Page 46 - 1233
P. 46
English Section 46
History undocumented: In defence of oral history 46
We must insist that our experiences and those of our grandparents are honest and sufficient,
argues Khader.
they passed away. Those who lived came to accept the
bitter reality that they may never see their homeland
again. My grandmother and grandfather died too soon for
Nehad Khader recording devices to capture their story.
Information by Palestinians and about Palestinians is kept I did, however, find someone to tell me the story. One empty it of its people. Otherwise, why would they have 1392 نیدرورف16 جمعه- 1233 شماره/ سال متسیب
in the public and classified archives of Israel, to which of the survivors is an elderly distant relative who is now fled?
the vast majority of Palestinians have no access [EPA] approaching her centennial. As she recounted it, Zionist What becomes puzzling to Hoffman is the consensus In touch with Iranian diversity
The recent documentary “The Great Book Robbery” troops attacked the village and arrested my grandfather among the refugees of the village of Saffuriyya to whom
sheds light on the dialectics between historical and her husband simultaneously. Pregnant, she gathered she spoke that there were, in fact, airplanes bombing
appropriation, information and power. Israel her children, and under threat of massacre she met my the village which prompted the civilians to flee. Still
appropriated more than Palestinian lands and homes - grandmother and the two women fled together. She gave neither the Israeli documents nor the Israeli personnel
it appropriates food, aesthetics and history. Information birth on their trek out to her third child and they had no she interviews mention airplanes. In fact, they deny their
by Palestinians and about Palestinians is kept in the option but to continue on their way. presence entirely. Finally, Hoffman writes:
public and classified archives of Israel, to which the vast It was not coincidental, she told me. Everything was “Could it possibly be that all of these scattered people
majority of Palestinians have no access. To what do the deliberate and planned. They came for the men who had managed to misremember, concoct, or conspire to
Palestinians, and other disenfranchised populations, turn were suspected of resistance and left the villages without relate the same details?”
for information (power) about our past? The burden of protection against well-armed militias. With reports of “The Oriental Imagination,” explains an Israeli war
proof has fallen on us (justly or unjustly) and we have mass rapes, summary executions and massacres in other general of the airplane stories. [124]
turned repeatedly to all that remains: memories, stories Palestinian villages by Zionist militias that were trained Finally, Hoffman finds a single document in the well-
and elders. by the British, what choices did they have when they protected IDF archives, with the ignored directive
I never knew my paternal grandmother. My father didn’t found themselves looking into the barrel of a gun? The “destroy after reading” attached to it. This document
even know her: she died when he was six months old. example was set with other villages: if they resisted they contains detailed information about the very same
What little we know of her short life is quite tragic. With would be massacred. bombings that took place throughout that night in the
a dearth of information about my ancestral village and its Shortly thereafter, my paternal grandfather and a few village of Saffuriyya. She writes:
destruction by Israel, learning about my grandmother’s other men were freed from detention and caught up with So it was. And so the villagers of Saffuriyya did not flee
life also became a lesson in the history of my country. them in exile. Zionist forces guarded the borders that because the army outwitted their defenders on the ground
It was May 15, 1948, in the Palestinian village of Umm were unilaterally set by Israel (Israel has never officially or because they were cowardly or weak or told by their
al-Zeinat near the city of Haifa, only hours after Zionists demarcated its borders) to shoot-to-kill any Palestinian leaders to do so. They fled because a pair of Israeli Air
declared the state of Israel. When she was forced out of who tried to return to their home. Force planes pummeled them with bombs from on high,
her home, my grandmother had been married with three So went the creation of Israel. It was not a mythical sending up flames and sending down mayhem. [133]
children - my uncles Mohammed and Nabil, and my aunt victory. It was ethnic cleansing, ruthless and brutal. Hoffman describes the pains that she went through to
Nehad. This is not the story of my family alone. This is the access these documents. Of course, someone suspected
My paternal grandfather, who also died when my father story of 80 percent of the indigenous Palestinian people to be Palestinian could never access documents in the
was a child, was jailed along with several other men from who became a diaspora population. Palestinians have IDF archive. Neither did our elders in the chaos and
his village. They may have been taken to prison directly long relied on oral histories, such as this one, to locate confusion of the years that followed 1948 have the time,
from their homes in Umm al-Zeinat, or they may have ourselves among this political chaos. We compare and inclination, or foresight to document their displacement
been arrested from the neighbouring village of Daliyat contrast one oral history with another, deducing how as it was happening. Yet even if they did, would the
al-Karmel where they tried to hide when the Zionist things may have transpired from that information. I had diaries of a stateless people in 1948 carry more weight
brigades entered their village. no reason not to believe my family’s stories as I pieced than their testimonies today?
Many of the men were jailed, and under threat of massacre them all together. Being a refugee population that has come to flourish
by an attacking military brigade, my grandmother But one day the story was corroborated by Israeli in the diaspora, and has only recently begun, as a
fled Umm al-Zeinat with the rest of the villagers. The government documents. people, to gather our bearings in time and in place,
infamous Deir Yassin massacre was only a month old. I picked up Ilan Pappe’s The Ethnic Cleansing of our history has gone (officially) undocumented.
Palestine. The expulsion of the Palestinian people, the Today we insist on its accuracy, and eventually
it may or may not be corroborated through state
Villagers’ resistance book argues, was not the unintended consequence of documents and records locked away in an Israeli Vol. 20 / No. 1233 - Friday, Apr. 5, 2013
Umm al-Zeinat’s people did not shy away from resistance. a war of defence by a helpless immigrant population. building beyond our reach.
The small village of about 1,700 had a reputation that Our expulsion was a settler-colonialist project; we were We have instead relied on creative, non-official
preceded it. I learned from a self-trained Palestinian systemically ethnically cleansed from our homeland. sources to learn our stories and carry them on.
historian who works as a tour guide of Palestine’s More importantly, the story about the arrests of Palestinian We become historians as we go, documenting,
destroyed villages that Umm al-Zeinat was famous for men and the reconnaissance work in the village of Umm crowdsourcing and questioning. In the end the
the ferocity of its women and men. He said that they had a al-Zeinat was there. This was history as I had always documents of the colonial state that expelled us
strong presence among the fighters in the 1936-39 revolt. known it. The victor, however, documents history in need not corroborate our stories. We must insist, as
He added that it was common knowledge during the revolt official documents that are deemed “official” by virtue of Ali did with his biographer, that our experiences and
that if anyone was “wanted” by the British authorities or their status as victor. those of our grandparents are honest and sufficient.
sought after by Zionist gangs, they would flee to Umm Massacres and mass arrests Nehad Khader is an educator and an artist. Currently
al-Zeinat where the women provided cover for them. Yet Documentation is important, though we never needed she serves on the programming committee of the DC
when they were confronted by an organised militia with it to believe the histories we were taught by our elders. Palestinian Film and Arts Festival and is managing
advanced weapons and training, the villagers had few The camps we lived in, our stateless status and UN food editor of Tadween Publishing.
options: to leave or to fight. And many did both. rations were enough proof. Still, there is a truth here.
Today what remains of Umm al-Zeinat is just piles of While the official documents of Israel itself tend to Follow her on Twitter: @nehadk262
rubble where houses once stood, bearing witness to the corroborate our stories, we need never wait for them to.
destruction of life, the attempt at erasing my ancestors’ One example of the problematics of trusting documents The views expressed in this article are the author’s
presence entirely and the prevention of their return. over lived experiences in the histories of colonialism can own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s
My grandmother and her companions walked, like so be found in Adina Hoffman’s biography of Palestinian editorial policy.
many other Palestinians, and probably found passage on poet Taha Muhammad Ali, My Happiness Bears no
motor vehicles at some point. Most likely they went east Relation to Happiness.
from the Haifa district to the West Bank, and eventually There is a moment in the book where Ali recounts the
my father’s family ended up in Iraq. The Arab military story of his family’s exile. He tells Hoffman of an aerial
legions who arrived in Umm el-Zeinat in May 1948 bombing of his village. The villagers fled from the air
were Iraqi. When my family went to Basra with the Iraqi strikes.
military, they did so with the explicit understanding that Hoffman expresses literal disbelief. She repeatedly tells
the army would soon return them safely to their homes Ali that those allegations are untrue: there is no official
in Palestine. documentation of the use of warplanes over his village.
All of my grandparents and great-grandparents believed But Ali never wavers. He insists that the Zionists had, in
that they would return to their homes in a matter of days, fact, employed airplane bombardments over his village to
weeks, months. Those who died believed it until the day
History undocumented: In defence of oral history 46
We must insist that our experiences and those of our grandparents are honest and sufficient,
argues Khader.
they passed away. Those who lived came to accept the
bitter reality that they may never see their homeland
again. My grandmother and grandfather died too soon for
Nehad Khader recording devices to capture their story.
Information by Palestinians and about Palestinians is kept I did, however, find someone to tell me the story. One empty it of its people. Otherwise, why would they have 1392 نیدرورف16 جمعه- 1233 شماره/ سال متسیب
in the public and classified archives of Israel, to which of the survivors is an elderly distant relative who is now fled?
the vast majority of Palestinians have no access [EPA] approaching her centennial. As she recounted it, Zionist What becomes puzzling to Hoffman is the consensus In touch with Iranian diversity
The recent documentary “The Great Book Robbery” troops attacked the village and arrested my grandfather among the refugees of the village of Saffuriyya to whom
sheds light on the dialectics between historical and her husband simultaneously. Pregnant, she gathered she spoke that there were, in fact, airplanes bombing
appropriation, information and power. Israel her children, and under threat of massacre she met my the village which prompted the civilians to flee. Still
appropriated more than Palestinian lands and homes - grandmother and the two women fled together. She gave neither the Israeli documents nor the Israeli personnel
it appropriates food, aesthetics and history. Information birth on their trek out to her third child and they had no she interviews mention airplanes. In fact, they deny their
by Palestinians and about Palestinians is kept in the option but to continue on their way. presence entirely. Finally, Hoffman writes:
public and classified archives of Israel, to which the vast It was not coincidental, she told me. Everything was “Could it possibly be that all of these scattered people
majority of Palestinians have no access. To what do the deliberate and planned. They came for the men who had managed to misremember, concoct, or conspire to
Palestinians, and other disenfranchised populations, turn were suspected of resistance and left the villages without relate the same details?”
for information (power) about our past? The burden of protection against well-armed militias. With reports of “The Oriental Imagination,” explains an Israeli war
proof has fallen on us (justly or unjustly) and we have mass rapes, summary executions and massacres in other general of the airplane stories. [124]
turned repeatedly to all that remains: memories, stories Palestinian villages by Zionist militias that were trained Finally, Hoffman finds a single document in the well-
and elders. by the British, what choices did they have when they protected IDF archives, with the ignored directive
I never knew my paternal grandmother. My father didn’t found themselves looking into the barrel of a gun? The “destroy after reading” attached to it. This document
even know her: she died when he was six months old. example was set with other villages: if they resisted they contains detailed information about the very same
What little we know of her short life is quite tragic. With would be massacred. bombings that took place throughout that night in the
a dearth of information about my ancestral village and its Shortly thereafter, my paternal grandfather and a few village of Saffuriyya. She writes:
destruction by Israel, learning about my grandmother’s other men were freed from detention and caught up with So it was. And so the villagers of Saffuriyya did not flee
life also became a lesson in the history of my country. them in exile. Zionist forces guarded the borders that because the army outwitted their defenders on the ground
It was May 15, 1948, in the Palestinian village of Umm were unilaterally set by Israel (Israel has never officially or because they were cowardly or weak or told by their
al-Zeinat near the city of Haifa, only hours after Zionists demarcated its borders) to shoot-to-kill any Palestinian leaders to do so. They fled because a pair of Israeli Air
declared the state of Israel. When she was forced out of who tried to return to their home. Force planes pummeled them with bombs from on high,
her home, my grandmother had been married with three So went the creation of Israel. It was not a mythical sending up flames and sending down mayhem. [133]
children - my uncles Mohammed and Nabil, and my aunt victory. It was ethnic cleansing, ruthless and brutal. Hoffman describes the pains that she went through to
Nehad. This is not the story of my family alone. This is the access these documents. Of course, someone suspected
My paternal grandfather, who also died when my father story of 80 percent of the indigenous Palestinian people to be Palestinian could never access documents in the
was a child, was jailed along with several other men from who became a diaspora population. Palestinians have IDF archive. Neither did our elders in the chaos and
his village. They may have been taken to prison directly long relied on oral histories, such as this one, to locate confusion of the years that followed 1948 have the time,
from their homes in Umm al-Zeinat, or they may have ourselves among this political chaos. We compare and inclination, or foresight to document their displacement
been arrested from the neighbouring village of Daliyat contrast one oral history with another, deducing how as it was happening. Yet even if they did, would the
al-Karmel where they tried to hide when the Zionist things may have transpired from that information. I had diaries of a stateless people in 1948 carry more weight
brigades entered their village. no reason not to believe my family’s stories as I pieced than their testimonies today?
Many of the men were jailed, and under threat of massacre them all together. Being a refugee population that has come to flourish
by an attacking military brigade, my grandmother But one day the story was corroborated by Israeli in the diaspora, and has only recently begun, as a
fled Umm al-Zeinat with the rest of the villagers. The government documents. people, to gather our bearings in time and in place,
infamous Deir Yassin massacre was only a month old. I picked up Ilan Pappe’s The Ethnic Cleansing of our history has gone (officially) undocumented.
Palestine. The expulsion of the Palestinian people, the Today we insist on its accuracy, and eventually
it may or may not be corroborated through state
Villagers’ resistance book argues, was not the unintended consequence of documents and records locked away in an Israeli Vol. 20 / No. 1233 - Friday, Apr. 5, 2013
Umm al-Zeinat’s people did not shy away from resistance. a war of defence by a helpless immigrant population. building beyond our reach.
The small village of about 1,700 had a reputation that Our expulsion was a settler-colonialist project; we were We have instead relied on creative, non-official
preceded it. I learned from a self-trained Palestinian systemically ethnically cleansed from our homeland. sources to learn our stories and carry them on.
historian who works as a tour guide of Palestine’s More importantly, the story about the arrests of Palestinian We become historians as we go, documenting,
destroyed villages that Umm al-Zeinat was famous for men and the reconnaissance work in the village of Umm crowdsourcing and questioning. In the end the
the ferocity of its women and men. He said that they had a al-Zeinat was there. This was history as I had always documents of the colonial state that expelled us
strong presence among the fighters in the 1936-39 revolt. known it. The victor, however, documents history in need not corroborate our stories. We must insist, as
He added that it was common knowledge during the revolt official documents that are deemed “official” by virtue of Ali did with his biographer, that our experiences and
that if anyone was “wanted” by the British authorities or their status as victor. those of our grandparents are honest and sufficient.
sought after by Zionist gangs, they would flee to Umm Massacres and mass arrests Nehad Khader is an educator and an artist. Currently
al-Zeinat where the women provided cover for them. Yet Documentation is important, though we never needed she serves on the programming committee of the DC
when they were confronted by an organised militia with it to believe the histories we were taught by our elders. Palestinian Film and Arts Festival and is managing
advanced weapons and training, the villagers had few The camps we lived in, our stateless status and UN food editor of Tadween Publishing.
options: to leave or to fight. And many did both. rations were enough proof. Still, there is a truth here.
Today what remains of Umm al-Zeinat is just piles of While the official documents of Israel itself tend to Follow her on Twitter: @nehadk262
rubble where houses once stood, bearing witness to the corroborate our stories, we need never wait for them to.
destruction of life, the attempt at erasing my ancestors’ One example of the problematics of trusting documents The views expressed in this article are the author’s
presence entirely and the prevention of their return. over lived experiences in the histories of colonialism can own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s
My grandmother and her companions walked, like so be found in Adina Hoffman’s biography of Palestinian editorial policy.
many other Palestinians, and probably found passage on poet Taha Muhammad Ali, My Happiness Bears no
motor vehicles at some point. Most likely they went east Relation to Happiness.
from the Haifa district to the West Bank, and eventually There is a moment in the book where Ali recounts the
my father’s family ended up in Iraq. The Arab military story of his family’s exile. He tells Hoffman of an aerial
legions who arrived in Umm el-Zeinat in May 1948 bombing of his village. The villagers fled from the air
were Iraqi. When my family went to Basra with the Iraqi strikes.
military, they did so with the explicit understanding that Hoffman expresses literal disbelief. She repeatedly tells
the army would soon return them safely to their homes Ali that those allegations are untrue: there is no official
in Palestine. documentation of the use of warplanes over his village.
All of my grandparents and great-grandparents believed But Ali never wavers. He insists that the Zionists had, in
that they would return to their homes in a matter of days, fact, employed airplane bombardments over his village to
weeks, months. Those who died believed it until the day
