The Iraqi poet, writer, journalist, and jurist Salīm Murād Sha‘shū‘a was born in 1926 in Baghdad, where he was educated at the Alliance Israélite Universelle school, the Shammash School, and the Law College. He began writing and publishing poetry while practicing law as an attorney. In 1948, he started up al-Murūj (The Valleys), an Arabic literary and social journal, but managed to publish only one issue. In 1950, he was imprisoned on the charge of spreading Zionist propaganda. The following year he emigrated to Israel.

The poetry Sha‘shū‘a wrote in his new home was permeated with Zionist…