Gaza, 23/04/2017--- Press House organized a meeting on the occasion of the Book and Copyright Day which issues on 23th of April, attended by a pile of writers, intellectuals, and publication and marketing workers of the Gaza Strip.
Belal Jadallah, Chairman of Press House, thanked the attendees asserting that the Palestinian culture and literature in Gaza was and still very important; that's why we should celebrate this day in Gaza to stress on the importance of literature in the Palestinian life.
The meeting was led by Atef Abu Saif, Writer and Author, who confirmed that Gaza celebrates such world days as the world does despite the pains and miserable situation it's passing by, and be proud of the great achievement of these writers, poets, playwrights, and authors who had a great influence on people's lives by beautifying and changing it to better.
The Author Abu Saif also noted that this celebration which coincides with UNESCO celebration, aims to confirm the importance of culture and its role in developing ethics, enhancing identity and making progress.
" The World Book and Copyright Day coincides with the death of Shakespeare and Cervants, issued by UNESCO in 1995, is a golden chance for encouraging people to read and explore the joy that writing brings." Abu Saif added.
He also confirmed that this day is a good opportunity to discuss the Palestinian culture case and the situation of the book, its creation and copyrights in Palestine.
In his turn, Ghareeb Al-Asqalany, General-Secretary for Palestinian writers Union , opened his speech talking about the challenges of creating and protecting books.
He noted that the absence of the concerned organizations makes book protection process difficult especially as Gaza doesn't have a Palestinian book keeper.
Al-Asqalany appealed to find such organizations and enhance cooperation among the cultural organizations that are concerned about books.
In his turn, Tawfiq Abu Shomar, commented on the situation of creating books in Palestine and highlighted the fact that there's no intellectual property law in Palestine, which makes the situation get bad.
Abu Shomar added that the weak level of reading books in the Arab work in general and in the Palestinian society in particular is notable.
Atef El-Dorra, Owner of Dar el Kalema, and Mahmoud Mady, Owner of Khota Dar for Publication commented on the situation of the publishers in the Gaza Strip.
Under the absence of publisher union and duplication between the real publisher and stationary seller, publishers have been suffering from many challenges that hinder creating books process. They confirmed
Khamees Al-Turk asserted that protecting many intellectual products is a necessity, where all of us must share and support books.
In his trun, Yousri Al-Ghoul asked to pay attention to the social media and use it for encouraging reading books, where the port Othaman Hussein discussed the mess of creating books problem and how to share all shapes of books.
Reham Ouda asked to hold responsibility on the literary robbery.
The poet Alaa Al-Ghoul noted that the legal protection is absent, and the legal factors that push creating books forward must be activated.
The lawyer Fatma Ashour confirmed that there's a necessity of promoting cooperation between civil organizations and society including the law sector in order to making the demands of protecting books and copyrights true.
Mohammad Al-Boji, the Head of Critics Union Association, stressed on the importance of activating the role of cultural organizations in the Strip, and protecting the book in the printing places, which steal books and buy them for financial profit.
Rezeq Al-Bayyari, Writer Union Activities Coordinator, assured that there's a necessity to protect the writer, where he sent regards to the writers on the occasion of the World Book Day.
At the end of the meeting, Mohammad Nassar, Storyteller and novelist, wrote a number of recommendations suggested by the attendees which focus on the importance of getting the role of the book back through encouraging reading, sharing books with appropriate price, setting rules to protect the author copyrights within the robbery and violations, and working on how to get the book international code as it's considered as one of the great symbol the Palestinian book must have instead of holding titles of other countries led to showing Palestine as it's a poor-achievement country.
