DUBAI: The acclaimed Palestinian singer and activist Rim Banna has died after a years-long public battle against breast cancer, her family confirmed on social media Saturday morning. Banna gained recognition at home and abroad for her haunting modern take on traditional Palestinian music and poetry and was seen as an important ambassador for Palestinian cultural self-assertion. “I am an artist that uses her voice against the unjust and the occupier,” she told The Cairo Post in 2014. Banna’s mother, Palestinian poet Zuhaira Sabbagh, wrote on Facebook that her daughter “departed but left behind her bright smile that illuminated her beautiful face.”