Rinad Tamimi spent her childhood in the West Bank – then her teenage years in Dunedin. Herald journalist Ben Tomsett spoke to the Palestinian Kiwi about culture shock, survivor’s guilt and her journey from Hebron to mid-winter New Zealand.
Born in the ancient West Bank city of Hebron, Rinad Tamimi moved to New Zealand in 2008 when her mother Mai Tamimi secured a PhD scholarship from the University of Otago and relocated the family.
Tamimi was 13 when they left balmy Hebron in August - the temperatures edging up towards 30 degrees - and arrived in midwinter Dunedin. “I didn’t even know what a hot water bottle was,” she told the Herald.
Tamimi missed her favourite foods from back home: the upside-down maqluba, mansaf, and the dessert knafeh, foods that were hard to come by in Dunedin, though her mother made a huge effort to recreate the taste of home: “She’s always managed to find the ingredients and the spices here somehow.”
“I arrived here as a 13-year-old child who only learned English at school as a second language. I knew the vocab in English, but I just did not speak,” Tamimi said.
Navigating a new cultural system while still treasuring her own had its challenges, but Tamimi recalls lots of support from their new Dunedin community.
“People were really lovely ... People in high school were always helping,” she said.
Tamimi also missed Hebron - her favourite market, tending to the garden with her grandmother, fragrant trees in bloom and eating corn on the cob with her cousins, memories blended with others of settlers, and soldiers armed with machine guns patrolling the streets.
She told the Herald her childhood was shaped by her warm family and vibrant culture – as well as an omnipresent occupation.
“We used to sometimes wake up to tanks coming through our neighbourhood, searching for people in the area who had political associates,” she said.
She recalls travel from one Palestinian city to another as a daunting task – with checkpoints and restrictions turning simple journeys into hours-long ordeals.
“The road could actually be half an hour, but with the checkpoints, surveillance, with everything it added up to three, four hours of travel.”
Tamimi is now the spokesperson and primary organiser for Dunedin Justice for Palestine.
Since October last year, she has helped organise weekly Saturday rallies calling for an immediate ceasefire in the deadly conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
She collaborates with her mother – Dr Mai Tamimi, who received a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to ethnic communities in the 2022 Queen’s Birthday Honours. Mai has been a translator and supporter of refugee families, and supported the Muslim community following the March 15, 2019, Christchurch terror attack, and was a member of the Royal Commission Ministerial Advisory Group.
Advocacy runs in the family. Rinad’s advocacy for Palestine began shortly after arriving in New Zealand – her first public speech was in 2009, a year after she moved and she remembers the courage it took.
“Around that time, there were also things happening, mainly in Gaza. So we went out for a march. I was 14 at the time and still had barely any English, but stood up in front of people and spoke that day,” she said.
Her activism has grown over the years, and more so since the conflict escalated in October.
“The survivor’s guilt is really huge. We hardly sleep, but when we sleep, we worry about family, when we wake up, we worry about family,” she said.
“Since October 7, myself and a few people who’ve always been doing stuff for Palestine in Dunedin ... we organised our first rally.”
Every Saturday, the rally has gathered at the Otago Museum Reserve before marching to the Octagon where speeches are delivered. Their consistent message has been the desire for a permanent ceasefire.
The response to the group’s efforts has been overwhelmingly positive, she said.
“It’s been really good, building connections, starting that movement, building basically a new Palestinian community in Dunedin,” she told the Herald.
She said calls for a free Palestine were not antisemitic, and she wanted Israelis to live in peace as much as Palestinians.
“Palestinians, Jews, Muslims and Christians lived together in Palestine for years and years and years. When we say ceasefire, we say ceasefire for all. When we say peace, we mean it for all,” she said.
“As much as all of these Palestinians have been killed for no reason, there are so many Israelis that were also killed for no reason. So many Jewish people actually come and stand up with us in those rallies every week.”
Despite facing occasional backlash, derogatory comments and confrontations during marches, Tamimi said her advocacy was about raising awareness, fostering understanding and empathy.
“When we call for a ceasefire, we want it from both sides. We want everyone to live in peace. We’re not just doing it for the Palestinians, we’re doing it for everyone.”
The past eight months have been challenging for Tamimi and her family as the situation in Gaza has deteriorated.
Her grandparents and extended family still live in the West Bank.
Tamimi said she hoped the New Zealand Government would address the crisis by pulling troops from the Red Sea. She also hoped New Zealand would recognise Palestinian statehood – as Norway, Spain and Ireland formally did in May. Currently, 143 of 193 United Nations member states recognise Palestine as a state.
“They could do a lot more,” Tamimi said.
While it was encouraging the Government had joined the international call for a ceasefire, she said: “It did take them 40,000 lives.
“The least they could do is to grant special humanitarian visas for those who have family in Gaza.”
Alongside continuing to organise the weekly rallies, Tamimi hosts a podcast, The Watermelon Report, on Dunedin radio station Oar Fm, which provides updates on Gaza and Palestine.
She urged people to research the history of the conflict before making judgments.
“What we just need now is for the conflict to end,” she said.
Ben Tomsett is a Multimedia Journalist for the New Zealand Herald, based in Dunedin.
His eldest brother said they were struggling to comprehend their sudden loss.