Kenizé Mourad: “Since I started speaking out about Palestine, I have been boycotted.”

Kenizé Mourad (Paris, 1939) wants to escape all the attention, but she can't. You'd think she was the daughter of an Ottoman princess and an Indian rajah. As soon as she entered her Barcelona hotel, a bellboy reminded her that the elevator on the left was wider, so she could get in more comfortably with her wheelchair. The writer thanked him and then stood up with no help other than her crutch. She tore her ligaments a few weeks ago, but, as her friend and translator Ilya U. Topper points out, "They told her to rest for six weeks, and within two, she was already touring all of Istanbul. At 86 years old!" She smiled and added: "I didn't want to miss my tour of Spain for anything."

She's here to present her new book, In the Land of the Pure (M'Sur), in which a journalist investigates the threat posed by a terrorist group that could gain access to the atomic bomb in Pakistan; and the reissue of The Perfume of Our Land , the book in which she compiled the testimonies of a wide range of Palestinians and Israelis who live with the conflict on a daily basis.

Complex youth “I am the great-granddaughter of sultans, but I know what it's like to have no money and long for answers.”

It's been twenty years since he published his essay on Palestine and nothing seems to have changed.

Actually, yes. They're worse off. Until the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023, everything remained the same. Twenty years of blindness on the part of all governments. Since then, that nightmare has become an even more unbearable horror. I don't understand how there can be so much silence.

On the part of the leaders?

And the media, and some citizens... I'm stunned, I don't understand anything. Well, yes. It must be because of the consequences of speaking out.

What does it refer to?

I suffer from them myself. Before publishing The Perfume of Our Land and speaking openly about the conflict, I appeared on every television channel in France. But from then on, I was boycotted.

And yet he has continued to write.

If I hadn't written for twenty years, I don't know if I'd be here today. It means a lot to me.

He has just published a new novel, In the Land of the Pure , in which he shows another Pakistan to which the West is not accustomed.

Most people think of terrorists, bearded men, and veiled women. I'm not saying there aren't any, but it's much more diverse and has a very rich cultural life, with many concerts, plays, bookstores, and fashion shows. I travel there often, as part of my family lives there. It's a country that's unknown to the world. Well, maybe a little less so these past few weeks.

When people think of Pakistan, most people think of terrorists, bearded men, and veiled women.

Are you saying this because of the diplomatic crisis you have with India and the spiral of violence on the border?

Exactly. India has never accepted Pakistan, because Pakistan comes from India. But I hope everything slows down a bit. They're two nuclear powers, it's all madness. India wants to take Pakistan just as Israel wants to take Gaza and Palestine. And as for Narendra Modi, the Indian Prime Minister... don't get me started...

Speak, speak...

He's a Hindu fanatic and has publicly stated that he wants to expel Muslims and Christians if they don't convert to Hinduism. Thirty years ago, the country was different and much more intellectually open. I also have family in India, and they tell me they have a hard time finding work because of their Muslim names.

The CIA offered you one, as a spy.

But I didn't accept it, even though the Turkish newspapers insisted I did. I thought about taking advantage of the offer to publish an article about how the CIA was trying to recruit left-wing journalists like me, but I was afraid something would happen to me.

The CIA's interest may have stemmed from your broad worldview. You were born in Paris, lived in Lebanon, have family in India and Pakistan, and live in Istanbul... Where do you feel you're from?

I've spent my life trying to find my identity, but in the end, I realized I'm simply Kenizé Mourad, and that's okay. I'm the great-granddaughter of sultans, and my family was aristocratic, but I lived in an orphanage and know what it means to have no money and yearn for answers.

Is that why you became a journalist?

I loved it a lot. When I stopped to write my books, I felt very sad. I watched everything that was happening in the world on television and thought, 'What are you doing at home?'

I did not agree to become a spy, even though the Turkish newspapers insist that I did.

Why did you become a novelist then?

I made the decision after the Iranian revolution. I wanted to tell a lot of stories, but articles just didn't work for me.

Then came success with the novel On the Dead Princess's Side , in which she told the story of her family.

My publisher ventured that it might do well. He estimated selling 50,000 copies. I told him that anything less than 100,000 would be a failure, and he laughed. I sold millions and got 34 translations.

And today he's here, presenting his books throughout Spain, with his first stop in Barcelona.

Spain, for me, is synonymous with freedom. When I was fifteen, I was able to leave the Catholic orphanage where I lived for the first time. I was sent to Madrid to learn Spanish. The nuns believed I was coming to a boarding house and that by eight o'clock at night someone would force me to return home. But here everything is very open and the hours are very late, and I almost never went to bed before midnight. I could go out, I had many boyfriends... I was delighted. I breathed for the first time.