Publication of the Almanach issue 5 (2025) by the SMEIC

Refusal is not withdrawal. It is a potential space for persistence, resistance, and collective repair.

The fifth issue of Almanach confronts a year marked by violence, fragile ceasefires, and the continuing erosion of international law across the MENA region. Edited by Nadia Radwan, Elife Biçer-Deveci, and Alessia Vereno, the issue insists on refusal as a survival strategy at a moment when artists, researchers, and writers face censorship and professional risk for taking ethical positions.

Its contributions reflect on how creating, thinking, publishing, and caring for one another become acts of resistance. From the delayed official recognition of the massacres against the Yazidis to violations of international law in the provision of humanitarian aid in Gaza, the issue highlights the material, psychological, and political consequences of war, and the dangerous normalization of violence in public discourse.