Dr Shahd Abusalama

Dr. Shahd Abusalama is a Palestinian-British academic, writer and artist, born and raised in Jabalia Refugee Camp, northern Gaza. After a decade in the UK, she relocated to Barcelona in 2024 to support her recently-displaced family. In 2025, her PhD research at Sheffield Hallam University, which explores historical representations of Gaza refugees in colonial, humanitarian and Palestinian documentary films, was published in "Between Reality and Documentary" by Bloomsbury and SOAS Palestine Studies, leading to speaking tours in Spain, Ireland, UK, Japan and Belgium. She is a contributor to Light in Gaza: Writings born of Fire (2022) and Gaza on Screen (2023), and her coverage of Gaza genocide can be accessed on the Electronic Intifada, The New Arab, Declassified UK, among others. Since her late teenage years, she has been blogging in English at Palestine from My Eyes, with her writings documenting Israel’s colonial violence and siege on Gaza translated into various languages and reproduced on different platforms, including an Italian collection published by Lorusso Editore in Rome in 2013. A longtime member of Gaza’s Al-Assria Dabke Troupe, she co-founded Hawiyya Dance Company in London in 2017.