EP. 40: Lana Mustafa's Roots of Resilience in Palestine and the Diaspora

Lana is a Palestinian-American farmer and the Executive Director of Montclair Community Farms, where she leads urban agriculture, food access, and environmental education initiatives in northern New Jersey, and she is the founder of Roots Of Resilience, a Mutual Aid organization dedicated to supporting farmers in the West Bank. A lifelong grower, Lana began gardening at the age of seven and now stewards a homestead in Clifton with her 3 children,  where she grows food, saves seeds, keeps bees, and raises backyard chickens. Her work centers seed sovereignty, land justice, and preserving culturally significant crops, with a deep commitment to supporting farmers and all land workers.

Lana and I met at the Making Brooklyn Bloom conference in 2018 where Chris and I were presenting a couple workshops on seeds focused on stories of liberation. We became friends and collaborators, and I’m excited to say Lana and I will be presenting together tomorrow morning, January 31st, at the NOFA-NJ winter conference in Asbury Park about Truelove Seeds, thanks to Lana’s invitation as both a NOFA-NJ board member and grower for the Truelove Seeds catalog.

We conducted this interview on November 19th, 2025 starting at Lana’s kitchen table in Clifton, New Jersey. After a sweet stop to Yaffa Coffee and Ku-NAH-fah in Little Palestine, we ended up at City Green Farm Eco-Center where they give her space to grow a couple impressive rows of Bamyeh, Palestinian Okra for their CSA and for seed, which she splits between the Palestine Heirloom Seed Library and Truelove Seeds.

SEED STORIES:

Bamyeh Falastinia Okra

Filfil Gazawi (Gazan Peppers)

Olive harvest

Palestinian Za'atar

Freekeh (Wheat)

Maramiyeh Sage

Night Blooming Jasmine

Reyhan Basil