GAZA, (PIC)
The book “Survivors from the Darkness” was recently published by the author and political analyst Wesam Afifa, by the Indian publishing house LeftWord Books, dealing with the experience of captivity through the testimony of the Palestinian journalist Osama inside the Israeli occupation prisons during the war on Gaza, in a work that combines live testimony, documentary narrative, and human literature.
The book falls within the literature of testimonies and prisons, and documents the details of 20 months that Osama spent in Israeli detention during the period extending from March 2024 until October 2025, moving between a number of detention centers and prisons, including “Sde Teiman” detention camp, which the book describes as one of the harshest detention sites during the war.
The work is based on a direct testimony of the prisoner, providing a detailed narrative of what the Palestinian detainees were subjected to of harsh detention conditions, including interrogations, isolation, humiliation, and physical and psychological violence, in an attempt to document an aspect of the human experience lived by the Palestinian prisoners during the war.
In his introduction to the book, the international thinker and historian Vijay Prashad said that this is “a book that should not have been written at all, but it was written because what happened should have been documented.”
He added that the work does not aim at entertainment or literary ambition as much as it seeks to record a human experience that took place in the context of the ongoing war on Gaza.
Afifa points out that the book does not deal with prison as a place of detention only, but as a space for testing human limits and the ability to remain steadfast, where personal testimony turns into a window for a broader understanding of the meanings of dignity, hope, and survival in the face of oppression.
The book is considered the first work published for Afifa in the English language by an international publishing house, after a long career in journalism, writing, and documentation related to the Palestinian cause and the war on Gaza.
The book was published with the translation of the Palestinian poet and translator Hosam al-Madhoun, while its introduction was written by Vijay Prashad, one of the most prominent contemporary thinkers and writers on issues of the Global South and liberation movements.
The book is scheduled to be available for international distribution via the website of the Indian publishing house LeftWord Books, with the possibility of ordering and shipping it to various countries of the world.
“Survivors from the Darkness” presents a human testimony that transcends the boundaries of place and time, to tell the story of a Palestinian journalist who found himself inside a harsh detention system during one of the bloodiest wars in the history of Gaza, in an attempt to preserve memory and document what happened for future generations.