Rabat — Italian-Moroccan rappers Baby Gang and Neima Ezza have joined forces on “Dima Falestini,” the latest release from Mocro Stars, a project connecting Moroccan artists and the diaspora across international rap scenes.

Released on October 2, the three-minute track places the two artists over a sample of Palestinian singer Mohammed Assaf’s “Dammi Falastini,” a song released in 2015 whose title translates as “My Blood Is Palestinian.”

“Dima Falestini” reshapes that reference through contemporary rap production, with Baby Gang and Neima Ezza performing partly in Italian and Arabic.

The release is also tied to a humanitarian initiative. Mocro Stars says royalties from the song will be donated to “The Zaynab Project,” a women-led grassroots nonprofit supporting families and children in Gaza through food, clean water, emergency assistance, and longer-term care for orphaned children.

Morocco, Italy, and Palestine in one track

The title itself plays with language and identity.

“The song ‘Dima Palestini’ brings together two realities: ‘Dima’ for Dima Maghreb, but ‘Palestini’ because Dima Palestina,” Neima Ezza said. “We are always on the side of Palestine, on the side of truth.”

In Moroccan Darija, “dima” means “always,” giving the title a different emphasis from Assaf’s original “Dami Falastini.”

That linguistic shift fits the broader idea behind Mocro Stars, which uses Morocco as its anchor while following the country’s diaspora into established music scenes abroad.

Baby Gang, born Zaccaria Mouhib in Italy to a Moroccan family, has become one of the most visible Italian-Moroccan names in Italy’s rap scene.

Neima Ezza, born in Morocco and raised in Milan, has similarly built his career within Italian hip-hop while maintaining a strong connection to his Moroccan background.

Their collaboration therefore reflects the increasingly cross-border character of contemporary Moroccan rap, where identity is often shaped simultaneously by Morocco and the European cities in which artists live and work.

Mocro Stars expands beyond Morocco

Mocro Stars was first announced in 2023 by French-Moroccan rapper Lazer MMZ as a collaborative project centered on Moroccan rap. Early announcements already named artists including Baby Gang among those expected to participate.

The project has since widened its scope, bringing together Moroccan artists and members of the diaspora across eight countries, including Morocco, France, Spain, Belgium, Canada, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands.

Italian reporting on “Dima Falestini” describes the wider Mocro Stars project as involving 35 Moroccan and diaspora voices. Its first recent release was “Casanegra,” bringing together Moroccan rapper ElGrandeToto and French-Moroccan artist Maes.

With Baby Gang and Neima Ezza, the project moves naturally into Italy, where both artists already have established audiences.

Their participation illustrates what Mocro Stars appears increasingly designed to do: connect rap scenes that may be geographically separate but already share artists, audiences, languages, and cultural references.

“Dima Falestini” pushes that idea one step further. The track connects Morocco and its diaspora while centering a subject beyond either Morocco or Italy, using Assaf’s recognizable Palestinian refrain as its emotional foundation.