Toronto artist Mustafa has released a new single called "Gaza Is Calling," which explores his "first experience with heartbreak in friendship," as he explained in a press release.

"I was 11 when I met this boy from Gaza," he continued. "We were inseparable. With him I shared one of the deepest loves I've ever known, he grew up alongside me in a housing project in Toronto. And not even this love was a match for the violence we were up against; the one in our new home, the one that followed him from Gaza like a cold wind.

"In the end it was all the bloodshed between us that didn't allow us to see each other without tears appearing, and one of the last notes he sent to me was about how we would continue on in another life."

Mustafa described that the string sample on the track is "the Arabian nostalgia that we share," and the Autotuned Arabic he sings is "the balance we tried to reach being boys of cultural empires in a small hood, and the Oud is the instrument of our homelands, Sudan and Palestine."

Mustafa also released an accompanying music video, directed by Hiam Abbas and starring Palestinian model Bella Hadid and Gazan rapper MC Abdul, who play grown-up versions of two young friends. Much of the video was shot around April 2023, but "Gaza Is Calling" also features real-life footage captured in the West Bank city of Jenin, from as recently as last week, as the press release noted.

Hadid helped Mustafa conceptualize the video. In a statement, Mustafa explained:

"I reached out to Bella in 2022 about the 'Gaza Is Calling' short film. I wrote a story about a grief that meets you on whatever land you escape to. In it we follow Bella Hadid and MC Abdul of Gaza as they journey through their grievances. A parallel story of Israa Ahmed and her younger brother plays out. Israa and her brother engage in the ruins and danger of a refugee camp in Palestine as Bella and Abdul engage with memorabilia and guilt in the Western world. Hiam Abbas directs. Israa and her brother are still in this camp in Jenin, Palestine today. The hope is that this serves as a stark reminder that every path is ours, every child is ours, and every war is ours to answer for and speak against."

All net proceeds from "Gaza Is Calling" will be donated to the Palestine Children's Relief Fund. Earlier this year, Mustafa co-organized a benefit show at New Jersey's Newark Symphony Hall to raise money for aid in Gaza and Sudan. The sold-out event included performances by Daniel Caesar, Clairo, Omar Apollo, Stormzy and MC Abdul.

In 2022, Mustafa won the Prism Prize, which recognizes outstanding artistry in Canadian music video production, for his "Ali" video, off the singer-songwriter's Juno Award-winning and Polaris Prize-shortlisted debut album, When Smoke Rises.