Omar Fares Omar Abu Shawish

• Name — Omar Fares Abu Shawish • Native Name — عمر فارس أبو شاويش • Birth Name — Omar Fares Omar Abu Shawish • Born — 22 March 1987 • Birthplace — Nuseirat Camp, Gaza Strip, Palestine • Died — 7 October 2023 • Place of death — Nuseirat Camp, Gaza Strip, Palestine • Death Cause — Israeli airstrike • Occupation — Poet, novelist, journalist and social activist

Abu Shawish was born in the Nuseirat refugee camp on 22 March 1987. His family are refugees from Barqa, Gaza, which was occupied and depopulated on 13 May 1948 during Operation Barak, a Yishuv offensive in southern Palestine just prior to the outbreak of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. He received a bachelor's degree in journalism from Al-Azhar University, Gaza. He was a member of the General Union for Palestinian Writers and the People's Committee for Refugees. He was a co-founder of the Palestine Youth Cultural Network. He also wrote a number of patriotic and humanitarian songs, which spread widely during the Gaza War (2008–2009). He won several local and international awards, including: • “Best National Song of the Year 2007” award at the International Festival of National Song and Heritage in Jordan • “Distinguished Volunteer and Ideal Young” award in 2010 within the National Festival honoring Palestinian volunteers, at the initiative of the Sharek Youth Forum in Palestine and sponsored by the Palestinian Supreme Council for Youth and Sports • “Distinguished Arab Youth in the Field of Media, Journalism and Culture” award for the year 2013 by the Arab Youth Council for Integrated Development of the Arab League. He published a number of collections of poetry, and a novel, titled Alā qayd al-mawt, which was published by Bayt al-Yasmin in 2016. His novel was critically received in Palestine. The book was republished by Al Manhal in 2018. On 7 October 2023, he was killed in an Israeli airstrike which hit his home in Nuseirat Camp during the Gaza war.

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