Remi Kanazi will be touring North America this winter and spring on the Poetic Injustice tour.
The tour will be promoting the release of Remi’s long awaited collection of poetry and CD,
Poetic Injustice: Writings on Resistance and Palestine.

Pulitzer Prize winner and Nation Institute senior fellow Chris Hedges said, "There is more
truth, and perhaps finally more news, in Remi Kanazi's poems than the pages of your daily
newspaper or the sterile reports flashed across your screens." Former US Congresswoman
and Green Party nominee for president Cynthia McKinney said Poetic Injustice is
"breathtakingly honest prose that shakes the reader's preconceived notions of the Middle
East …run out and get this collection today. ”

Remi is fresh off his North American Poets For Palestine tour, appearing at more than 150
venues across the US and Canada to highlight the widely acclaimed collection of poetry,
hip hop,and art, Poets For Palestine. Poetry pioneer Bob Holman remarked, “If you want to
know about Palestine, read this book.” Moustafa Bayoumi, editor of the highly regarded
Edward Said Reader and Midnight on the Mavi Marmara, said that Poets For Palestine is
“a bold, necessary, and moving collection.”

If you would like to host a performance, book signing, or add Remi to an existing program
(i.e. a cultural night, Arab festival, spoken word show, hip hop show, Palestine Awareness
Week, or fundraiser) please let me know. Remi’s work is also a great addition to events
featuring academics, politicians and activists.

To book Remi or get more information, please email me at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

*About Remi

Remi Kanazi is a poet, writer, and activist based in New York City. He is the editor of Poets
For Palestine and the author of the forthcoming collection of poetry, Poetic Injustice: Writings
on Resistance and Palestine. His political commentary has been featured by news outlets
throughout the world, including Al Jazeera English, GRITtv with Laura Flanders, and BBC Radio.
His poetry has taken him across North America,  the UK, and the Middle East, and he recently
appeared in the Palestine Festival of Literature as well as Poetry International. He is a recurring
writer in residence and advisory board member for the Palestine Writing Workshop.


*Additional Praise for Poetic Injustice

“It is through art not the news that we feel and begin to understand the long night of suffering
and humiliation endured by the Palestinians. There is more truth, and perhaps finally more news,
in Remi Kanazi's poems than the pages of your daily newspaper or the sterile reports flashed
across your screens.”
--Chris Hedges, Pulitzer Prize winner and Nation Institute senior fellow

“With Poetic Injustice, Remi Kanazi has burst onto the scene with breathtakingly honest prose
that shakes the reader's preconceived notions of the Middle East and pokes holes into the
conventional wisdom that far too many people refuse to question. Run out and get this
collection today—it will shake you up in a good way.”
--Cynthia McKinney, former US Congresswoman and Green Party nominee for president

“Repression creates resistance. It also generates beautiful artistic works, which become a
cultural weapon in the struggle for the realisation of dreams.This book of poems is a shining
example of tomorrow’s Palestine."
--Ronnie Kasrils, African National Congress activist and former South African
government minister

“You want to hear a voice which refuses to be silenced, and only such voices carry the deep
truth about what's happening these days, about what's happening in Gaza or Iraq or East
Jerusalem? OK. If you do, listen to Remi Kanazi and the lucidity of his anger.”
--John Berger, novelist and Booker Prize winner

"Some poetry is meant to make you sit in quiet contemplation. Not so with Remi Kanazi's.
Read his words out loud for yourself and your friends. Let their compassionate anger, their
intricate dance of ideas, their unflinching witness, wash over you, dance with you, pick you
up, and spur you to action."
--Ali Abunimah, Co-founder of Electronic Intifada and author of One Country: A Bold
Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse


"Remi Kanazi's poetry, full of defiance and longing, allows us to feel the power and pain of
Palestine's struggle."
--John Pilger, Award-winning journalist, author, and filmmaker


"Back from Gaza, Remi Kanazi's poems make tears come to my eyes. Poetry more than any
other means communicates what is deepest in man, what gives us hope beyond crime and
despair."
--Stephane Hessel, French ambassador, former French resistance fighter, and participant
in the drafting of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

"In Poetic Injustice, Remi Kanazi lines up his word soldiers and marches into the battle of
identity, occupation, loss and exile. Stripping the spin and gloss from policies and politics,
Kanazi volleys truths from his own life as a Palestinian-American and as a witness to the
oppression and occupations, state terrorism and racism. A poet with immense power and
bravery, he underlines each phrase, word and line with devotion.”
--Elmaz Abinader, Author, poet, and PEN Award winner

A Poem for Gaza

I never knew death
until I saw the bombing
of a refugee camp
craters
filled with
dismembered         legs
and splattered   torsos
but no sign of a face
the only impression
a fading scream

I never understood pain
until a seven-year-old girl
clutched my hand
stared up at me
with soft brown eyes
waiting for answers

I didn’t have any
I had muted breath
and dry pens in my back pocket
that couldn’t fill pages
of understanding or resolution

in her other hand
she held a key
to her grandmother’s house
but I couldn’t unlock the cell
that caged her older brothers
they said:
we slingshot dreams
so the other side
will feel our father’s presence!

a craftsman
built homes in areas
where no one was building

when he fell
silence

a .50 caliber bullet
tore through his neck
shredding his vocal cords
too close to the wall
his hammer
must have been a weapon
he must have been a weapon
encroaching on settlement hills
and demographics

so his daughter
studies mathematics

seven explosions
times
eight bodies
equals
four congressional resolutions

seven Apache helicopters
times
eight Palestinian villages
equals
silence and a second Nakba

our birthrate
minus
their birthrate
equals
one sea and 400 villages re-erected

one state
plus
two peoples
…and she can’t stop crying

never knew revolution
or the proper equation
tears at the paper
with her fingertips
searching for answers
but only has teachers
looks up to the sky
to see Stars of David
demolishing squalor
with Hellfire missiles

she thinks back
words and memories
of his last hug
before he turned and fell
now she pumps
dirty water from wells
while settlements
divide and conquer
and her father’s killer
sits beachfront
with European vernacular

this is our land!, she said
she’s seven years old
this is our land!
she doesn’t need history books
or a schoolroom teacher
she has these walls
this sky
her refugee camp

she doesn’t know the proper equation
but she sees my dry pens
no longer waiting for my answers
just holding her grandmother’s key
searching
for ink

Remi Kanazi, Palestinian-American poet and activist, gave a rousing performance at South Bank’s annual Poetry International festival...