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7
Gender representation of oral history: Palestinian women narrating the stories of their displacement
FAIHA ABDUL HADI
The paper is based on highlighting the voices of Palestinian women who were displaced from Palestinian cities and villages in 1948 as a primary source,1 adopting the methodology of oral history from a gender perspective.
This multidisciplinary perspective is premised on the interaction between the researcher and the narrator (Tonkin 1995), and a deep knowledge of women’s psychology (Gluck and Patai 1991); at the same time, it acts on deconstructing the dominant values, which fail to recognize the experiences of women as a major component in history making. Thus a new set of values would be formed, allowing the integration and harmonization of the experiences of women and men (Hoda 1999: 168).
By telling their stories, women become visible and their voices are raised to express what they experience, know and go through. When we listen to the voices of women we can discern what is common in their stories regarding the “year of displacement”, as well as the differences emanating from their different social class and the different human experience they had in each town that they were displaced to. By listening to the hidden, honest and unheard voice of women, we can also understand the power relations between men and women and among the women themselves.
In order to allow the hidden voices of the narrators to emerge, and in order to listen to their honest and true opinions regarding what had happened to them from the year of displacement until the date of recording the interviews, the research adopted the gender perspective whereby the researchers listened patiently and attentively to the women. They observed and recorded the elements surrounding the narrators, and documented the body language: the eyes, the mouth, the lips, the hands, the feet and their eyebrows, in addition to documenting the long and short moments of silence. They shared with the narrators the concerns, dreams and pain that they experienced with the same sense of intimacy as when the narrators talked about the suffering of the past. While it is true that the researchers followed a research questionnaire, this served only as an outline that helped them probe some critical issues regarding the question of displacement. However, what was central to the methodology was its interest in allowing the narrators the opportunity to start talking from the angle that they preferred when remembering the past, so that their choices would help reveal which experiences and feelings were major and central to the past for them (Al-Dajani and Soliman 1995).
This interaction and communication between the researchers and the narrators is what could contribute to the generation and building of shared knowledge regarding the displacement in 1948, which might sometimes be aligned with the written Palestinian narrative and differ at other times, but certainly and necessarily adds new dimensions to it.
THE LIVING MEMORY OF PALESTINIAN WOMEN
The Palestinian women narrated their memories regarding the displacement of 1948. Through their eagerness to render a very accurate and detailed account of the events, the women described every detail of what affected their families. They described their efforts to secure food, water, clothes, other means of comfort, things they left behind when they were displaced. They focused on the impact of what had happened to them and their families, which contributes towards deconstructing the Zionist narrative claiming that Palestinians left voluntarily in 1948, surrendering their country without resistance.
The women’s stories agreed that the Zionist militia resorted to the systematic expulsion of the women and their families through various means. They killed by shooting civilians directly, and by them bombing from the air. They also spread terror among Palestinians with shelling, bombs, explosions, tanks and massacres, the most prominent of which was the massacre of Deir Yassin. They did not only claim responsibility for these massacres, they also intentionally exaggerated them,2 confirming that what happened was ethnic cleansing par excellence.3
Thurayya Yaseen Alya’qoubi, displaced from Majdal Asqalan4 and currently residing in Rafah city,5 described the events in Al Majdal in 1948 when planes were dropping bombs over the residents of the city in a clear attempt at displacement: “The planes used to strike three times a day, then we started fleeing to Ni’lia,6 which was a village that did not attract attention, but because it was Al Majdal, the Jews told the displaced: go, go to Al Majdal, go to your ‘Paris’ meaning Al Majdal.” 7
Rasheedeh Hasan Fdalat, displaced from I’raq Al Manshiyyah8 and currently residing in Al Baqa’a refugee camp,9 described what happened to her and the residents of her village on the day of their displacement, when the Hagana gangs used the most heinous methods to terrorize them and force them to leave:
Each night there were bombs fired by Zionist militia and where would they fall? They would primarily fall among the cattle at my grandfather’s house, right inside the house! From the morning, they would fire ten [she counts on her hands], ten and twenty at a time. One day my uncle’s wife took a knife, and my grandfather did not know, and said, I want to slaughter one or two of the cattle so that we can eat them. I swear to God, the meat of the cattle at my grandfather’s house was blown away to the next neighbourhood [pointing with her hand to a place far away] from the impact of the airstrikes. This is something I heard with my own ears, and saw with my own eyes. My mom was always counting the bombs, and she would miscount! [She hits her leg with her hand], one bomb after the other, boom, boom, and where would they fall? They would fall on our town, how could I describe it? Let us say it was something like Al Baqa’a refugee camp. My mother started saying: [she holds her head and starts scratching it violently with her hands] my children, my children, my sons my daughters, my children my children [she claps] the next thing I saw was that her head had all turned white, white, she had white hair.10
Sana Kamel Aldajani, who was displaced from Yafa (Jaffa)11 and currently resides in Cairo, talked about the fear and horror that was caused by the bombs the Zionist militia fired towards the houses in order to force their residents to leave. She explained that the intention of the Palestinian families at the time was to leave temporarily, seeking safety away from the bombs and shelling:
It was almost around this time, exactly on 28 April 1948, when I and five of my siblings together with our parents were home. We would wake up terrified in the middle of the night to the noises of bombs shaking our house. It seems like on that night the plan was to target Yafa [Jaffa] in particular because it was the first harbour city and was very important for Palestine and the whole of the east Mediterranean coastal area. Yafa had always played a prominent role for Palestine and hosted many of the leaders who played a tremendous role in the years that preceded the displacement and beyond. I was eight years old, as I mentioned. Together with my siblings, we would run to my parents’ room only to find them as terrified as we were. The decision was quick that night as I remember clearly: get dressed children and let us go to the house of my grandparents from my mother’s side, which was off the sea and the seacoast a bit. There we found a large number of the family members. Suddenly we were a very large family all of us, my grandparents, uncles, my grandmother and aunts, my cousins, we were all there! Gathered at my mother’s great grandfather’s house, in the large garden, recounting many stories that Zionist militia has utilized the element of surprise during the attack and a timing when the people are at their houses.12
Ameeneh Abdelhameed Ataba, displaced from Saffourieh13 and currently residing in Nazareth,14 talked about the tanks that barged into the streets and fired their shells at the time of breaking the fast during the month of Ramadan and forced people to flee:
It was during the month of Ramadan. People were just breaking their fast. Suddenly, they saw the tanks. Two tanks barged into the town. Our house, that is our land, was close to the street. The residents of Saffourieh, the gardeners, once they saw the tanks entering the town started saying: there are barrels behind them and others would say, there is something happening, we do not know! They could hear the
tanks, they started shouting, they entered and it meant occupation. The gardeners backed away, they backed away. They hid amidst the pomegranate trees. My mother was pregnant in her ninth month and I was a little girl. They grabbed us and took us to hide amidst the pomegranate trees.15
Lateefeh Ahmad Uthman Mtair, displaced from Bir Ma’in village16 and currently living in Qalandya refugee camp,17 identified the time of the aggression and the violent manner in which the Zionist military entered the village that led to their displacement: “We remained in Beit O’ur Il Tahta,18 and then we moved a bit further up from Beit O’ur Il Tahta. There were fig trees named: the figs of Abu Nsseir and we sat underneath them. If only you saw the scene, the ground and the sky were on fire.”19
Labeebeh Rasheed Aleesa, displaced from Saffourieh and currently residing in A’in Al Helweh refugee camp,20 confirmed that people were forcibly displaced by the bombing and that the residents did not have any weapons to fight back:
We were in Saffourieh, I don’t know, there were airstrikes against the town. People went out and their intention was just to hide under the olive trees. We went out under the bombing, the planes bombed the town and the Palestinians had neither planes nor anything else for that matter! The Jews were firing at the people, at the children, at the babies, they fired at everyone and the planes would bomb everywhere. People were not armed at the time, they had nothing.21
In describing the displacement process the women used expressions indicating that they were seeking safety and refuge from imminent death for a limited period and that they never thought of leaving their towns or villages permanently. On the contrary, they refused to use the term immigration: “It was not a decision to leave, it was a decision to avoid the aggression and the massacres”;22 “we experienced a state of fleeing”;23 “the people fled as a result of that”;24 “suddenly it felt like it was the end of days”;25 “We left with the idea that we would return”;26 “and what forced us to flee except for the bombing of the country and the killings? What forced us to be displaced except for fear?”27
An Oral History of the Palestinian Nakba Page 21