Photograph by Mike James
Cincinnati was ranked by USA Today as the No. 1 U.S. city for street art in 2024 and No. 2 this year, so a lot of local artists are making their marks on the city. But Jason Al Ghussein is creating very different murals from other artists.
The Cincinnati-based Palestinian-American artist did a vibrant 50-foot-tall mural of Palestinian Jaffa oranges in 2020, “Welcome to Jaffa,” that he painted illegally on an abandoned building in Over-the-Rhine. It drew the attention of Pink Floyd cofounder Roger Waters, who visited the painting in 2022 to meet with Al Ghussein before a concert stop at Heritage Bank Center. Later that evening, Waters wore the keffiyeh that Al Ghussein gave him—a symbol of Palestinian resistance—on stage.
Al Ghussein is set to unveil his latest work, “Focus on Love,” a striking 50-by-75-foot mural featuring a young Palestinian girl in Gaza donning bright red heart-shaped sunglasses and a bold black-and-white patterned Palestinian keffiyeh. He’ll officially unveil the completed mural to the public on Tuesday during a dedication ceremony and multi-benefit fundraiser at 1622 Main St. in Over-the-Rhine.
“I don’t think there are any other artists in town who, when they’re 50 feet up in the air on boom lift painting a mural, are getting texts from their cousins that more family have been killed in a genocide,” he tells Cincinnati Magazine. “I have an album on my phone called ‘Gaza Family Casualties.’ ”
Thirty-six members of Al Ghussein’s family have been killed in Gaza since October 7, 2023, in what major reputable human rights organizations such as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and the United Nations Human Rights Council have labeled a genocide. He says he’s self-funding large-scale public art about the ongoing ethnic cleansing in Gaza in order to drive dialogue here about Palestine.
Last October, Al Ghussein began raising money for “Focus on Love,” which features a young Palestinian girl named Laila surrounded by watermelons as fruit, flowers, and vines overtake an Israeli watch tower. Watermelons emerged as a symbol of Palestinian solidarity after Israeli authorities banned the display of the Palestinian flag in the occupied territories in the 1980s.
Watermelons carry a deeper meaning as well, says Al Ghussein. After the U.S. Civil War, former slaves in the South grew watermelons on their own land as a cash crop—and so they became a symbol of liberation and self-reliance. Al Ghussein specifically included them in his composition to emphasize the long history of Black American/Palestinian solidarity and to link with Rothenberg Elementary School’s garden program, which will be planted in front of the mural.
Al Ghussein comes from a politically influential family in Palestine. His grandfather, Yacoub, was arrested by the British and sent to the Seychelles for nearly two years with other Palestinian leaders. “My grandfather was a national leader of Palestine when the British government was trying to take it over,” he says. “At that time, the British were trying to dissolve the Palestinian government by arresting political leaders and sending them into exile.”
Photograph courtesy of Jason Al Ghussein
In November 2024, President Biden was photographed leaving a Nantucket bookstore with Rashid Khalidi’s The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine. The book shot to the top of The New York Times best-sellers list for more than 30 weeks amid escalation of violence in the Middle East. The book features a photo of Yacoub with Khalidi’s uncle, Husayn al-Khalidi, also exiled to the Seychelles.
Last year, Rashid Khalidi retired from Columbia University amidst the university’s systematic attempts to silence the students and faculty speaking up about Palestine. “It’s pretty wild to see the President of the United States walk out of a book store holding a book that details the arrest and exile of your grandfather and his compatriots,” says Al Ghussein.
During work on his latest mural, Al Ghussein was visited by Josh Paul and Tariq Habash, former Biden Administration officials who resigned in protest of U.S. policy toward Israel. They later co-founded A New Policy, a Washington, D.C.-based PAC advocating for a foreign policy rooted in human rights and American interests. Last year, Al Ghussein was with Habash—a Cincinnati native—when Habash was awarded the “Spirit of Courage” honor at a CAIR Ohio banquet for his public resignation from the Biden Administration.
“Americans ask why Palestinians are angry without asking why Israel keeps 2.3 million people under siege, denies their right to return, builds illegal settlements, and bombs them year after year,” says Al Ghussein. “This has gone on for 75 years. Real peace requires real change. The current Israeli government does not want peaceful coexistence with the Palestinians. It wants to eradicate them. The Netanyahu government wants conquest, land, and domination.”
During the late 18th century, the Al Ghussein family built a solid stone mansion in Gaza that later housed the British Consul during the British mandate, before being abandoned and falling into disrepair in 1948. In 2020, after an extensive renovation, the mansion reopened as the Al Ghussein Cultural House and became a cultural hub and meeting space for civil society, musical performances, poetry readings, and arts and historical exhibitions.
“My dad, his siblings, and extended family all had memories there,” Al Ghussein says. “When I found out the property had been restored and converted into an arts and cultural center, I had hopes of visiting Gaza to see family and hold a gallery exhibition in that space.”
Amid the current hostilities, however, an Israeli bombing destroyed the Al Ghussein Cultrual House. “Israel is erasing our culture,” he says. “They’re deliberately destroying these historic buildings to erase all traces of Palestinian history and culture. It’s widely understood by scholars of international law and human rights that the deliberate destruction of art, cultural heritage, and historical sites is a component of genocidal intent.”
Al Ghussein applied to have “Welcome to Jaffa” be part of BLINK’s public mural program in 2022 and 2024, but he was turned down. He developed the BLONK app in response, raised donations for equipment, and lit up the mural anyway.
Photo courtesy of Jason Al Ghussein
A year later, his second labor-of-love mural is finally finished. He estimates he’s spent $80,000 of his own money on it and hopes the artwork will inspire people to donate to Palestine Children’s Relief Fund and other humanitarian relief agencies.
“The mural is my response as an artist in mourning to current events,” says Al Ghussein. “It is my outlet to cope with what we as Palestinians are going through right now. Another part of it is a reminder and assertion to our community that it’s OK to be Palestinian. Because we are being told that we’re ‘terrorists,’ that we’re ‘radical Islamic jihadists,’ and that we’re ‘anti-semitic.’ And what I want people to understand is, this is language used to dehumanize us so they can kill us. But this girl with heart-shaped sunglasses on, with a keffiyeh wrapped around her neck and blowing in the wind, is unbothered by all that bullshit. We’re looking forward—and we’re focused on love.”
“Focus on Love” is located at 1622 Main Street in Over-the-Rhine. You can donate to his GoFundMe here. All donors will receive a 16×12 print of the mural.
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