Asmaa al-Ghoul

Asmaa al-Ghoul (sometimes spelt 'al Ghul') was born in 1982 in Rafah, a Gazan city bordering Egypt whose population is mainly Palestinian refugees. In 2003, she married an Egyptian poet and moved to Abu Dhabi. She and her husband later divorced, and she returned to Gaza with their son. At the age of 18, al-Ghoul won the Palestinian Youth Literature Award. In 2010, she received a Hellman/Hammett award from Human Rights Watch, aimed at helping writers ‘who dare to express ideas that criticize official public policy or people in power.’ In 2012, al-Ghoul was awarded the Courage in Journalism Award by the International Women’s Media Foundation. She works for Lebanon’s Samir Kassir Foundation, which lobbies for media freedom. Her work has been translated into English, Danish and Korean.