Dr Abdulatef Abu Hashem
A historian, librarian, archivist, and researcher specializing in Arab-Islamic heritage, Abdul Latif Z. Abu Hashem is particularly interested in the history of Palestine and the Gaza Strip during the Ottoman period. He is the director of the Eyes on Heritage عيون على التراث foundation, founded in 2007 and whose aim is to collect funds and manuscripts on the history and heritage of Gaza and Palestine. Dr. Abu Hashem enjoys international renown: since 2006, he has been responsible for libraries and research at the Department of Islamic Heritage, Ministry of Endowments and Religious Affairs. He has written numerous books and reference articles on the history of Gaza:
- Ġazzaẗ al-ʿuṯmāniyyaẗ, 2019 (غزة العثمانية, Gaza ottomane)
- Fihras maẖṭūṭāt al-ǧāmiʿ al-ʿumarī al-kabīr fī ġazzaẗ, 2016 (فهرس مخطوطات الجامع العمري الكبير بغزة,)
Ahmad Ashour
is a lecturer and researcher at the University of Tours who specializes in children’s literature, cultural policies, and education in contexts of occupation and oppression. He analyzes how reading cultures, participatory teaching methods, and community cultural initiatives can strengthen critical thinking, free expression, and social cohesion. Before joining academia, he headed the Gaza office of the Tamer Institute for Community Education for sixteen years and served as office manager for the French NGO Acted.
Zoé Carle
A specialist in comparative literature, she is an associate professor in the Department of French, Francophone, and Comparative Literature at Université Paris 8. She works on the relationship between literature and politics, as well as on the restructuring of the Arabic book market, particularly as seen from Morocco.
Géraldine Chatelard
Historian and anthropologist specializing in the contemporary Middle East; English and Arabic scholar; PhD in History and Civilization (EHESS); project manager for relations with the Middle East at the BNF (2020-2025), associate researcher at the Institute for Research and Studies on the Arab and Muslim Worlds (Aix-Marseille Université) and French Institute of the Near East; independent consultant (refugees and forced migration, cultural heritage in conflict and post-conflict situations).
Rémy Gareil
A historian by training, he specializes in the intellectual and political history of the medieval Arab world, particularly Abbasid Iraq. He is an associate professor in the Department of Arabic Studies at the University of Lyon 3.
Nadia Hebaz
Teacher of French literature in preparatory classes for literary studies in Tunis; Arabic and Spanish speaker; proofreader and editor of academic texts in French; member of the editorial team of the Academia blog member of the Fedi pour Gaza collective.
Karim Kattan
Karim Kattan is a Palestinian and French writer from Bethlehem, born in Jerusalem. He holds a PhD in comparative literature. He writes fiction, essays, and poetry in English and French. His novels are published by Elyzad, based in Tunisia. His first novel, Le Palais des deux collines (The Palace of Two Hills), published in 2021, won the Prix des cinq continents de la francophonie (Five Continents Francophonie Prize) that same year. His second novel, L’Éden à l’aube (Eden at Dawn), was published in 2024. It has received numerous awards and has been shortlisted for several others, including the 2024 Prix Renaudot. His collection of poems, Hortus Conclusus, was published in 2025 by L’Extrême contemporain. His books have been translated into several languages. His French-language texts have appeared in various publications, including Le Monde, Libération, Mediapart, AOC, and L’Orient-Le Jour; in literary and poetry journals, including the long-standing French-language science fiction magazine Solaris and Kometa; and in several anthologies, most recently in 2025, Sur cette terre il y a ce qui mérite vie, published by Seuil. His English-language texts have appeared in numerous magazines, including The Paris Review, The Dial, The European Review of Books, The Baffler, Strange Horizons, The Funambulist, +972 Magazine, and The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction.
Mariem Guellouz
A sociolinguist and a performance artist, she is an associate professor at the Université Paris Cité and a researcher at the Cerlis research center.
Philippe Rekacewicz
A geographer, cartographer, and information designer, he was a permanent contributor to the French monthly Le Monde diplomatique from 1988 to 2014. At the same time, he headed a cartographic unit—relocated to Norway—of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), GRID-Arendal. He is currently working on several socio-geographical projects (competitive use and production of public/private space, perception and representation of borders, migratory movements) and is interested in the relationships between cartography and art, science, and politics (the contribution of art to map production and the political use of maps as objects of propaganda and manipulation).. He is conducting research on cartographic writing as an extension of conventional cartography and the emergence of experimental, sensitive, and emotional cartography. Since January 2021, he has been an associate researcher in the Department of Social Sciences at Wageningen University in the Netherlands. Finally, he has been co-hosting the visionscarto website with Philippe Rivière since 2006. He is the co-author of two books, Palestine-Israël, une histoire visuelle, Le Seuil, 2024, and Cartographie radicale, La Découverte, 2021
Vanessa Van Renterghem
A historian and Arabic studies scholar, she is a professor of medieval Arab history at INALCO (Paris), director of the Department of Arab Studies, a researcher at Cermom, and an associate researcher at IFPO and in the “Medieval Islam” team (UMR Orient & Méditerranée). She co-founded and led the humanitarian association Life4Syria from 2012 to 2022.