Personal Info
- Country of residence: Jordan
Information
Mohammed Makram Omar Al-Balaawi was born in the Jordanian city of Irbid on August 2, 1969, to a Palestinian family originally from the village of Bal’a in Tulkarm Governorate. He is married and has seven children. He studied primary school in Islamic schools in Irbid and in schools run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA). He studied secondary school at Prince Hassan Bin Talal School, where he obtained his high school diploma in 1986. He obtained a bachelor’s and master’s degree from Nagpur University in India in 1993, and a doctorate in English literature “Post-colonial Studies” from the International Islamic University in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia in 2014. He worked in the field of relief, and worked as a teacher in government schools in Jordan until 2001, then worked as a lecturer at the College of Health Sciences in Saudi Arabia, then worked as an employee at the University of Dammam, and became responsible for the university newspaper and its information center.
Al-Balaawi joined the Islamic Movement in Jordan, and part of his activity focused on charitable work. He became involved in serving the Palestinian cause, contributing to the establishment of the Al-Quds-Malaysia Foundation, and became the director of the Academics for Al-Quds Association in 2020, and the acting president of the Union of Palestinian Academics since 2021. He founded the Asia-Middle East Forum, which aims to provide knowledge and understanding between the Asian continent and the Middle East.
Al-Balaawi writes stories for children, and forty-one of his stories have been published. He has two collections of children's literature that he is preparing for publication. He has also published a number of research papers and articles specializing in international relations, in addition to Palestinian and Zionist affairs, which have been translated into more than thirteen languages, including: Asia Towards the Right: The Beginning of a New Era (2017), A Reading of India's Decision to Cancel the Special Status of Kashmir, The US Withdrawal from Afghanistan: A Gateway to Peace or War?, The Indian Elections and Their Implications for the Palestinian Cause (2019), The Future of US-China Relations in Light of Corona (2020), Chinese-Israeli Relations Under the American Microscope (2021), After the 2021 Myanmar Coup: The Limits of Military Democracy, and China and the Middle East: A Real Strategy or Malicious Competition? (2021).
His co-authored books include: Islamization of Knowledge and English Literary Studies in the Age of Islamophobia and Westernophobia (2016), Jerusalem: History, Religion, and Politics (2019), Deconstructing the Pro-Israel Discourse: India as a Case Study (2019), The 2019 Indian Elections: Outcomes and Implications (2019), and Neo-Oriental Narratives: A Study of the Representation of Muslim Communities in Selected Literary Works after 9/11.
Al-Balaawi believes that the settlement path expresses a state of psychological helplessness and surrender to the status quo, as this path emerged after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Palestinian feeling that he was helpless and powerless, stressing that the Oslo Accords brought nothing to the Palestinians except estrangement, internal disputes and deviation from the compass. Also, the refusal to resort to the ballot box, according to Al-Balaawi, came from the group causing the division, which is the group that is trying to dictate its desire to the Palestinian people completely, and if the democratic state in Palestine had continued, the division would not have occurred.
Balawi believes that the national partnership in the PLO is theoretically a beautiful thing, but practical reality has proven over the years that trying to reform the PLO is futile and impossible to achieve. Moreover, the Arab regime does not want any democratic state in the PLO institutions, and seeks to keep it as a tool aimed at achieving its own goals. Balawi believes that the Palestinian political system is a system based on a single government system and lacks democracy.
Balawi believes that resistance by all means is the best solution to the Palestinian issue, and that the Palestinian people are the ones who determine the type and method of resistance that is most worthy according to what is consistent with reality to achieve their goals. He also believes that the complete liberation of the land is coming and that the Zionist movement will be defeated, and if not at the hands of the Palestinians, then it will be by self-actualizers. Until this time, talk about the return of refugees while the Zionist project remains is an illusion, because the Zionist movement will always work to deport and displace the Palestinians from their land. It is not possible to talk about the return except after the Zionist movement leaves the land of Palestine. Balawi believes that the Arab situation during the past few years was a natural reaction to oppression, monopolization of power, and violations of human rights.
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