Review of Pizza Before We Die

The least important part of Pizza Before We Die by Hassan Kanafani is my tiny little contribution to it which is a blurb that you'll find just inside the cover. It was my honour to have read the manuscript before publication and provide a few sentences for endorsement. Long story short, this is a necessary read 5/5 stars. Please, request it at your library, borrow it, buy a copy for yourself and friends, and above all read it, and be inspired by it, to action.

Because this is a recount of what the author Hassan Kanafani, a pseudonym for safety purposes, lived through in Gaza from December 2024, fourteen months into the genocide, until July of 2025, 22 months in. Around 8 months in all.

His words are spare, precise, and devastating. They lay out, in heart rending clarity, not only what he sees happening in Gaza himself or heard from his friends, but also incisive commentary on why it's happening and the immense burden of the emotions that come with both witnessing and understanding the genocide of his family, his friends, his people.

That this eyewitness account was published at all is an amazing story by itself and is explained in a foreword by editor Yasuko Thanh. I do suggest diving right into Chapter one though and leaving the foreword for later as Hasan's words will transport you right into Gaza especially when he leads you through the heart wrenching experience of Ramadan and the constant betrayal of the Israeli 'ceasefires' that were, and are, insults to the term. Kanafani's words are vital and necessary as they bring back to life the horror of what was done to the people of Gaza in a way that even the terabytes of recorded video of the atrocities cannot. For example, here is an edited excerpt from March 2025: "There is a massacre in Nuseriat Camp after a strike on a charity kitchen filled with civilians. Everyone inside - hungry and fasting - perishes... on a day that should have been filled with sweets and laughter, there is only blood... Mothers weep beneath collapsed ceilings. Fathers dig with their bare hands trying to find what's left of their families."

This is a work of both grief and principle, It is both a memory and a call to action, the title speaks to holding onto life in the face of death. The hope from two little girls to have some pizza before they die even amidst a cruel and brutal blockade of food, even during flour massacres, speaks to the resilience of the Palestinians in Gaza and reminds those of us outside, with privilege, that death is inevitable for us as well, it reminds us to fight for justice before we die.

Thanks so much for the editor Yasuko Thanh for thinking of me to provide a blurb and to the publisher Arsenal Pulp Press for providing me both a digital and physical copy for the purposes of the blurb and review. without them this necessary, heart breaking book would not have been published. Thanks most of all to Hassan Kanafani for bearing witness so effectively to, not only the devastation of his people in Gaza, but also their resilience and the inherent justice of their cause, the Palestinian cause, which is the cause of all justice loving people in the world. All opinions are my own. In the End, only God knows best.