Noor and Abdulla Al Owais here.

Today, we decided to do a joint post about two stories from Palestine.

Sitti’s Bird: A Gaza Story

Author and Illustrator: Malak Mattar Published by: Crocodile Books (2022) ISBN: 9781623718251. Book photos taken by reviewers.

Sitti’s Bird is about a little girl who dreams of being an artist one day, but there are bombs destroying her country, and she can’t go to school. She starts drawing and painting every day to feel better, and one day her grandmother’s bird visits her home to tell them to help their grandma who lost everything in the bombings. After 50 days, it is safe for her to go to school again. They hold an exhibit in the school and her paintings bring joy and happiness to the people. She is invited to an international art exhibit with her parents, but she is not allowed to leave Gaza, because there are certain rules in place that don’t allow anyone to leave whenever they want. She remembers her grandmother’s birds and believes one day she could freely visit other places and come back to Gaza. This picture book is based on the author’s real life and the bombing of Gaza in 2014.

The image above is my (Noor’s) favorite illustration in the book because it shows happiness, and it shows how the children of Gaza are learning and doing things they love, and that they are back in school.

My favorite illustration (Abdulla’s) is when Malak sees the bird in her window (see image above) and communicates with the bird and feels freedom. Because I wish Palestinian people will also have their freedom soon.

First of all, this book made us feel sad because no one deserves to live like this, with their country being bombed and not being allowed to leave and come back whenever they want. What made this even sadder is that right now in 2023 – 2024, Gazans are going through the same thing, with the bombing happening for more than 171 days. We question why they are always bombed?  Why do the children of Gaza have to go through all this, all the time? We learnt about the United Nations Rights of the Child at school, but we know that the children of Gaza are not protected by the UN children’s rights.

Second, the book also gave us hope that things could get better. We hope it will get better, because what’s happening right now does not make sense at all. It is heartbreaking, frustrating and completely unjust.

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Homeland: My Father Dreams Of Palestine

Author: Hannah Moushabeck Illustrator: Reem Madooh Published by: Chronicle Books (2023) ISBN: 9781797225913. Book borrowed through Libby through the Abu Dhabi Tourism & Culture membership. Book photos taken by reviewers.

Homeland is a picture book about the author’s life story. She tells us how she and her sisters used to wait for their father to tell them stories of their homeland, Palestine. Her father’s stories are filled with childhood joy, and important memories. Their father tells of the food they used to cook, the house they used to live in, and the café his grandfather used to own. After he was displaced in 1948 because of the Nakba (the Catastrophe), her father used to visit until 1967, when all Palestinian refugees were prevented from visiting their homeland.

I like the Mukhtar Café (see image above) because it shows all sorts of people coming to the café, to enjoy their time and meals, and to drink coffee with their friends and I can tell from the illustration that they seem happy.

I liked when the grandmother, Teta, says, “Ya Allah, Michel!” when he tries to use her china to make music like the juice vendor. I liked it because it was funny, and it seemed like it could happen in my own house.

I liked this illustration because there are many details (see image above). There are pigeons flying with keys in their mouths, which is a symbol for people to go back to their homes. There is a church and a masjid, showing that the people there have different religions, but they all live in harmony together. There is a family back home preparing food happily in their kitchen. There is also a picture of a key and a black and white picture of a family which I think means that the family is not living together, and they were separated when they became refugees.

We are Emirati children and we are reviewing books about Palestine because we feel empathy towards our brothers and sisters in Palestine and we feel sadness and frustration at what they are going through today, with the bombings of Gaza that have killed so many people and children and displaced more than one million Palestinians. We are Emirati, but we are also Palestinians until all Palestinian people and children live in freedom and peace.

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For #WorldKidLit Wednesdays throughout the month of March, we have Emirati kid reviewers share their thoughts about the books that they read. In case you missed it, we had Abdulla Al Owais share his thoughts on a picturebook entitled Two Great Leaders, Noor Al Owais shared her favourite Maitha Al Khayat picturebooks here, Noor Al Owais also shared about an anthology of amazing women from the Middle East, while Abdulla Al Owais featured Emirati/Arabic proverbs and sayings here. And earlier today, Noor and Abdulla wrote a collaborative post on a famous Emirati cartographer, Ibn Majid here.

We also invite you to pair this post with Dr. Mark Baildon and Rindi Baildon’s #UAEReads post on Aya Ghanameh’s These Olive Trees here.

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About the Guest Contributors for #UAEReads:

Noor Al Owais is from Sharjah, the UAE and is a 5th grader at Ajman Academy. She likes to read, bake and cook. She loves figure skating and taekwondo and creating slime. She also likes spending time playing outside, gardening and imagining all sorts of things.

Abdulla Al Owais is from Sharjah in the UAE and he is a 3^rd grader at Ajman Academy. He is very active and loves sports like football, taekwondo and tennis. You can find him building lego sets, or sketching in his sketch book. He enjoys reading and listening to his yoto.

Reviews represent the point-of-view of the author and/or authors and not Global Literature in Libraries Initiative as an organization.

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About the Guest Editor/Curator for March 2024 [#UAEReads]:

Myra Garces-Bacsal has served as a teacher educator for 15 years and has led several research projects on reading and social emotional learning, diverse picturebooks and teacher practices, psychology of high creatives and exceptional people, culturally responsive and inclusive education. She is a quintessential lover and creator of booklists (see her Social and Emotional Learning bookshelf here and other publications below). Myra serves as the Assistant Dean for Research and Graduate Studies with the College of Education, UAE University. She is a self-proclaimed nerd who lives and breathes books and enjoys organizing events and festivals where fellow nerds converge and attempt to joyfully change the world.

Publications on booklists:

Garces-Bacsal, R. M., Alhosani, N. M., Elhoweris, H., Tupas, R. (2023). A diverse social and emotional learning booklist for gifted learners and advanced readers. Roeper Review, 45(1), 25-36. https://doi.org/10.1080/02783193.2022.2145397

Garces-Bacsal, R. M., Alhosani, N. M., Elhoweris, H., Al Ghufli, H. T., AlOwais, N. M., Baja, E. S., & Tupas, R. (2022). Using diverse picturebooks for inclusive practices and transformative pedagogies. In M. Efstratopoulou (Ed.), Rethinking Inclusion and Transformation in Special Education (pp. 72-92). IGI Global. https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-6684-4680-5.ch005

Garces-Bacsal, R. M. (2021). Of grit and gumption, sass and verve: What gifted students can learn from multicultural picture book biographies. In S. R. Smith’s Handbook of giftedness and talent development in Australasian Pacific (pp. 431-453). Singapore: Springer International Handbooks of Education. https://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007/978-981-13-3041-4_18

Garces-Bacsal, R. M. (2020). Diverse books for diverse children: Building an early childhood diverse booklist for social and emotional learning. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, 22(1), 66-95. https://doi.org/10.1177/1468798420901856