São Paulo – Brazil’s National Library Foundation (FBN) and the National Library of Palestine signed on Wednesday (12) a memorandum of understanding that outlines joint initiatives between the institutions. According to FBN, this is the first agreement entered into by the National Library of Palestine, located in Ramallah, with a foreign institution. The document was signed remotely by FBN president Marco Lucchesi and the director of the Palestinian National Library, Marwan Awartani. The Brazilian ambassador at the Representative Office in the West Bank, João Marcelo Queiroz Soares, took part of the online meeting.
Through the protocol, the institutions will foster the exchange of information and experiences in Information Science and related fields. The partnership also provides for the sharing of collections, collaboration on research projects, conferences, and technical visits, among other activities.
According to the FBN, the rapprochement between the two libraries began in June, when the Brazilian institution sent the first of three shipments of donated books by Brazilian authors translated into Arabic, including works by Machado de Assis (1839–1908), Itamar Vieira Jr., Graça Aranha (1868–1931), Marina Colasanti (1937–2025), and Patrícia Melo. The donations also included an Arabic–Portuguese dictionary and a trilingual Portuguese–Arabic–Spanish edition of Deleite do estrangeiro em tudo o que é espantoso e maravilhoso: Estudo de um relato de viagem bagdali [Delight of the foreigner in all that is astonishing and wonderful: A study of a Baghdadi travelaccount], by Paulo Daniel Elias Farah.
“The signing of the Memorandum of Understanding between the national libraries of Brazil and Palestine carries great humanitarian value. We expressed to the minister and director of the Palestinian library, Marwan Awartani, our desire to assist in the preservation and conservation of bibliographic heritage. We will not give up on the culture of peace,” said Lucchesi.
Read more:
A partnership to foster Arab culture
Translated by Guilherme Miranda
