Saint Levant

Marwan Abdelhamid (Arabic: مروان عبد الحميد; born October 6, 2000), known as Saint Levant, is a Jerusalem-born Palestinian rapper. He is a multilingual rapper, known for his song "Very Few Friends". He is also Dior's first fragrance ambassador in the Middle East.

Early life and education
Abdelhamid was born on October 6, 2000, in Jerusalem to an Algerian mother and Palestinian father during the Second Intifada. Abdelhamid's childhood was spent primarily in the Gaza Strip in the Palestinian territories until the 2007 Battle of Gaza forced his family to relocate to Amman, Jordan. Growing up, he communicated in English at school, French at home, and Arabic at the Palestinian refugee camp where he played football after school.

In 2022, Abdelhamid received a bachelor's degree in international relations from the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Career and activism
Before taking on the name Saint Levant, Abdelhamid wrote "Jerusalem Freestyles" and "Nirvana in Gaza", both of which discussed political issues. Around the same time, Abdelhamid began posting videos on TikTok in which he discussed Palestinian history, as well as commentary on toxic masculinity in Arab culture. Shortly after, he co-founded GrowHome, which connects Palestinian entrepreneurs with individuals who can help fund their projects.

In November 2022, Saint Levant released his trilingual rap track "Very Few Friends", which was streamed approximately 2 million YouTube views in one month. The song soon became popular on TikTok and Instagram.

In 2023 Saint Levant released "From Gaza with Love". In 2024 he signed with Universal Arabic Music (UAM) and released, together with MC Abdul, "Deira". The song is in the Shaabi musical style of Algiers, Algeria. He explained that "Deira" was the name of the 22-room beachfront hotel that his father Rashid, designed and his parents built in 2000 when they moved to Gaza and which the Israeli military destroyed by bombing in 2023 during Israel's latest attacks on the Gaza Strip.

He tells Arab News in an interview, "I grew up in a hotel built with my father’s architectural brain. And, to me, it was like the best years of my life."

Saint Levant is outspoken on the struggle in Palestine, telling Harper's Bazaar: "'Everything I do is focused and based on the Palestinian cause and struggle, doing a lot of contextualizing… I came to America… and… people think… the… conflict (is)… between these two equal(s)… (who) just hate each other for some reason, (that) Palestinians just hate Israelis. (In reality) it's 80 years of occupation and oppression and displacement and ethnic cleansing so I think it's very important to just push that forward always and I try to do it through the music; I try to do it through my actions, and everything that I do'."Saint Levant performed at Coachella in 2024. He used his performance to bring awareness to the ongoing conflict taking place in Gaza.

Personal life
Abdelhamid lives in Los Angeles, though he regularly returns to Amman.

EPs and albums

 * From Gaza, with Love (EP) (2023)
 * DEIRA (Album) (2024)

Singles

 * "Jerusalem Freestyle" (2020)
 * "Nirvana in Gaza" (2020)
 * "7ajir" (2021)
 * "Haifa in a Tesla" (2021)
 * "Desert Rose" (2021)
 * "Sahrawi" (2021)
 * "1001 Nights" (2021)
 * "Nasser" (2022)
 * "Caged Birds Sing" (2022)
 * "Mandela" (2022)
 * "Tête-à-Tête" (2022)
 * "By the Sea" (2022)
 * "One More Time / Baby" (2022)
 * "Mistakes" (2022)
 * "Here and There" (2022)
 * "Very Few Friends" (2022)
 * "I Guess" (2022)
 * "Facetime" (2023)
 * "Nails" (2023)
 * "Deira" featuring MC Abdul (2024)
 * "5am in Paris" (2024)
 * "Galbi" (2024)