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DUBAI: US Palestinian beauty entrepreneurs Simi and Haze Khadra, as well as US Dutch Palestinian supermodel Bella Hadid, took to social media this week to pay tribute to their respective grandparents.
The Khadra twins — beauty entrepreneurs and DJs who grew up between Riyadh, Dubai and London and are now regulars on the Los Angeles social scene — shared a post lauding their grandmother on her birthday.
“Happy birthday to our grandmother, teta Fairouz, who was born in Akka, Palestine. Like all four of our grandparents, she was forcibly expelled from her home as a child by Israeli forces in 1948 … she is the most selfless human we know — always displaying the remarkable strength, generosity, and integrity Palestinians are known for.”
The twins took to Instagram earlier this month to announce that they would donate all sales from their makeup brand SimiHaze Beauty until Nov. 27 on the brand’s website to the Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund (PCRF).
“PCRF is working on getting children out of Gaza for free medical care. Simi & Haze have a trusting relationship with the PCRF, having completed successful fundraising campaigns together that have yielded dramatic improvements to children’s lives by bringing them the medical care they need to survive,” they posed on Instagram.
Meanwhile, Hadid took to Instagram Stories to celebrate her grandfather.
“He passed away when I was young but his memory is still inside my head,” she posted alongside a photograph of her paternal grandfather, adding: “His laugh, and his hug, and his voice and the fact that he could not be buried in the place where he was born and where his father and father’s father were born and died in the city they built — this is one of the many reasons I strive for a free, equal, liberated Palestine. I hope you are proud.”
Earlier this month, Hadid marked her father’s birthday with special post on Instagram that celebrated his Palestinian roots.
The 27-year-old catwalk star posted a picture of her and real estate mogul Mohamed Hadid from last year at the “Labour of Love” exhibition in Doha, which investigated the symbolism of the Palestinian thobe.
“Happy birthday to my baba … born in Nazareth, Palestine November 6, 1948,” Bella captioned her post.
In an earlier post, she shared the story of her father who was born in the year of the Nakba or “The Catastrophe” in 1948.
“Nine days after he was born, he, in his mother’s arms, along with his family were expelled from their home of Palestine, becoming refugees, away from a place they once called home,” she said.
“My grandparents, never being allowed to return. My family witnessed 75 years of violence against Palestinian people — most notably, brutal settler invasions which led to the destruction of entire communities, murder in cold blood and the forcible removal of families from their homes,” she added.
