As we commemorate International Women's Day, come attend this all-women panel. The fight for Palestinian freedom is incomplete without gender freedom, and so is the fight for gender freedom incomplete without the fight for Palestine. This panel will tackle the intersectionality of both struggles as we move forward with the movements for social justice.
Event moderator:
Aber Kawas graduated in 2014 from The City College of New York's International Studies Program with a concentration Latin American Studies. Aber has interned at CAIR New York, Urban Justice Center's Street Vendor Project and is now the Youth Lead Organizer at the Arab American Association of New York where she previously worked as a Fellow in 2012 registering over 800 voters with the Verazzano Bridge Coalition. She has worked with several organizations in the city around issues such as immigration, police surveillance, racial profiling, ect. and hopes to work to improve the conditions of immigrants in the New York area by providing programs and services to both them and their children.
Guest Speakers:
Mariam Bazeed is an Egyptian immigrant, a vocalist in the classical Arabic art-music tradition, a performance artist, and a writer of fiction, poetry, memoir, and plays. Her play, PEACE CAMP ORG, considers the parallels between narratives of normalization and invisibility as they relate to the Israeli occupation of Palestine, and as they relate to the queer child in the conservative family. She is currently pursuing an MFA in Fiction at Hunter College and is at work on her first novel.
Hanna Abozaid, also known by her stage name as Abuzayed the Free, is a Palestinian-American jazz singer and rapper from the south. Currently living in Brooklyn, she empowers the youth by teaching music, freestyle rap, and self-love to children grades k-12. She uses her BA in Rehabilitation Science and backgrounds in improvisational theatre, dance, and therapy to guide participants in authentic expression, a celebration of life, and communication of struggles. Drawing from her intersectional experience and complex background, Free uses her voice to call for spiritual liberation and healing. She embraces pain as inspiration and advocates for the systemically and spiritually oppressed.
As an independent artist under her own label, Love Always Wins, Free released her debut album, which she has toured. She regularly performs, constantly writes new music, and continues to offer experiences of unity, hope, and resilience.
Yasmin Hassan is an Egyptian-American senior at Hunter College majoring in Political Science, minoring in International Relations, and is pursuing a certificate in Human Rights. She is currently president of the Palestine Solidarity Alliance and is an immigration legal intern with the International Rescue Committee, as well as a Chapter Director with Generation Citizen. She is currently working on her thesis which examines the discriminatory history of U.S. statutes and policy that have contributed to the United States refugee admissions program taking the shape that it has in modern history.
Zakiyah Ansari is the Advocacy Director of the New York State Alliance for Quality Education (AQE), the leading statewide organization that has been fighting for educational justice in New York State. Zakiyah is the mother of 8 children and grandparent of 3. Zakiyah has dedicated almost 20 years of her life to the fight for educational justice and ending the oppression of Black and brown people. In 2013 Zakiyah co-initiated a national grassroots movement, “Journey for Justice,” an alliance currently composed of grassroots community-based organizations from over 24 cities across the United States representing constituencies of youth, parents, and inter-generational organizations who have been impacted by the harmful policies of school closing, turnaround, and corporate charter expansion of schools in communities of color. In 2017 Zakiyah was named one of City and State magazines "25 Most Influential in Brooklyn".
Pauline Park (paulinepark.com) is chair of the New York Association for Gender Rights Advocacy (NYAGRA) (transgenderrights.org), which she co-founded in 1998, and president of the board of directors of Queens Pride House (queenspridehouse.org), which she co-founded in 1997. She led the campaign for passage of the transgender rights law enacted by the New York City Council in 2002. In January 2012, Park participated in the first US LGBTQ delegation to Palestine, a seven-day tour of the West Bank and Israel that included meetings with LGBT- and non-LGBT Palestinians and Israelis.
She did her B.A. in philosophy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, her M.Sc. in European Studies at the London School of Economics and her Ph.D. in political science at the University of Illinois at Urbana. In 2005, Park became the first openly transgendered grand marshal of the New York City Pride March. In 2015, she was invited to keynote the Queer Korea Festival/Seoul Pride Parade, the largest event in the history of the LGBT community of Korea up until that time, drawing a crowd estimated at more 35,000. In October 2012, Park was one of 54 individuals named to a list of "The Most Influential LGBT Asian Icons" by the Huffington Post. In November 2012, she was named to a list of "50 Transgender Icons" for Transgender Day of Remembrance 2012.
Aber Kawas graduated in 2014 from The City College of New York's International Studies Program with a concentration Latin American Studies. Aber has interned at CAIR New York, Urban Justice Center's Street Vendor Project and is now the Youth Lead Organizer at the Arab American Association of New York where she previously worked as a Fellow in 2012 registering over 800 voters with the Verazzano Bridge Coalition. She has worked with several organizations in the city around issues such as immigration, police surveillance, racial profiling, ect. and hopes to work to improve the conditions of immigrants in the New York area by providing programs and services to both them and their children.
Guest Speakers:
Mariam Bazeed is an Egyptian immigrant, a vocalist in the classical Arabic art-music tradition, a performance artist, and a writer of fiction, poetry, memoir, and plays. Her play, PEACE CAMP ORG, considers the parallels between narratives of normalization and invisibility as they relate to the Israeli occupation of Palestine, and as they relate to the queer child in the conservative family. She is currently pursuing an MFA in Fiction at Hunter College and is at work on her first novel.
Hanna Abozaid, also known by her stage name as Abuzayed the Free, is a Palestinian-American jazz singer and rapper from the south. Currently living in Brooklyn, she empowers the youth by teaching music, freestyle rap, and self-love to children grades k-12. She uses her BA in Rehabilitation Science and backgrounds in improvisational theatre, dance, and therapy to guide participants in authentic expression, a celebration of life, and communication of struggles. Drawing from her intersectional experience and complex background, Free uses her voice to call for spiritual liberation and healing. She embraces pain as inspiration and advocates for the systemically and spiritually oppressed.
As an independent artist under her own label, Love Always Wins, Free released her debut album, which she has toured. She regularly performs, constantly writes new music, and continues to offer experiences of unity, hope, and resilience.
Yasmin Hassan is an Egyptian-American senior at Hunter College majoring in Political Science, minoring in International Relations, and is pursuing a certificate in Human Rights. She is currently president of the Palestine Solidarity Alliance and is an immigration legal intern with the International Rescue Committee, as well as a Chapter Director with Generation Citizen. She is currently working on her thesis which examines the discriminatory history of U.S. statutes and policy that have contributed to the United States refugee admissions program taking the shape that it has in modern history.
Zakiyah Ansari is the Advocacy Director of the New York State Alliance for Quality Education (AQE), the leading statewide organization that has been fighting for educational justice in New York State. Zakiyah is the mother of 8 children and grandparent of 3. Zakiyah has dedicated almost 20 years of her life to the fight for educational justice and ending the oppression of Black and brown people. In 2013 Zakiyah co-initiated a national grassroots movement, “Journey for Justice,” an alliance currently composed of grassroots community-based organizations from over 24 cities across the United States representing constituencies of youth, parents, and inter-generational organizations who have been impacted by the harmful policies of school closing, turnaround, and corporate charter expansion of schools in communities of color. In 2017 Zakiyah was named one of City and State magazines "25 Most Influential in Brooklyn".
Pauline Park (paulinepark.com) is chair of the New York Association for Gender Rights Advocacy (NYAGRA) (transgenderrights.org), which she co-founded in 1998, and president of the board of directors of Queens Pride House (queenspridehouse.org), which she co-founded in 1997. She led the campaign for passage of the transgender rights law enacted by the New York City Council in 2002. In January 2012, Park participated in the first US LGBTQ delegation to Palestine, a seven-day tour of the West Bank and Israel that included meetings with LGBT- and non-LGBT Palestinians and Israelis.
She did her B.A. in philosophy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, her M.Sc. in European Studies at the London School of Economics and her Ph.D. in political science at the University of Illinois at Urbana. In 2005, Park became the first openly transgendered grand marshal of the New York City Pride March. In 2015, she was invited to keynote the Queer Korea Festival/Seoul Pride Parade, the largest event in the history of the LGBT community of Korea up until that time, drawing a crowd estimated at more 35,000. In October 2012, Park was one of 54 individuals named to a list of "The Most Influential LGBT Asian Icons" by the Huffington Post. In November 2012, she was named to a list of "50 Transgender Icons" for Transgender Day of Remembrance 2012.