Yousef Bashir will be presenting on his book , The Words of My Father.

A Pales­tin­ian-Amer­i­can activist recalls his ado­les­cence in Gaza dur­ing the Sec­ond Intifa­da. Stand­ing in his front yard with his father and three Unit­ed Nations observers, Yousef was shot in the spine by an Israeli sol­dier, leav­ing him in a wheel­chair, par­a­lyzed from the waist down for a year. While an Israeli sol­dier shot him, it was Israeli doc­tors who saved Yousef and helped him even­tu­al­ly learn to walk again. In the wake of that expe­ri­ence, Yousef was forced to reck­on with the words of his father, whose belief in coex­ist­ing peace­ful­ly with his Israeli neigh­bors was unshake­able, and whose com­mit­ment to peace was absolute. Like the empa­thet­ic man who raised him, Yousef became an out­spo­ken activist for peace. Amid the tragedy of the ongo­ing Mid­dle East­ern con­flict, The Words of My Father is a pow­er­ful tale of moral awak­en­ing and a fraught, fero­cious, and pro­found rela­tion­ship between a son and his father. Bashir’s sto­ry, and the ideals of peace and empa­thy it upholds are a sooth­ing balm for these dan­ger­ous and trou­bled times, and a reminder that love and com­pas­sion are a gift — and a choice.

Yousef Bashir is a Palestinian-American from the Gaza Strip, the son of Khalil Bashir, a highly respected educator. Still suffering the effects of a near catastrophic injury at the hands of an anonymous IDF soldier, Yousef made his way to the United States where he earned a BA in International Affairs from Northeastern University and an MA in Co-existence and Conflict from Brandeis University. Now living in Washington DC, Bashir has worked on Capitol Hill, and served as a member of the Palestinian Diplomatic Delegation to the United States. Yousef is an accomplished author, a vigorous advocate of Israeli-Palestinian peace.

For tickets go to: http://www.picatic.com/jewishbookfestival