In her home in Bayssariyeh, Amal welcomed us on February 28, 2019. She was the one speaking, and we were the ones asking questions about the South, its people, and its problems.
On April 22, 2026, while doing the same thing—telling people about the South and standing against the erasure of memory and land—Amal was killed in an Israeli airstrike that targeted her several times.
As part of a research project on the agricultural plain in the Zahrani region, we had observed changes in land ownership. We wanted to understand the reality of these ownership structures and their implications, particularly regarding the future of the plain and the history of agriculture there, knowing that existing zoning plans were inadequate in protecting it.
During the session, which was more of an open discussion than a structured interview, we were able to gain insight into the details of the urban planning and regulatory issues in the Zahrani region. But she didn’t just participate in this interview; she was also an integral part of the workshop we organized with residents of the area about the plain.
We publish this interview today as a token of our gratitude to Amal for her contributions to this region, serving as a reference point for its history and knowledge about its cultural, environmental, urban, and social heritage, and finally, for standing up to the Israeli war machine and its killing spree.
Below are the words of the martyred journalist Amal Khalil about the Zahrani Plain.