Living Memories
falestin naili2019, Memories of 1948 (by C. Conti & A. Alcantara)
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The 19 stories offered here illustrate different ways of being present, of counting, of making oneself heard and of having some weight. In the face of erasure – imposed through terror, through the destruction of their villages, by being uncounted during population censuses, by being deprived of their right of residence – in the face of the confiscation of their property and their marginalization in the dominant historiography on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, 11 men and 8 women tell their stories of 1948. They retrace the effects of this historic cataclysm and the different strategies for survival, perseverance, creativity and resistance that they deployed.
Related papers
The “Silenced” Narrative of 1948 War Events Among Young Palestinians in Israel
Peace Psychology Book Series, 2016
The Arab-Israel conflict has been the central focus of numerous scholarly research studies. In the course of this conflict, Israeli Jews and Palestinians have each formed a collective memory that describes the development of the conflict. Among the many aspects of this, the narrative of the 1948 War events is the most significant. Each party has developed its unique and distinctive collective memory and has invested major efforts in maintaining it. Palestinians who are Israeli citizens, whose nation is in an intractable conflict with the Jewish citizens of Israel, represent a national minority which is exposed to two contrasting and conflicting narratives of the past: the Israeli one and the Palestinian one. They encounter the hegemonic Zionist narrative through various formal state systems while their own narrative they acquire mainly in informal contexts. Therefore, the main purpose of this chapter is to present the findings of research conducted among young Palestinians in Israel with regard to their collective memory narrative of the 1948 War events. The chapter will shed a light on the "mnemonic community" and "mnemonic arena" that preserved such a silenced collective memory. In addition, it will concentrate on the way young Palestinians explain what happened in 1948 War and how they perceive the influence that such events had on their current lives and values. This chapter seeks to contribute to an understanding of the significance of collective memory for societies involved in conflicts, since it is a determining factor in maintaining and feeding the conflict, often functioning as a potential obstacle to conflict resolution and peacemaking. land registries, municipal council archives, schools and cultural centers (Abd al-Jawad, 2007). In addition, depopulated houses were blown up or razed to the ground, perpetuating the Zionist narrative that Palestine was virtually empty territory before the Jews arrived (Masalha, 1997). In fact, random life stories told by individuals who have undergone these war experiences cannot create a national narrative and a collective memory with which a whole community can identify. National narratives and collective memory should be expressed through major societal communication channels and take the form of cultural products such as books, plays and films. Palestinians in Israel do not have their own national agencies or archives through which young generations could be made aware of their collective memory. In addition, they face deliberate silencing of their narrative by Israeli authorities. Actually, this was the reason to conduct this study which aimed mainly to investigate the nature of the Palestinian popular collective memory 1 regarding 1948 War events among young Palestinians who did not experience the events nor studied about them via official authorities.
We are more than scattered body parts: ‘We are more than statistics and scattered body parts’: Telling stories and coalescing Palestinian history
The fragmentation of Palestinian lives into exile, under occupation and within Israel has led to a complex interweaving of collective memory and individual memories in the attempt to come to terms with and represent this existence. Central to Palestinian self-understanding is the key interruptive event of the Nakba, the ethnic cleansing of Palestine in 1948 which disrupted the people's links to the land of Palestine -not only for Palestinians in exile but also for those within present-day Israel. Memorialization practices, such as those undertaken in village memorial books which record in detail the Palestinian villages destroyed in 1948, work to foster a collectivity linked across generations and borders. However these practices also repress marginalized voices, especially the voices, experiences and perspectives of women. By highlighting these voices, by engaging in collecting memories and by critically assessing the process of collective memorialization, the authors reviewed present a decentred, complex and kaleidoscopic version of Palestinian self-understanding and identity.
This Is Our Home: Everyday Resistance of the Palestinians in Israel 1948-66
2020
The aim of this chapter is to determine and examine what constituted everyday resistance for those Palestinians who lived in Israel,1 and who experienced life under Israeli military rule, from 1948 to 1966. The establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 and the outcome of the war changed the power relations between Israel and the Palestinians and had an immediate and direct impact on the Palestinian people: Palestinians refer to these events as "the year of the Al Nakba" or "the Catastrophe". The majority of Palestinians either were forced out of their homes or fled as a result of the war and became refugees in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and neighbouring Arab countries (Pappé 2006, 86-123). Those who remained were reduced to a minority within their homeland, cut off from the rest of their fellow nationals. It is estimated that in 1948 between 80,000 and 160,000 Palestinians remained, representing somewhere in the region of 10 percent of the original population. As a result of Al Nakba, Palestinians faced the destruction of their political, economic, and social structures (Ghanem and Mustafa 2009, 107; Bauml 2007), and this defeated population is largely absent from the Israeli state's official history: Israel's founding myth has been that Palestine was a land without a people for a people without a land (Pappé 2014). Where the Palestinian citizens of Israel did appear in the history of Israel, they were cast in the passive role of victims, and, at the same time that they were being excluded from Israeli narratives, Palestinians in Israel were also being excluded from the history of the Palestinian national resistance movement and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) (Darweish 2006; Rouhana and Sabbagh-Khoury 2011). Scholarly research on the military period has inadvertently reinforced their erasure by focusing on Israeli mechanisms of control and oppression (Jiryis 1976; Zureik 1979; Lustick 1980; Cohen 2010; Sa'di 2014). After Al Nakba, Palestinian areas were divided into three main districts, each directly administered by a military governor. Harsh restrictions were imposed on the lives of the Arab minority, and these restrictions drew upon the Emergency Regulation Laws inherited from the British Mandate of 1945. Palestinians' movements were restricted, and so people required a permit from the military governor to leave their village, whether it was to work, cultivate their land, visit family, obtain medical treatment, study, or travel for any other purpose outside the village boundary (Lustick 1980; Bauml 2007; Sa'di 2014). This research thus presents a new perspective on the reality faced by Palestinians in Israel after 1948, one which emphasises the agency of this community and documents its history of survival and resistance. While their new reality was characterised by the asymmetry of power between Israel and its Arab minority, and by marginalisation, they were able in their own way to resist the structural imbalance imposed on them. To maintain the fragmentation of and control over the Palestinian minority, the Israeli state reinforced the Palestinians' economic dependence on the Jewish sector. The majority of Arab land was confiscated, water sources were controlled, and Palestinians were excluded from economic development plans. Having been detached from their land, they were positioned as an unskilled labour force for the Israeli economy. Arab villages became the source of cheap labour and served as dormitories for Arab workers (Kretzmer 1990; Khalidi 1988). Meanwhile, the family, which was the primary social economic unit of Palestinian society, was deeply shattered and became vulnerable. Mari (1978, 18) depicts Palestinians in this situation as "emotionally wounded, socially rural, politically lost, economically poverty stricken and nationally hurt. They suddenly became a minority ruled by a powerful, sophisticated majority against whom they fought to retain their country and land". The heads of the extended families (mukhtar) became key contacts for people who wanted to obtain permits from
Forced Departures and Fragmented Realities in Palestinian Memoirs
2017
The Arabic word nakba means “catastrophe”. The Palestinians use this word to refer to the events that took place in Palestine before, during and after 1948. These events terminated both in the establishment of the state of Israel and the loss of Palestine. In the decades after 1948, the narratives of identity, exile and dispossession become the self-representation of survival. Palestinian memoir-writing, an amalgam of the personal and the political, well represents the ideas of self-representation, exile, displacement and collective memory which I seek to explore in a contemporary Palestinian memoir: Ghada Karmi’s In Search of Fatima: A Palestinian Story (2002). This paper attempts to argue through a study of the memoir that there exists a shared national identity and collective memory within Palestine since al-nakba. The project includes the study of the history of Palestinian-Israeli conflict and the significance of the genre of the memoir. Although a memoir is by definition a per...
Voices against Erasure, Loss, and Dehumanization: The Year in Palestine
Biography, 2019
Rooted in the land just like other Indigenous populations who have endured settler colonialism, Palestinians use different venues to humanize their struggle for freedom and equal rights. From popular resistance and international solidarity activism to textual and visual productions, they share their voices and hopes with the world. More specifically, in life narratives published between 2017 and 2018, Palestinians speak with urgency. The individuals who populate the life narratives I survey in this essay remember the physical loss of historical Palestine and draw attention to numerous barriers that stand between them and their right to return to and inhabit the land. Their voices attest to their ongoing collective displacement since 1948, wrestle with thorny political questions, unveil the multifaceted damage settler colonialism has brought upon their communities, and genuinely yearn for a normal future. Their texts have one eye on the pastas the past is never past-with the other fixed on the present to report the horrors of decades of ongoing dispossession. The following discussion samples a few of these publications and does not promise in any way to be comprehensive. The works covered here include Where the Line Is Drawn: Crossing Boundaries in Occupied Palestine by Raja Shehadeh, Young Palestinians Speak: Living under Occupation by Anthony Robinson and Annemarie Young, The Last Earth: A Palestinian Story by Ramzy Baroud, and Drawing the Kafr Qasem Massacre by Samia Halaby. A Palestinian author, lawyer, and human rights activist, Shehadeh speaks directly to Western misrepresentations of Palestine. His narrative unveils injustices rarely addressed in Western discourses. Shehadeh was born in the city of Ramallah shortly after his family was forced out of Jaffa to make room for Israeli Jewish settlers. In his 2008 book entitled Palestinian Walks: Forays into a Vanishing Landscape, not only does Shehadeh mourn a disappearing Indigenous landscape and show
After the Nakba in Nuba: A Palestinian Villager's Diary, 1949
Biography, 2014
This article uses diary entries recorded by a Palestinian villager from outside Hebron to explore individual Palestinian subjectivities and experiences in the immediate aftermath of the 1948 war; tropes of village life and displacement in Palestinian national narratives; and the difficulties and possibilities presented by diaries in approaching Palestinian history and life writing.
Narrating Palestine: The Palestinian Oral History Archive Project
The Palestinian Oral History Archive (POHA) project, based at the American University of Beirut (AUB), was launched in 2011 to digitize, index, catalog, and provide access to over one thousand oral history testimonies by first-generation Palestinian refugees residing in Lebanon. The interviews and other recorded statements provide a valuable lens through which to examine a defining moment of rupture in Palestine's modern history from an underrepresented social and cultural perspective. This report highlights the methodological decisions that informed the planning and implementation of the POHA project as a grassroots digital archive that seeks to preserve the orality and immediacy of the refugees' narratives. The archive aims to engage scholars interested in Palestine studies, in particular, and Middle East studies, in general, within the broader framework of a person-centered archival perspective, with a view to furthering a dialogical ethnographic methodology and producing a narrative of the Nakba " from within. " IN HER REVIEW ESSAY " Oral History and al-Nakbah, " historian Sherna Berger Gluck discusses a set of oral history collections that narrate the Nakba from the point of view of Palestinian refugees. She notes the collections' potential to provide evidence of the events of 1948 through the rarely recorded points of views and lived experiences of ordinary Palestinians. Gluck emphasizes the potential of such collections to reveal underrepresented histories of entire communities whose voices are generally not heard in official narratives. She concludes that, in spite of some of the medium's shortcomings—the subjective and fallible nature of human memory, as well as the subjective, individual viewpoint of any single testimony—oral history testimonies and archival collections, when aggregated and consolidated, can deepen our understanding of the watershed moment by " pulling together the various strands of the Nakba story, highlighting recurring themes, and sensitizing us to questions about memory and memorialization. " 1 Gluck discusses the corrective potential of such oral histories, emphasizing their role as signifiers of an important and formative moment in modern Palestinian history. In particular, she notes that oral testimony provides powerful and effective tools for reconstructing, filling in, and widening a narrative of the historical event that is true to the lived human experiences of expulsion and displacement of Palestinian communities in granular detail. Hence, oral testimonies of the Nakba help construct a narrative of loss " from within, " a potentially useful tool in Palestinian communities' pursuit of justice. 2
One land and three narratives: Palestinian sites of memory in Israel
Memory Studies, 2018
The first part of the article invites a fresh look at the often defined concepts of ‘space’ and ‘place’, connecting them to different subject positions, mental frames and projects. The second part addresses memory issues that underlie the political conflict between the state of Israel and Palestinians in the Near East. It will analyse two seemingly incompatible memories related to the same events and topography. The focus of the essay is not only on the divisive force with which two incompatible histories are constructed in the same landscape but also on recent memory practices and performances that raise awareness of this impasse and work towards a more complex and inclusive transnational memory of the entangled history of 1948.
Living&Memories!
By#Falestin#Naili!
!
There%are%dead%who%sleep%in%rooms%you%will%build%!
there%are%dead%who%visit%their%past%in%places%you%demolish%!
there%are%dead%who%pass%over%bridges%you%will%construct%!
there!are$dead$who$illuminate$the$night$of$butterflies,$dead$!
who$come$by$dawn$to$drink$their$tea$with$you,$as$peaceful$!
as#your#rises#left#them,#so#leave,#you#guests#of#the#place,#!
some%vacant%seats%for%your%hosts%…%they%will%read%you%!
the$terms$of$peace$…$with"the"dead!!
(From& The$ “Red$ Indian’s”$ Penultimate$ Speech$ to$ the$ White$ Man," by" Mahmoud" Darwish,"
translation)by)Fady)Joudah)!
Living&Memories!
On#May#15,#2018,#thousands#of#Palestinian#demonstrators#gathered#on#the#border#between#the#
Gaza$ Strip$ and$ Israel$ to$ demand% their% right% to% return% and% to% oppose% the% relocation% of% the%
United' States' Embassy' to' Jerusalem.' Seventy"one$ years$ after$ al# Nakba! (1948),( these(
demonstrators,+most+of+whom+were+under+30+years+old,+surprised+the+world+by+the+longevity+
of# their# memory.# They" shouted" loudly" and" strongly" about" their" right" to" return" to" nearby"
villages( and( neighbouring( towns( in( Gaza,( like( Ramla,( Lod,( Majdal( and( Jaffa.( These( young(
people,&who&have&known&no&reality&other&than&military&occupation,&wars&and&blockades,&form&
part% of% a! collective( destiny( with( 1948( as( its( tragic( point( of( departure.( For( them,( the( border(
constitutes) the) line) drawn) between) their) lives) in) the) refugee) camps) of) Gaza) and) the) bygone)
days%in%the%villages%and%towns%of%their%forefathers,%some%of%which%are%visible%from$the$border.$
It#is#the#demarcation#between#their#present#reality#and#a#past#from#which#they#were#forcibly#
cut$off$and$on$which$they$cannot$turn$their$backs.!
In#May#2000,#similar#scenes#played#out#following#the#retreat#of#the#Israeli#army#from#southern#
Lebanon.' The' border,' once' again' accessible' after' 28' years' of' military' occupation,' was' the'
backdrop)for)visits)and)family)reunions)for)Palestinian)refugees)who)had)settled)in)Lebanon)
and$their$relatives$living$in$the$north$of$Israel.1!Many%Palestinian%refugees%today%live%very%close%
to# the# places# they# came# from# but# to# which# they# cannot# return,# even# for# a# visit.# Sohaila#
Shishtawi(testifies(to(this;(living(in(Amman,(she(is(only(80(km(away(from(her(native(Jerusalem:(
‘I" recently" applied" for! a" visa" at" the" Israeli" embassy" in" Jordan" to" go" and" visit" my" nephew" in"
Jerusalem,*but*it*was*turned*down.*I*do*not*understand;*how*could*an*89"year"old$Palestinian$
woman,'1.4'm'tall'and'weighing'38'kg,'possibly'pose'a'threat'to'Israel?’!
Nevertheless,* since* 1948,& the& “absentees”& have& been& making& their& presence& felt,& even& if& it& is&
physically)impossible.)The)19!stories'offered'here'illustrate'different'ways'of'being'present,'of'
counting,)of)making)oneself)heard)and)of)having)some)weight.)In)the)face)of)erasure)–!imposed(
through' terror,' through' the' destruction' of' their' villages,2! by# being# uncounted# during#
population) censuses,) by) being) deprived) of) their) right) of) residence) –! in# the# face# of# the#
confiscation)of)their)property)and)their)marginalization)in)the)dominant!historiography+on+the+
Israeli"Palestinian) conflict,) 11! men$ and$ 8" women& tell& their& stories& of& 1948.& They& retrace& the&
effects& of& this& historic& cataclysm& and& the& different& strategies& for& survival,& perseverance,&
creativity)and)resistance)that)they)deployed.!
These! 19! stories' obviously' cannot' cover' all' of' the' experiences' Palestinians' lived' through' in'
1948,& but& they& give& a& fairly& representative& idea.& From& Gaza& to& Nazareth,& the& narrators& come&
from%towns%and%villages%in%different%parts%of%historical%Palestine.%Today,#some#live#in#refugee#
camps,' others' in' towns' and' cities' in' the' region' or' much' further' afield.' They' come' from'
different( social( classes,( different( professions( and( represent( various( degrees( of( social( and(
political( engagement.( Some( of( the( stories( emanate( from" public" figures" such" as" the" Latin"
Patriarch( of( Jerusalem,( Michel' Sabbah! and$ the$ intellectuals$ Ilham& Abughazaleh! and$ Faissal&
Darraj,"but"the"majority"of"the"testimonies"are"those"of"people"who"have"left"no"written"traces"
of#their#experiences.#It#is#thanks#to#the#passionate#work#of#the#team#of#editors#that#their#voices#
can$be$heard.$This$book$can$thus$be$seen$as$a"response"to"the"call"made"some"ten"years"ago"by"
1! M.# A.# KHALIDI! (ed.),' Manifestations* of* Identity:* The* Lived* Reality* of* Palestinian* Refugees* in* Lebanon," Beirut,"
Institute(for(Palestine(Studies/(Ifpo,(2010.(!
2! Nur$ MASALHA," The$ Palestine$ Nakba:$ Decolonising$ History,) Narrating) the) Subaltern,) Reclaiming) Memory," Zed"
Books,&2012&and&Ilan&PAPPÉ,"The$Ethnic$Cleansing$of$Palestine,!Oxford,(Oneworld(Publications,(2006.%See%also%
the$monographs$on$destroyed$villages$published$in$the$1980s$and$1990s$by$the$Birzeit'Center"for"Research"
and$Documentation$of$Palestinian$Society$(CRDPS)$directed$by$Sharif$Kanaana$and$Salah$Abd$al"Jawad,&and&
the$book$by$Walid$ AL"KHALIDI,"All#that#Remains:#The#Palestinian#Villages#Occupied#and#Depopulated#by#Israel#in#
1948,"Washington"DC,"Institute$for$Palestine$Studies,$1992.!
Ahmad&Sa’id&and&Lila&Abu&Lughod&to&make&it&possible&for&‘Palestinian&stories&to&slip&through&
the$wall#of#the#dominating#history#of#1948#and#open#it#up#to#factual#and#moral#questioning’.3!
These% very% personal% stories% deal% with% themes% that% are% often% combined:% the% land% and%
rootedness,)creativity)and)resistance,)and)finally,)the)space)of)the)possible.)!
The$collapse(of(a(world!
Over% and% above% these% themes,% these% texts% evoke% the% terror,% the% wrenching% and% the% intense%
sense$of$loss$experienced$by$these$men$and$women,$the$majority$of$whom$were$still$children$
during'the'war'of'1948.'Depicted'by'Israel'as'the'war'of'independence;'it'has"been"the"subject"
of#many#books#and#special#editions#of#journals;#yet#until#recently,#the#Palestinian#perspective##
remained(marginal.(It(is(in(the(details(of(the(tragedy(afflicting(the(Palestinians(that(we(find(the(
reasons'for'its'name:'al#Nakba!–!the$catastrophe.*Fear*of*death,*violence,*the*loss*of*loved*ones,"
separation," exile," of" being" deprived" of" one’s" home" and" all" means" of" subsistence," all" of" those"
fears&are&part&of&the&moment&when&the&world&of&the&Palestinians&falls&apart.!
In#these#testimonies#we#hear#the#suffering#of#wandering#and#the#extreme#vulnerability#of#the#
families:) during) their) flight,) many) families) were) broken) apart) and) children) were) lost) in) the)
general' panic.' Nakhle' Shahwan' of' Beit' Jala' remembers& that& in& the& aftermath& of& the& war& of&
1948%Radio$Jerusalem$devoted$two$hours$each$afternoon$to$messages$from$refugees$who$had$
lost%a%family%member%during%the%flight,%often%children.%%We#also#hear#the#simple#words#used#by#
the$children$to$express$their$fear$and$revolt,$like$those$of$Halima&Mustafa,"fleeing%the%invasion%
of# Fir‘im,# near# Safad,# her# mother’s# sewing# machine# on# her# sister’s# head:# ‘Dar,% dar% abuna% wa%
jayin&el&ghuraba&yetarduna.’&(This&is&our&father’s&house&but&strangers&are&coming&to&evict&us).!
Between&the&lines&of&these&stories&of&flight&lies&the$fear$of$massacre.$Rushdieh(Al(Hudeib!is#a#
survivor' from' the' village' of' Dawaimeh,' to' the' west' of' Hebron,' in' which' a' battalion' of' the'
Israeli(army(committed(a(massacre(in(late(October(1948((after(the(foundation(of(the(State(of(
Israel).)Around)500)civilians#were#killed.#It#happened#more#than#six#months#after#the#massacre#
in# Deir# Yasin,# carried# out# by# paramilitary# Zionist# groups# which# the# Zionist# propaganda# had#
3! A.# H.# SA’DI! and$ L.$ Abu$ LUGHOD! (eds),' Nakba:& Palestine,& 1948& and& the& Claims& of& Memory," New" York," Columbia"
University* Press,* 2007,* p.* 23.* We* should* point* out* here* several! recent& initiatives& in& the& field& of& Palestinian&
oral%history,%including%the%“Palestinian%Oral%History%Project”%of%the%American%University%of%Beirut%(AUB)%and%
the$ “Testimonies$ on$ the$ Displacement$ of$ the$ Palestinians$ in$ 1948”$ project$ which$ led$ to$ the$ publication% of%
“Living'Memories”,'edited'by'Faiha'Abdulhadi,'Ramallah'2017.'!
exploited)to)frighten)the)Palestinians)and)push)them)into)abandoning)their)villages.)Deir)Yasin)
had#a#traumatic#effect#on#the#Palestinian#population,4!as#Sohaila'Shishtawi!tells%us.!
In# spite# of# the# collective# trauma# caused# by# these# massacres,# around# 150,000# Palestinians#
stayed'in'their'towns'and'villages'and'found'themselves'integrated'into'the'new'territory'of'
the$ State$ of$ Israel.$ Both$ Samira& Khoury! from% Nazareth% and% Suad% Qaraman! from" Haifa" bear"
witness'to'life'under'martial'law,'to'the'censuses'and'to'the'administrative'apartheid'against''
the$Palestinians.!
After&the&rupture&of&1948,&the&Palestinians&were&faced&with&a&multitude&of&legal&situations,&in&
particular) concerning) the) rules) that$ govern$ their$ residence$ in$ different$ parts$ of$ historical$
Palestine) and) in) host) countries.5! In# a# world# regulated# by# nation# states,# they# have# been#
deprived'of'a'Palestinian'nationality'which'could'have'united'and'defined'them.'The'stories'of'
Umaima%Al%‘Alami!and$Tamam$Al$Ghul,"who"cannot"go"to"their"native"Jerusalem"without"special"
authorization*from*Israel,*are*enlightening*on*this*subject.*This*has*lead*to*the*very*particular*
relationship, that, Palestinians, have, with, their, identity, papers, and, especially, with$ their$
passports.(Faissal&Darraj!highlights'this'through'his'story,'which'is'that'of'a'refugee'who'has'
‘for%seven%decades%been%a%man%whose%existence%was%confiscated’.!
‘The%land,%a%perfect%metaphor%for%permanence’6!
The$land$has$a$special$place$in$many$of!the$stories,$because$it$represents$a$central$stake$in$the$
conflict( between( the( indigenous( Palestinian( population( and( the( ambitions( of( the( Zionist(
movement' at' the' end' of' the' 19th! century.) Colonialist) ideologies) of) settlement) share) the)
leitmotiv!of#an#empty!territory,(and(so(the(Zionist(ideology(has(described(Palestine(as(‘a(land(
without'people'for'a'people'without'land’.7!
4! Deir%Yasin%was%attacked%by%the%Irgun,%the%Stern%Gang%and%the%Palmach,%under%the%umbrella%of%and%supported%
by#the#Haganah,#on#April#9,#1948.#The#massacre#there#has#been#called#by#the#Zionist&information&services&a&
‘decisive( accelerating( factor’( in( the( exodus( of( Palestinians.( (B.# Morris,# Victimes,) Histoire) revisitée) du) conflit)
arabo!sioniste,"Editions"Complexe"2003,"pp."229–232).!
5! See#J.#Al#HUSSEINI!and$A.$SIGNOLES!(eds),'Les$Palestiniens$entre$Etat$et$diaspora,"Paris,"Karthala,"2012.!
6! Nadine'PICAUDOU!(ed.),'Territoires(palestiniens(de(mémoire,"Paris,"Karthala/"Ifpo,"2006,"p."27.!
7! This%slogan%was%formulated%for%the%Zionist%movement%by%Israël'Zangwill'towards'the'end'of'the"19th!century(
(E.$SAID,"The$Question$of$Palestine,"New"York,"Vintage"Books,"1979,"p."9),"but"Lord"Shaftesbury"is"probably"the"
first&to&have&used&it&in&reference&to&Palestine&in&the&mid"19th%century.%!
Suleyman) Hassan’s# story# of# life# in# the# little# West# Bank# village# of# Kafr# Laqif# reflects# the#
steadfastness( of( a( farmer,( strongly( attached( to" his" land" and" his" olive" trees." He" grasps" every"
legal%means%available%to%assert%his%property%rights%in%face%of%the%settlers%who%arrived%after%the%
occupation) in) 1967.) During) the) 1967) war,) Suleyman) –! harking( back( to( the( experience( of(
refugees'arriving'in'his!village'in'1948'"!!managed'to'convince'nearly'all'the'villagers'of'Kafr'
Laqif,'who'had'been'chased'away'by'the'Israeli'army,'to'return'home'as'quickly'as'possible.'
We# find# that# same# attachment# to# the# land# in# the# story# of# the# agronomic! teacher,( ‘Abd! Al#
Rahman$ Al# Najjab," who" has" insisted" on" the" importance" of" being" agriculturally" autonomous"
throughout'his'life.!
Another( story( shines( a( light( on( the( close( link( between( cultivating( the( soil( and( the(
determination*to*be*present*and*to*maintain*one’s*rights.*The*residents*of*the*village*of*Battir*
near%Jerusalem,%located%close%to%the%railway%line%between%Jerusalem%and%Jaffa,$took$fright$after$
the$Deir$Yasin$massacre$and$did$not$dare$sleep$in$their$village.$Nevertheless,$they$continued$to$
cultivate) their) land) in) the) daytime) in) order) to) give) the) Israeli) army) the) impression) that) the)
village'was'still'inhabited.'When'Battir'was"about"to"find"itself"in"the"no"man’s"land%between%
the$ Israeli$ border$ and$ the$ Jordanian$ border,$ one$ of$ the$ villagers,$ Hassan% Mustafa," decided"
together'with'some'20'men'from'the'village,'including!Hassan%Harbouk%who%tells%the%story,%to%
resort&to&a&ruse&in&order%to%prevent%the%evacuation%of%the%village.%Moreover,%the%inhabitants%of%
Battir&managed&to&save&their&land&once&again&in&2014&with&the&inscription&of&the&village&on&the&
UNESCO'list'of'endangered'world'heritage'sites.'The'village'thus'escaped'having'a'new#stretch#
of#the#so"called&separation*wall*built*on*it.!
!
Against(all(odds(–!al#sumud!
Battir’s( destiny( takes( us( to( the( theme( of( creativity( and( resistance( which,( in( Palestine,( is(
characterized* particularly* by* perseverance,* or* the* capacity* to* hold* on* –! al# sumud." A"
revolutionary, trait, exalted, by, Palestinian, nationalists,, this, type, of, resistance, is, manifested,
essentially)in)day"to"day$behaviour.$The$notion$of$sumud!developed'in'the'1970s'in'response'
to# the# profound# transformations# experienced# by# rural# Palestinian# society.# The# land#
confiscations)and)the)attraction)of)the)Israeli)job)market)had)an)impact)on)rural)Palestinians.)
Al#sumud,"in"that"context,"meant"living"in"one’s"village"and"preserving"one’s"land.8!
In#the#stories#gathered#in#this#book,#perseverance#takes#on#different#forms#depending#on#the#
context.( From( the( individual( will( to( succeed( in( order( to( ensure( the( survival( of( the( family( in(
spite&of&dispossession,&to"military"participation"in"Palestinian"resistance,"al#sumud!is#primarily#
based&on&the&determination¬&to&be&a&victim&that&suffers&its&fate.!
Some,&such&as&Muhyeddin)Al)Jamal,"write"that"determination"into"their"autobiographic"story,"
like%the%beginning%of!an#epic.#A#poor#child#from#a#village#near#Ramla,#he#managed#gradually#to#
become& a& prosperous& entrepreneur& in& Brazil.& For& others,& that& perseverance& is& linked& to& the&
conviction'that'rights'must'be're"established*and*injustice*refused.*Fuad%Shehadeh,"a"lawyer,#
born% in% Jerusalem% in% 1925,% decided% to% open% a% case,% in% 1950,% against% the% two% international%
banks&that&had&frozen&Palestinian&assets&at&the&request&of&the&Israeli&authorities.&This&allowed&
families(to(get(their(money(back(even(if(it(was(only(through(small!monthly(reimbursements.!
In#the#same#spirit#of#fighting#injustice,#others#decided#to#devote#their#lives#to#the#resistance#by#
joining&the&ranks&of&the&PLO.&Some&paid&with&their&lives,&like&Majed&Abu&Sharar,"whose"journey"
is# told# here# by# his# family# and# friends.$ There$ are$ also$ some$ women,$ such$ as$ Samira& Khoury!
from%Nazareth,%one%of%the%founders%of%an%organization%called%Nahda!(awakening),+who,+since+
the$founding$of$the$State$of$Israel,$has$advocated$against$the$martial$law$imposed$on$residents$
of#Palestinian#towns%and%villages.%Other%women%organized%civil%and%political%responses%to%the%
repeated' devastation' suffered' by' Palestinian' society,' like' the' university' professor' Ilham&
Abughazaleh!in#Nablus.!
The$space$of$possibilities!
The$ history$ of$ Palestine$ has$ been$ written$ by$ the$ winners$ of$ the$ 1948$ war$ and$ has$ been$
considered) retrospectively) as) the) chronicle) of) inevitable) events.) To) counter) this) fatalistic)
vision& of& history,& one& has& to& look& at& the& untrodden& paths,& the& unexploited& potentials& and& the&
ungrasped* possibilities# of# various# moments# in# history.# The# space# of# possibilities# is# a# red#
thread' in' the' stories,' telling' of' the$ coexistence$ of$ all$ of$ the$ country’s$ inhabitants,$ whatever$
their& religion,& which& was& the& norm& in& Palestine& before& 1948.& That& coexistence,& which& had&
8! S.! TAMARI! and$ R.$ HAMMAMI," “Populist" Paradigms:" A" Review# of# Trends# and# Research# Problems# in# Palestinian#
Sociology”,*in*R.*Bocco*et#al."(eds),"Palestine,*Palestiniens:*Territoire*national,*espaces*communautaires,"Beirut,"
CERMOC,'1997,'p.'29.!
already'been'disrupted'before'al#Nakba!by#British#mandate#policies#and#the#growing#influence#
of# the# Zionist# movement,# stands" out" in" many" of" the" stories" like" a" thread" woven" into" the"
memories'of'better'days.!
The$Latin$Patriarch$of$Jerusalem,$Michel'Sabbah,"born#in#Nazareth#in#1933,#remembers#what#
some% forget:% ‘The% British% had% withdrawn% in% 1947% and% had% left% the% country% in% a% state% of% war,%
between& Arab& Palestinians& and& Jewish& Palestinians.& At& the& time,& everybody& was& still&
Palestinian.’+Mohammad'Tijani'of'the'destroyed(Mughrabi(Quarter((Harat%al%Maghariba)"of"the"
Old# City# of# Jerusalem# recalls# the# links# between# Arab# Palestinians# and# Jewish# Palestinians#
which% resisted% several% wars.% The% generation% which% still% remembers% living% together% is% slowly%
disappearing,+ and+ with$ it,$ the$ memory$ of$ coexistence.$ Salaheddin) Aissa! also% evokes," with" a"
degree% of% nostalgia,% the% ‘living% together’% that% prevailed% in% his% region% between% Palestinian%
villagers)and)the)inhabitants)of)the)kibboutzim,"even"the"marriages"between"Arabs"and"Jews"
from$ Europe.$ Suad% Qaraman! tells% of% friendships% that% defied% the% limits% of% identity% categories%
defined&by&the&mandate,&which÷d&the&Palestinian&population&between&“Jews”&on&one&side&
and$ “Arabs”$ (or$ “non"Jews”)' on' the' other.' However,' the' policy' of' division" practised" by" the"
mandatory)power)and)wanted)by)the)Zionist)movement)had)made)itself)felt)long)before)1948:)
for$example,$the$Kadoorie$agricultural$school$where$‘Abd!Al#Rahman#Al#Najjab!was$educated,$
was$ divided$ into$ two$ establishments$ by$ the$ British,$ one$ for$ Arab$ students$ and$ the$ other$ for$
Jewish'ones.!
Beyond'collegial'links'or'friendships,'there'is'the'question'of'advocating'for'a'political'project'
common% to% all% the% inhabitants% of% Palestine,% and% in% ways% that% are% evidently% even% more%
constrained+ since+ 1948+ than% during% the% Mandate% period.% In% this% regard,% the%
compartmentalization- of- historical- narratives- about- Palestine- not- only- fails- to- do- justice- tohistorical* realities* that* are* far* more* complex* than* those* that* dominate* the* country’s*
historiography,,but,it,also$makes$it$impossible$for$a$common$horizon$of$a$just$solution$to$the$
Israeli"Palestinian) conflict) to) emerge.) Edward& Said! insisted,( in( 1984,( on( the( necessity( of(
elaborating+ narratives+ to+ ‘absorb,+ support+ and+ circulate’+ the+ facts,9! to# incorporate# them# into!
history( and( to( use( them( in( a( historical( narrative,( with( the( aim( of( re"establishing+ justice.10!
Palestinian)memories)constitute)an)important)pillar)of)that)narrative,)which)must)necessarily)
open%onto%a%history%of%possibilities.!
9! E.#SAID,"“Permission"to"Narrate”,"Journal(of(Palestine(Studies,"vol.%13,%spring%1984,%p.%34.!
10! SAID,"1984,"p."46!
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