Discovering a story that weaves together love, frustration at one’s own inertia, and a longing for justice, set against the backdrop of the Palestinian conflict: the tour that brings Paolo Naldini to present his first novel, Good Morning, Palestine, continues across several Italian cities. A premise: these are not events conceived as mere showcases, but collective moments of reflection—with different speakers each time—that intertwine the imaginative dimension of storytelling with current events. The encounters do not simply introduce the book; they offer multi-voiced dialogues on the themes addressed in the volume published by Capponi, following a format of diverse testimonies envisioned by the author.

The book as an activator: the presentation and the solidarity dinner

On Thursday at 6 p.m., at Libreria Giovannacci on Via Italia 14 in Biella, a new presentation of the novel will take place. Paolo Naldini will be in conversation with Maria Elena Delia, Italian spokesperson of the international Steering Committee of the Global Sumud Flotilla and Italian representative of the Global Movement to Gaza. During the free, open-access event - moderated by Journal director Luca Deias - attendees will be able to purchase the book and join the signing session. However, the event will extend beyond the bookshop’s walls. Good Morning, Palestine intertwines literature and introspection, but also civic engagement: the book’s proceeds are in fact destined for The School Bag Project: Supporting Education in Gaza, supporting schooling for children in war-affected areas. In this spirit, a themed dinner will be held at 8 p.m. at Cittadellarte’s Bistrot Le Arti, in support of the same project to which the book’s earnings are donated.
“It will be a unique occasion,” the organizers explain, “to share conviviality and to learn more about this project and the book. And above all, to activate ourselves - even through a small gesture - against the inertia toward the ongoing genocide.” Thus, the book becomes an activator: of consciences, relationships, introspective and collective reflections. It does not merely recount a story born of the author’s imagination - though one that reinterprets and reverberates with a tragedy of urgent contemporary relevance - but pushes beyond the standstill. Just like the story’s protagonist, who travels to Jerusalem in an attempt - first individual, then collective - to ignite a spark of change, the book’s author also goes further, moving from words on a page into real life. And in this process, he invites unknown readers to join the cause.

The tour between past and future

The first presentation took place on November 12 in Pettinengo, where - alongside the author, in conversation with Pacefuturo president Stefano Zumaglini - Nazarena Lanza, promoter of the Local March for Gaza, and Izz Aljabari, a young Palestinian artist, also spoke. After this “home” stop, the book was showcased last weekend in Tuscany and Emilia-Romagna: on November 29 in Florence at the historic Dino Campana Room of the Biblioteca delle Oblate, as part of the eighth edition of the Identities – Reading the Contemporary festival, with contributions from professor Micaela Frulli, editor Chiara Belliti, and Tania Biancalani, project manager of The School Bag Project in relation to the emergency educational kit created by the Anniya Collective for the children of Gaza; and on November 30 in Bologna at the headquarters of the cultural association Capire, where Naldini spoke with archaeologist and environmental hiking guide Sara Zanni. Three December presentations have already been announced (all details will be provided later): in addition to the December 4 event at Libreria Giovannacci, one will take place on December 9 in Pozzuoli and another on December 14 in Biella, again at Cittadellarte, during the Cittadelmarket event. For next year, stops in Milan, Turin, and Rome are already on the horizon.

The book

The volume - now available in bookstores and online, also in digital format - undertakes a journey into conscience and the sense of guilt tied to one’s passivity in the face of history, and the disarming normality with which we coexist with injustice. The author portrays the obsession of a middle-school teacher, Sebastiano, overwhelmed by a moral and emotional crisis fueled by the powerlessness he feels toward the genocide of the Palestinian people and by a love - irrational in every form yet the driving force behind his every action - for a singer he “knows,” or rather has heard, on YouTube. Good Morning, Palestine is a cry, but also an intimate diary that becomes public: the protagonist, in constant and provocative dialogue with his inner Jiminy Cricket, decides to set off toward Jerusalem accompanied only by his poodle, Leone. It is an inner march before a geographical one, toward the idea of a different tomorrow. Between reality and delirium, love and desire, Good Morning, Palestine unfolds a slow loss of balance - regained? - first solitary, then collective. Paolo Naldini has not only produced an intense and courageous work infused with politics and compassion, but was also prophetic: he wrote the novel between summer and autumn 2024, without knowing that the Global March to Gaza would later take place in June 2025 in Cairo.

The author’s voice

“When I was returning from Cairo this June, disappointed because the Global March had been halted at the outset by the Egyptian government, I thought,” said Paolo Naldini, “that we should organize a march in every city, like a relay that would symbolically connect the world to Gaza. When I got back, I spoke with Nazarena Lanza, then with Ettore Macchieraldo and Alberto Conte, and Andrea Trivero and Alessandro Beata, in short, with various activists who were planning a procession from Oropa to Santhià. I immediately suggested connecting the Global March to Gaza with their initiative by organizing the first Local March for Gaza. We carried it out with real success, welcomed by mayors, citizens, and associations with great warmth and solidarity.

“Thanks to the group’s decision to immediately create a website to recount the march and invite others to replicate it, 29 Local Marches for Gaza have now taken place, raising awareness among thousands of people and allowing them to express their feelings of closeness and brotherhood with the Palestinian people. Had I not written the book, some of this would not have happened, and I myself likely would not have taken part. In this sense, writing was not only prophetic - because the real march to Gaza mirrors the protagonist’s march toward Jerusalem - but also a lever to activate myself first and compel me to ‘get off the couch,’ go out into the streets with others, and express what I felt.

“I believe,” he concluded, “that it is a right - but also a duty - of citizens in a democratic state to express what they feel and to allow others to take a position, and for political representatives to decide whether or not to bring these demands into the halls of institutional politics.”