Palestinian village memorial books were written to preserve the history and culture of the Palestinian people, more than 700,000 of whom were expelled from their homes by Israeli forces during the 1948 Palestine War.
Over 120 memorial books have been published, each focusing on one or more of the 400 towns and villages that were affected, most of which were razed to the ground to prevent residents from returning.
Notably, Donald Trump has chosen former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee to be his Ambassador to Israel. Huckabee has stated that “there is no such thing as a Palestinian.” He also claims that there are no such things as a West Bank, settlements, or an occupation.
Furthermore, Huckabee insists that any Palestinian state must be located outside the land of Israel and within “Islamist controlled properties and territories.”
How appropriate for activist Edward Said to have asserted that Palestinians have been denied the “permission to narrate” their own stories and histories. Village memorial books are one attempt to do so.
Israel’s intense bombardment has caused Gaza’s nearly complete destruction. And although Israeli settlements in the West Bank are illegal according to international law, Israel is in the process of their aggressive expansion.
Tragically, the United States, Israel’s main weapon supplier, has responded with little more than platitudes.
The story of the Palestinians reminds me of a session that I attended at a climate change conference in Washington, D.C. The presenter was from Kiribati, a small-island nation in the Pacific, which is being slowly swallowed by the sea.
“Tell people,” he told the audience. “Tell people that we were here.”
Terry Hansen
Milwaukee, Wisconsin