist and political philosopher who was a leader of the civil rights move ...

Nelson Mandela Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela ( , ; born Rolihlahla Mandela; 18 July 1918 – 5 December 2013) was a South African Internal resistance to apartheid, anti-apartheid activist and politician who served as the first president of South Africa f ...

and

Mahatma Gandhi Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (2October 186930January 1948) was an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalism, anti-colonial nationalist, and political ethics, political ethicist who employed nonviolent resistance to lead the successful Indian ...

References

Sources

* * *

External links