Respond’s Arabic team is working around the clock in response to the genocidal siege on Gaza.

We are translating humanitarian parole applications for Palestinians from Gaza. We are also translating legal resources for detainees incarcerated in Israeli prisons; interpreting Know Your Rights sessions for communities protesting across the US and Europe; translating lawsuits seeking prosecution for Israel's war crimes; and translating for journalists from Gaza. 

Our Arabic team has also mobilized a grassroots watchdog effort to catch Western media's mistranslations in coverage of Gaza. Our recent intervention into a racist mistranslation of Arabic testimony about abuse in Israeli prisons by the BBC was viewed 12 million times and led to the BBC issuing a formal correction. 

All of this work is led by Palestinian and Arab translators – who were already inundated with casework responding to recent environmental catastrophes in Libya, Morocco, and Syria-Turkiye.  We need your support so they can earn dignified wages and sustain this critical work!  

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Thank you for uplifting Gaza Translators

Hundreds of you responded to our call to support our Gazan linguists who are doing life saving translation work for thousands of Palestinians fleeing genocide.
Because of you, we have been able to provide emergency stipends to ensure our Gazan translators ...

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We have 12 Gazan translators on our team who have lost their homes and their loved ones

They have been forcibly displaced 5-10 times each; they are without electricity and reliable internet connection; they are living in tents and building fires to cook and boil contaminated water. All the while, they are supporting thousands of Gazans fleeing ...

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Respond’s Executive Director on fighting language deprivation as a weapon of war

Language is used to exclude and abuse, to erect walls of paper and concrete around borders, to spread lies that justify violence and genocide. Respond Crisis Translation was founded on this notion …

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Ukraine, Afghanistan, Haiti, U.S.-MX border: Eliminating language barriers on the frontlines by creating jobs for crisis-impacted interpreters

Here is the transcript of a panel event hosted by Respond Crisis Translation and leads across our Ukrainian & Russian, Southwest Asian and North African, Haitian Creole, Spanish, and Indigenous & Marginalized Languages teams.

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Respond-translated “war diary” illuminates survival, resilience in Gaza

In “War Diary,” published by AGNI Magazine at Boston University, Nahil Mohana shares moments from her life in Gaza from October 7-29th, 2023. Respond Crisis Translation linguist Mohamed Fenzari translated much of this dispatch …

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Dr. Timnit Gebru: The consequences of mistranslation and language weaponization for Eritrean and Palestinian asylum seekers

As the genocide in Gaza escalates, we at Respond Crisis Translation gathered to commemorate the anniversary of the ongoing Nakba and honor Palestinian translators and interpreters. Dr. Timnit Gebru, an expert on AI ethics and algorithmic bias and …

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Respond Crisis Translation’s Ayah Najadat: Amid surging caseload, Palestinian translators have been stepping up

On May 11, ahead of Nakba Day, Respond Crisis Translation hosted a gathering in Palo Alto, California, to highlight the work of the Palestinian and Arab interpreters and translators who are working tirelessly to support humanitarian parolees from Gaza and …

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Respond’s Arabic Team: supporting asylum seekers from Syria, Morocco, Libya, and Palestine

Respond Crisis Translation’s Arabic Team worked tirelessly in 2023, supporting hundreds of individuals seeking asylum and refuge, partnering with organizations on dozens of projects, as well as raising awareness around key language justice issues, throughout 2023 …

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Respond in Al Jazeera: Intervention leads BBC News to correct egregious mistranslation

On Saturday, November 25, a clip posted by BBC News showed a released Palestinian prisoner describing horrific abuses inside an Israeli prison. She said, in Arabic, that Israel held them in the cold without electricity, "sprayed us with pepper spray" and “left us to die." …

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Respond's Arabic team combats language violence against Palestinians

At Respond Crisis Translation we witness that language access is central to the struggle against violence everywhere.

Our team is working tirelessly to address language violence and language gaps that are fueling the ongoing genocide of Palestinians in Gaza. One of many examples is the systemic mistranslation of common Arabic words that…

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Mistranslating the movement: Language is being weaponized to malign the Palestinian liberation movement and justify an ongoing genocide.

Arabic words are regularly mistranslated or misconstrued in English-language media to stereotype and demonize Palestinians, painting them as terrorists and contributing to racist narratives that pro-Palestinian activism is inherently violent or antisemitic.

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