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Palestinian Walks: Notes on a Vanishing Landscape
Over two decades of turmoil and change in the Middle East, steered via the history-soaked landscape of Palestine. This new edition includes a previously unpublished epigraph in the form of a walk.
When Raja Shehadeh first started hill walking in Palestine, in the late 1970s, he was not aware that he was travelling through a vanishing landscape. These hills would have seemed familiar to Christ, until the day concrete was poured over the flora and irreversible changes were brought about by those who claim a superior love of the land.
Six walks span a period of twenty-six years, in the hills around Ramallah, in the Jerusalem wilderness and through the ravines by the Dead Sea. Each walk takes place at a different stage of Palestinian history since 1982, the first in the empty pristine hills and the last amongst the settlements and the wall. The reader senses the changing political atmosphere as well as the physical transformation of the landscape.
By recording how the land felt and looked before these calamities, Raja Shehadeh attempts to preserve, at least in words, the Palestinian natural treasures that many Palestinians will never know.
When Raja Shehadeh first started hill walking in Palestine, in the late 1970s, he was not aware that he was travelling through a vanishing landscape. These hills would have seemed familiar to Christ, until the day concrete was poured over the flora and irreversible changes were brought about by those who claim a superior love of the land.
Six walks span a period of twenty-six years, in the hills around Ramallah, in the Jerusalem wilderness and through the ravines by the Dead Sea. Each walk takes place at a different stage of Palestinian history since 1982, the first in the empty pristine hills and the last amongst the settlements and the wall. The reader senses the changing political atmosphere as well as the physical transformation of the landscape.
By recording how the land felt and looked before these calamities, Raja Shehadeh attempts to preserve, at least in words, the Palestinian natural treasures that many Palestinians will never know.
242 pages, Kindle Edition
First published May 22, 2008
243 people are currently reading
7526 people want to read
About the author
Raja Shehadeh
46 books345 followersRaja Shehadeh (Arabic: رجا شحادة) is a Palestinian lawyer, human rights activist and writer. He is the author of Strangers in the House (2002), described by The Economist as “distinctive and truly impressive”, When the Bulbul Stopped Singing (2003), Palestinian Walks (2007), for which he won the 2008 Orwell Prize, and A Rift in Time (2010). Shehadeh trained as a barrister in London and is a founder of the human rights organization Al-Haq. He blogs regularly for the International Herald Tribune/The New York Times and lives in Ramallah, on the West Bank.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 351 reviews
April 24, 2016
Well, you see, Aborigines don't own the land.They belong to it. It's like their mother. See those rocks? Been standing there for 600 million years. Still be there when you and I are gone. So arguing over who owns them is like two fleas arguing over who owns the dog they live on.I see this as a book about land and the felt relationship to land. Raja Shehadeh spent much of his professional life fighting legal battles for Palestinian landowners, strongly motivated by patriotism. But the folks on the other side, Israeli settlers, not only have the legal upper hand, but the same passionate motivation: deep belief in their entitlement to the land. Shehadeh is reminded again and again, by everything: the attitudes of settlers he encounters, the orientation of settlements, the walls built to segregate them from neighbouring Palestinian villages, that the project of settling the occupied West Bank is ideologically invested in erasing the Palestinians and their history.
-Crocodile Dundee
Shehadeh feels the same way. He would love to forget the occupation and just enjoy the beauty and tranquility of the hills. But over the 39 years this book spans, his ideal of sarha, which means most precisely walkabout, wandering without constraint, becomes ever more distant around Ramallah as the landscapes of lush spring-watered valleys, arid hilltops 'embraced' by villages is fragmented by big, busy roads that cut through the landscape to make journeys as swift and convenient as possible for settlers, as areas of open and supposedly public land become illegal for Palestinians to enter, and as the fear of being arrested or shot increasingly haunt the walker's mind. Metaphors of invasion and occupation crop up constantly, cutting up the text as its referent is cut up, as a poem often takes the form or sound of what it echoes.
Much of his purpose in writing, I feel, is to counter the Israeli narrative that Palestine was ugly, neglected and unappreciated by its inhabitants before they took possession of it and began to develop it. He quotes the orientalist writings of famous western visitors and contrasts their dismal assessments of the landscape with his own loving impressions. He repeats that he was at first happy when Israel designated areas of the Palestinian territories as nature reserves, only to be dismayed to see them being built on and Palestinians legally shut out. He turns a popular mantra cynically on its head; the settlement project makes 'the desert bloom with neon signs and concrete'.
Israeli architects Rafi Segal and Eyal Weizman perceptively uncover 'a cruel paradox': 'the very thing that renders the landscape "biblical", its traditional inhabitation and cultivation in terraces, olive orchards, stone building and the presence of livestock, is produced by the Palestinians, whom the Jewish settlers came to replace. And yet the very people who cultivate the 'green olive orchards' and render the landscape biblical are themselves excluded from the panorama. The Palestinians are there to produce the scenery and then disappear'This is a book of love, anger and despair. It is an ode shading into a requiem. Both Israeli settlers who can shoot Palestinians with impugnity and Palestinian militias and bullies threaten and thwart Shehadeh and his walking companions at different times. This memoir elucidated to me more clearly than anything I have ever read the psychological toll taken by living under occupation. Shehadeh, a relatively privileged middle class man records the loss of something he senses, as I sense, is a human right. As a lover of walks myself and an itchy-footed introvert, the fantasy and reality of sarha sustains me; great swathes of the country I live in are open, public and free to wander; I walk in them fearlessly carrying no documents to validate my right to do so. But this privilege is raced; the document I carry is the whiteness of my skin. The logic and violence of settler colonialism is at work all over the world, only in the occupied territories of the West Bank it proceeds with especially murderous urgency.
When Mick Dundee says 'the Aborigines don't own the land, they belong to it' I see this as an invitation to rethink the relationship to land outside of the logic of colonial capitalism. If 'the Aborigines do not own the land', settler logic allows it to be claimed by them. If indigenous people are to remain free to use and live on the land where they are, they are forced to accept the colonial position that land can be owned, and take ownership of it. To me, the colonial view is a kind of madness. Shehadeh began to write to restore his sanity after being crushed by despair, rage and defeat. Though the settlers see the world through lies, he recognises and relates to their love for the land. The challenge his words shape for Israelis is to enact this love while rejecting the colonial logic of the genocide of the natives. He writes calmly, honestly, critically, towards sanity and towards peace.
May 9, 2024
“We had become temporary residents of Greater Israel, living on Israel’s sufferance, subject to the most abusive treatment at the hands of its young male and female soldiers, controlling the checkpoints, who decided on a whim whether to keep us waiting or to allow us passage. But worse than than all of this was that nagging feeling that our days in Palestine were numbered and one day we were going to be victims of another mass explosion.”
read if: you are interested in stories where nature is at the forefront and if you want to hear about a Palestinian’s firsthand experience in the West Bank between 1978 and 2006.
This book, spanning decades, is beautiful heartbreaking. Told through walks our narrator goes on through the years, we watch as the land of Palestine gets smaller, the natural world gets more developed, and even a simple walk could be a death sentence for a Palestinian living in Ramallah. Seeing how something as mundane as the direction of walks and ability for Raja to traverse through Palestine is heartbreaking as he is able to go less and less far from Ramallah each walk because of soldiers and checkpoints.
read if: you are interested in stories where nature is at the forefront and if you want to hear about a Palestinian’s firsthand experience in the West Bank between 1978 and 2006.
This book, spanning decades, is beautiful heartbreaking. Told through walks our narrator goes on through the years, we watch as the land of Palestine gets smaller, the natural world gets more developed, and even a simple walk could be a death sentence for a Palestinian living in Ramallah. Seeing how something as mundane as the direction of walks and ability for Raja to traverse through Palestine is heartbreaking as he is able to go less and less far from Ramallah each walk because of soldiers and checkpoints.
July 16, 2015
Under the general plan of a book describing walks with family and friends on the West Bank in the general area of his home in Ramallah, Shehadeh presents a story of land, religion, geography, nature, peoples, politics, betrayals. As the laws governing the lives and land on which the Palestinians live change over the course of these walks, (from 1978 to 2006) rights and walks become more circumscribed, nature is trampled, the future looks dimmer. Somehow, through writing, the author finds a way through his anger and we are given this book.
The last chapters in particular have several sections that I found myself copying out to remember as I think they have some universal application beyond Palestine, but I was so overwhelmed to find that sense of...I'm not sure what to name it...acceptance of self/situation/time. He will not ever agree with what has or is happening but he will not allow himself to be destroyed by it. Beautifully written and sad.
Recommended for anyone interested in a literary approach to Palestinian history through its landscape.
The last chapters in particular have several sections that I found myself copying out to remember as I think they have some universal application beyond Palestine, but I was so overwhelmed to find that sense of...I'm not sure what to name it...acceptance of self/situation/time. He will not ever agree with what has or is happening but he will not allow himself to be destroyed by it. Beautifully written and sad.
Recommended for anyone interested in a literary approach to Palestinian history through its landscape.
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October 23, 2023هذا الشّكلُ الأدبيّ للكتابة عن فلسطين ضروريّ، لكنّهُ نادر الوجود. لم أستطِع أن أحبّ يومًا الأدب الفلسطينيّ؛ لأنّه لا يقولُ شيئًا عمّا أراه. لكنّه ضروريّ، لأولئكَ الّذين لم يحظوا بلعنةِ أن يروا فلسطين. ضروريٌّ لأنّهُ يمنحهم الإحساس المبتور بالمكان؛ المكان الّذي يدافعون عنه.
أغبطهم، لأنّهم لم يخبروا الحسرة بتجسّدها الطبيعي في المكان.
الكتابة عن الوطن، مثل الكتابة عن الحبّ، الصُّحبة، والأمومة — شاقّة، ولا يمكن أن نبشِر فيها من غير التورّط بشعارات محفوظة، وكليشيهات متداولة. ما يفعلُهُ رجا في هذا الكتاب مشكورٌ عليه، لأنّني أستطيع أن أتخيّل يده تكفّ عن الكتابة بين الجملة وأختها. إنّ الكتابة الوصفيّة لفلسطين بطبيعتها وجغرافيّتها المحيّرة أعسرُ من أن تخلع ضرسَكَ بيديك.
في هذا الكتاب، يصفُ رجا "سَرحاتَه" الستّ في هضاب رام الله. تُتعِبُه الكتابة ولا تحرّره كما يقول لنفسه. لقد زُرتُ رام الله ثلاث مرّات في الشهر الماضي، وأستطيعُ أن أقولَ عنه، دون أن أمشي في تلك التلال، إنّ كلّ محاولة للكتابة عن هذا المكان تبدو غير منصفة. ولكنّ العالَم يعوّلُ علينا في الحَكْي. نحنُ المحبوسونَ في أبديّة هذا الجمال. نحنُ من هذه الجهة من الباب، علينا أن نحكي، نلتقط الصور، نُرسِل زيت الزيتون والزعتر لكم من الشقّة الأخرى من الباب. لكنّنا، ومع كلّ هذا القليل، نكونُ كمن يصفُ السماء لشخصٍ خُلق في زنزانة.
"السرْحَة" في المحكيّة المحليّة تعني المشي في الطبيعة من غيرِ وُجهةٍ محدّدة؛ أن تمشي ببساطة. في اللغة العربيّة، "السّرحُ": الماشية، شجر عظامٌ طوال، والسّرحُ أيضًا هو فناءُ الدّار. والصّفة "سُرُح" تعني السهل أو السريع. أمّا صيغة الفعل في "سَرَحَ الشيء"، أي أرسَلَهُ، و"سَرحَ ما في صدرِهِ": أخرَجَهُ. سَرحات رَجا حول رام الله هي كلّ هذا. أن تمشي كما تغدو الماشية وتُراح، متروكةً، آمنةً، لكنّها تعرفُ أنّها ستعود آخر النهار. أن تكونَ شجرةً في الطبيعة، أن تصيرَ رُكنًا منها تأوي أنتَ إليه. أن يصيرَ الوطنُ فناء الدّار — كلّ ما هو خارج مرقدك، من النهر إلى البحر، ومن البحر إلى النهر، فناءٌ لدارِك. إنّه مشيٌ سهل، أو لقد كان، لأنّه صار يُشتبَهُ بكَ الآن إذا مشيت، ولربّما تعرّضت بسبب هذا الاشتباه للقتل. وعليه فأمثالي، من وُلِدوا مستَعمَرين، حُكموا أن يخلقوا مشتبهًا بهم.
أن تسرَح، أي أن تُرسِلَ نفسَك. لكنّ اللغة خدعتنا هذه المرّة أيضًا، فإنّ المشيَ في فلسطين لن يمنحك ترفَ أن تسَرّحَ "ما في صدرِك".
يذكّرني هذا باقتباسٍ افتتح به أورهان باموق سيرَته الذّاتيّة "اسطنبول: الذّكريات والمدينة" — "the beauty of a landscape resides in its melancholy”.
نحتاجُ هذا النوع من الكتابة؛ الكتابة الّتي يمارَسُ فيها فعلُ التذكّر، السرد الوصفيّ، وتحويلُ هذا الجمال بحزنِه وألمِه إلى فُتات كلمات. كلمات قد تقولُ وقد تبين. وهذه الكتابة يعوزُها قلبٌ أقوى من قلبي، ولغةٌ أوسعُ من لغتي. هُنا يسرَحُ رجا في قضاء رام الله، لكنّنا نحتاجُ "سرحاتَ" كهذه في كلّ فلسطين.
مشيتي الأولى وعَرَج قلبي كانا في فلسطين، حبّي الأوّل ودموعي ودعائي، صوتي وصلاتي ولغتي؛ أوّلي إلى آخِري، عرفتُني في فلسطين. أوّل مرّة رأيتُ فيها النجومَ تحترق كان في أمّ رشراش التي صار اسمُها "إيلات". وهُناك شهقتُ شهقةَ الدهشة في الأخدود الأحمر. في الكَرمِل مَشيت، وأقدامي تقطعُ أحراش الصمت والشجر، والصفصافُ والصنوبرُ قُدّامي، من حَولي، أكثرُ حزنًا من عِظامي. في صحراء النقب نشأتُ، وبحرفِها الغريب نطقتُ. أمّي من أقصى المثلّث، أمّ الفحم الشامخة، ولكنّها ككلّ جميل هُنا، حزينة.
في ذكرى زواجي الأوّل ذهبنا إلى البانياس وقضيتُ يومي كاملًا عند النهر. في ذكرى زواجي الثّاني ذهبتُ إلى عكّا المتألّمة، الغريبة، التي تشعُرُ ببحرِها يُصارع الزمن. في حيفا عرفتُ أنّ البحرَ ينشُج، وأنّهُ يسمعُ الصّلاة. في ذكرى النكبّة الأخيرة، ذهبتُ إلى رأس الناقورة، حيثُ الموجُ يخبط في الصخر، ولكنّ الصخرَ يُثبتُ دومًا أنّهُ أقسى. ومن غيرِ مواعيد، أزورُ القدس، لأجدَها كما هي أبدًا، بهيّةً، متعبةً، ولها صوتُ من يحاول الشكوى؛ من يعالج البثّ ولا يستطيعه. في فلسطين، مليون "سرحَة" ولأجلها يجب أن يكتب مليون كتاب. لكنّني أعرف أننا لا نستطيع.
لا نستطيعُ تحمّلَ كلفة العجز أمامَ هذا البهاء المُثقَلُ ببهائه.
كلّما زرتُ جبال الجليل أتتني ربّةُ الشعر، وأرسلت في خاطري أكثر القصائد إدماءً؛ لكنّني لم أكتب من ذاك شيئًا قطّ. أكتب هذا لأولئك الذين يستطيعون. الذين يتحمّلون. الذين يرَونَ في "فناء منزلهم" امكانية للعيش واستحقاقًا للحَكي.
أكتب كلّ هذا ويطرُق بالي صوت السيّاب: "حتّى الظلام - هُناك أجمَ��، فهوَ يحتضِنُ العراق".
عِراقُكَ يا سيّاب؛ فلسطينِي أنا.
وهُنا، حتّى الظّلام هُنا أجمل، فهوَ يحتضنُ فلسطين.
أغبطهم، لأنّهم لم يخبروا الحسرة بتجسّدها الطبيعي في المكان.
الكتابة عن الوطن، مثل الكتابة عن الحبّ، الصُّحبة، والأمومة — شاقّة، ولا يمكن أن نبشِر فيها من غير التورّط بشعارات محفوظة، وكليشيهات متداولة. ما يفعلُهُ رجا في هذا الكتاب مشكورٌ عليه، لأنّني أستطيع أن أتخيّل يده تكفّ عن الكتابة بين الجملة وأختها. إنّ الكتابة الوصفيّة لفلسطين بطبيعتها وجغرافيّتها المحيّرة أعسرُ من أن تخلع ضرسَكَ بيديك.
في هذا الكتاب، يصفُ رجا "سَرحاتَه" الستّ في هضاب رام الله. تُتعِبُه الكتابة ولا تحرّره كما يقول لنفسه. لقد زُرتُ رام الله ثلاث مرّات في الشهر الماضي، وأستطيعُ أن أقولَ عنه، دون أن أمشي في تلك التلال، إنّ كلّ محاولة للكتابة عن هذا المكان تبدو غير منصفة. ولكنّ العالَم يعوّلُ علينا في الحَكْي. نحنُ المحبوسونَ في أبديّة هذا الجمال. نحنُ من هذه الجهة من الباب، علينا أن نحكي، نلتقط الصور، نُرسِل زيت الزيتون والزعتر لكم من الشقّة الأخرى من الباب. لكنّنا، ومع كلّ هذا القليل، نكونُ كمن يصفُ السماء لشخصٍ خُلق في زنزانة.
"السرْحَة" في المحكيّة المحليّة تعني المشي في الطبيعة من غيرِ وُجهةٍ محدّدة؛ أن تمشي ببساطة. في اللغة العربيّة، "السّرحُ": الماشية، شجر عظامٌ طوال، والسّرحُ أيضًا هو فناءُ الدّار. والصّفة "سُرُح" تعني السهل أو السريع. أمّا صيغة الفعل في "سَرَحَ الشيء"، أي أرسَلَهُ، و"سَرحَ ما في صدرِهِ": أخرَجَهُ. سَرحات رَجا حول رام الله هي كلّ هذا. أن تمشي كما تغدو الماشية وتُراح، متروكةً، آمنةً، لكنّها تعرفُ أنّها ستعود آخر النهار. أن تكونَ شجرةً في الطبيعة، أن تصيرَ رُكنًا منها تأوي أنتَ إليه. أن يصيرَ الوطنُ فناء الدّار — كلّ ما هو خارج مرقدك، من النهر إلى البحر، ومن البحر إلى النهر، فناءٌ لدارِك. إنّه مشيٌ سهل، أو لقد كان، لأنّه صار يُشتبَهُ بكَ الآن إذا مشيت، ولربّما تعرّضت بسبب هذا الاشتباه للقتل. وعليه فأمثالي، من وُلِدوا مستَعمَرين، حُكموا أن يخلقوا مشتبهًا بهم.
أن تسرَح، أي أن تُرسِلَ نفسَك. لكنّ اللغة خدعتنا هذه المرّة أيضًا، فإنّ المشيَ في فلسطين لن يمنحك ترفَ أن تسَرّحَ "ما في صدرِك".
يذكّرني هذا باقتباسٍ افتتح به أورهان باموق سيرَته الذّاتيّة "اسطنبول: الذّكريات والمدينة" — "the beauty of a landscape resides in its melancholy”.
نحتاجُ هذا النوع من الكتابة؛ الكتابة الّتي يمارَسُ فيها فعلُ التذكّر، السرد الوصفيّ، وتحويلُ هذا الجمال بحزنِه وألمِه إلى فُتات كلمات. كلمات قد تقولُ وقد تبين. وهذه الكتابة يعوزُها قلبٌ أقوى من قلبي، ولغةٌ أوسعُ من لغتي. هُنا يسرَحُ رجا في قضاء رام الله، لكنّنا نحتاجُ "سرحاتَ" كهذه في كلّ فلسطين.
مشيتي الأولى وعَرَج قلبي كانا في فلسطين، حبّي الأوّل ودموعي ودعائي، صوتي وصلاتي ولغتي؛ أوّلي إلى آخِري، عرفتُني في فلسطين. أوّل مرّة رأيتُ فيها النجومَ تحترق كان في أمّ رشراش التي صار اسمُها "إيلات". وهُناك شهقتُ شهقةَ الدهشة في الأخدود الأحمر. في الكَرمِل مَشيت، وأقدامي تقطعُ أحراش الصمت والشجر، والصفصافُ والصنوبرُ قُدّامي، من حَولي، أكثرُ حزنًا من عِظامي. في صحراء النقب نشأتُ، وبحرفِها الغريب نطقتُ. أمّي من أقصى المثلّث، أمّ الفحم الشامخة، ولكنّها ككلّ جميل هُنا، حزينة.
في ذكرى زواجي الأوّل ذهبنا إلى البانياس وقضيتُ يومي كاملًا عند النهر. في ذكرى زواجي الثّاني ذهبتُ إلى عكّا المتألّمة، الغريبة، التي تشعُرُ ببحرِها يُصارع الزمن. في حيفا عرفتُ أنّ البحرَ ينشُج، وأنّهُ يسمعُ الصّلاة. في ذكرى النكبّة الأخيرة، ذهبتُ إلى رأس الناقورة، حيثُ الموجُ يخبط في الصخر، ولكنّ الصخرَ يُثبتُ دومًا أنّهُ أقسى. ومن غيرِ مواعيد، أزورُ القدس، لأجدَها كما هي أبدًا، بهيّةً، متعبةً، ولها صوتُ من يحاول الشكوى؛ من يعالج البثّ ولا يستطيعه. في فلسطين، مليون "سرحَة" ولأجلها يجب أن يكتب مليون كتاب. لكنّني أعرف أننا لا نستطيع.
لا نستطيعُ تحمّلَ كلفة العجز أمامَ هذا البهاء المُثقَلُ ببهائه.
كلّما زرتُ جبال الجليل أتتني ربّةُ الشعر، وأرسلت في خاطري أكثر القصائد إدماءً؛ لكنّني لم أكتب من ذاك شيئًا قطّ. أكتب هذا لأولئك الذين يستطيعون. الذين يتحمّلون. الذين يرَونَ في "فناء منزلهم" امكانية للعيش واستحقاقًا للحَكي.
أكتب كلّ هذا ويطرُق بالي صوت السيّاب: "حتّى الظلام - هُناك أجمَ��، فهوَ يحتضِنُ العراق".
عِراقُكَ يا سيّاب؛ فلسطينِي أنا.
وهُنا، حتّى الظّلام هُنا أجمل، فهوَ يحتضنُ فلسطين.
November 16, 2012
There is a heaping, sun-blotting eyesore on the interstate in Florida. Whenever I drive by it I inevitably ask myself "What the hell is that big ass eyesore?" I say it out loud and gesticulate for dramatic self righteous effect (I'm in a car. I'm an asshole too). It's beyond tacky. It flirted with hideous and dated butt ugly before settling down with bad taste. Some kind of white and gold building thing with signage that becomes impossible to miss once you've noticed it because it says "The Holy Land". Can't argue with that logic. I remember there's some lion in all the holy bombasticity. It's a kind of crusades mystique that I wasn't really digging. I'd leave out the lion, for starters. I had long assumed it was a theme restaurant like Midevil Times. Wikipedia said it is a theme park with biblical types of attractions. They have a few reenactments a day of Jesus dragged and nailed to the cross (and that's not all!). I wish that people who wanted to fuel themselves on cans of messianic fury would do one of those reenactment deals in The Holy Land theme park and leave everyone else who wants to live with each other and the land alone. Crucifixions for anyone who wants them. There's a ten percent discount on martyrdom. I couldn't help but think of this place when reading about the hills bulldozed and the earth scorched with cement in the Israeli "territories". Walls as far as the eye can see. They'd probably turn Florida into a divine land of theme parks and my own home would be demolished to make room for rides about some other biblical thing. An immaculate conception whore house? That seems fitting for my place. My vegetables would be gone and my dogs would have no where to run. I would be so sad. John Sayles made a good movie called Sunshine State about the land and people losing to court orders and money and loopholes so unfair you could feel the tears of angry frustration if you couldn't make yourself think about something else (and don't forget the alligators who woke up one day to sun bathe on a golf course that belonged by rights to fat old men who can't dress themselves). I have never been to Palestine. I read the dismissive words from travel writers past that Shehadeh mourned. They had a place in the past that they couldn't let it feed them. I don't know what they were expecting. The sky and the earth wasn't majestic enough? They could argue with that? I have never been to a holy land. I only try to heed the sky. I sometimes long for the earth to take me when I can't do that. I mourn what is lost to shopping malls, parking lots and paper to wipe my ass with. I'm not at all sure that I'm worth that (definitely not). I don't know if I should call it art imitates and destroys life. Rapper Immortal Technique said that God wasn't a religion but a spiritual bond. Not art, then. I wish I had a spiritual bond with people and with the land. This other stuff makes it hard for me to do that.
Shehadeh's home is Ramallah. Ramallah is not mentioned anywhere in the bible so the people are allowed to stay there. Then progress walls them in. The roads belong to Israel after the Oslo accords. Walls built to avoid seeing their Arab neighbors and to avoid seeing the land. I kind of think that belief in a God probably has nothing to do with it's legal because we say it is asshole moves.
I wasn't looking forward to reviewing this book on goodreads. I'm worried that after I've done my thing I'm going to have one of my guilt episodes about adding another drop to the (already kicked) bucket in an exhausting and never-ending blight. Who am I to weigh down on anyone's shoulders? It's the don't tread on me butterfly effect of living in the world with other people and disrupting the business of trying to live with the same small voice in the crowd that everyone has. "Hey, wait! But what about-" and "I'm trying to live here". Everything you wish wasn't another wire in a fortress stronger than Sting could build around your heart. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been at the back of my mind for as long as I can remember. I think at least since the fifth grade in elementary school. I would sit in the room with the adults in my family watching the news about the first Iraq war. I'd ask questions and then they'd remember to tell me to shut up and go to bed (this was also when we first had cable television so that may have also been a factor in my news watching beginnings). Israel is unavoidable, really. If you think about it or not the foreign policy in my country still considers them first. I guess it was in middle school sometime when I first heard the excuse that the West Bank people were oppressed because they "had their chance" in 1948 and didn't want it. I've read since then many times that the settlements aren't illegal, or some kind of pussy foot way to deny that they are building more settlements. International law says it is illegal and what not.
What I really want to know is why all the lying about it? Why not just admit that they are continuing to conquer the land out from underneath the Palestinians to this day? If it is just then why say you are not breaking the law when that law is it is the law because we say so. Shehadeh discovers that all of the land is registered to the Israeli government, not just what is officially Israel. The only difference is in name. Why lie? Doesn't everyone know they are, anyway?
It's too late to stop it just like it's far too late to change the atrocities committed on the Native Americans back in the day. It turns out we are going to need that land too. Horrible. I wouldn't be alive if that hadn't happened. Side note that's not really a side note because it's connected to all this jumbled mess of people shit. Anyone else get a headache thinking about that who is or isn't responsible for what shit? The internet seems to be a happy place for people who like to point the finger for history bullshit. I'm a Yank and slavery was all the Souths fault! (I guess if they want to pretend that the sellers weren't yanks that's their deal.) My family heritage is Cherokee and post WWI immigrants from Wales and France. Going by their rules I could start blaming myself for civil rights (I wasn't alive) but not the other stuff. It's ridiculous, right, to live your life by foot notes? You're born and if you're lucky you get to live enough of your own life outside the dark shadows of the past. I don't get the divine right because of the bible. I think it would be silly if it weren't so frightening that "It says in the bible the land belongs to us because this is proof we were here first". I don't see how you can deny that the Arabs were already there too. The cruel "If you've left in the last ten years the land automatically belongs to us" boggles my mind (coupled with equally restrictive and cruel time bounds on Jordanian immigration). I don't get how all Jews own the land because of the bible but property rights to Arabs have to be proven within the last ten years (corruption to fuck them over anyway notwithstanding). I don't get how it is different to march Arabs from their homes, to say "Why doesn't the rest of the Arab world just take them?" Why pretend it isn't the same as what they wouldn't forget about historical bad shit for Jewish peoples.
Raja Shehadeh had a good point about PLO hopeful after the Oslo accords not understanding why the settlers were even there. They want ALL of greater Israel. That also includes lands in Jordan and Syria. I have a theory that public opinion is the reason behind the lies about going with the law. Lie enough, change the language to say what is not true, and maybe people will sleep enough and by the time they wake up it will be too late. If you're taking land from someone else that is what you are doing. Why pretend you are doing anything else? I don't understand why it is such a huge taboo to talk about something that is happening anyway. If it isn't bad then why do you need to lie? No doubt it is to shut up Israelis and Americans (the bank rollers) who wouldn't and don't agree with what they are doing. It is only their dead children in the armies to protect those settlements that were deliberately placed to antagonize ("We won!") Arab villages. Why else pretend they weren't building settlements when that is exactly what they were doing, and undeniably so? I also suspect that it is the fall out when they take the land from Jordan and Syria. I wish people DID face up to that and the story sold wasn't "We are protecting ourselves" and not the imprisonment of Palestinians (just like I wish that wars weren't raged in the middle east for oil profits or because Israel didn't like their neighbor. My theory is that people wouldn't sacrifice their lives if the line given resembled the truth). Two billion in foreign aid every year isn't to fight terrorists (in fact, the first two billion was to build settlements, and the money continues to magically direct towards that now). Foreign aid has to be spent on American corporations. Money that in theory belongs to tax payers who in theory pay taxes for their own country (it's called "entitlements" in the states and "foreign aid" elsewhere). The money goes to the corporations and not to help a country help itself. Two billion a year for how long? Since I've been on this Earth, at least. Why all the cloak and dagger bullshit about this, anyway?
A man going on a sarha wanders aimlessly, not restricted by time and place, going where his spirit takes him to nourish his soul and rejuvenate himself. But not any excursion would qualify as a sarha. Going on a sarha implies letting go. It is a drug-free high, Palestinian-style.
It isn't my life, or my home. I wish I could have an out of body experience and travel over the lands in a way that would be like a sarha. (Reading at the best of times is like this. I long for writing to be that way.) I fell in love with sarhas after reading Palestinian Walks. None of isolating walls to keep out. I had an ache when I read about sarhas. I pine for what they lost. It is hard to blink back the frustrated tears in the face of the injustice (in the best case that he had, a civil case for plaintiff Albina [he only found out by chance!] who had never left and could be proven, they brought in a mystery "witness" with his face wrapped in traditional Arabic headgear that covers all but the eyes. His identity they refuse to reveal. He is too young to have been alive to say if Albina had left to fight in the Jordanian army. The sham proceedings... Why call this law?). It must have been so hard to fight in a fraudulent legal system. Shehadeh built his life around fighting for human rights for his people. The Oslo accords made his legal accomplishments and career redundant. Did they ever stop taking? Yet he still writes about them as people, not monsters, albeit people who sleep in centuries ago. The unreachable minds of those who believe they are in the right and will do anything to get what they feel that they alone deserve. Palestinian Walks may sound like another stone in the shoe on a path that's too hard to keep walking. It's not, it's a wonderful book. I'm dreading the remorse I'm going to feel for not getting this right! It's so frustrating. The hills around Ramallah where Shehadeh took his walks as a young man in the seventies before they were lost to him forever. Shehadeh is himself a Christian. I didn't know that until I looked up his biography after reading his book. I don't connect me to any domination in name. If it is about life, and his I did connect to, I can. Would I belong to anything? I really just want the sarha. It hurts so much that he can't go outside and sleep under the sky. My favorite walk is the first one he takes when he returns home after studying law in the United States. He discovers a chair that his grandfather's cousin, a stonemason, had made for himself in the rocks. It is the perfect fit for himself. Shehadeh marvels that he had ever had the free time to make them for himself. It later gets destroyed when he takes his nephew to find his discovery. Why do they have to lose that for some more ugly condominiums?
Shehadeh writes not so much bitterly or in overwhelming anger. If you are familiar with Glenn Greenwald that would be a great shorthand for me to describe his sarcastic humor (this is highest compliment from me. I admire Glenn Greenwald so much). I would take their cue to write about people shit and feel less helpless to it that way. This is right and the hell mouth inside doesn't open wider to talk incomprehensible dentist talk. Maybe it's just something that people wrote down but it's less lonely if it applies to you and them equally. The rug isn't pulled out from underneath you. I feel too emotional and standing on nothing myself. How can a man of law take seriously that the Israeli big men feel "torn" if they don't have all of greater Israel as the only justification that they need to do whatever they can to get it. Putting it that way, though, only reminds me how cruel it was to try and fight their lies with law. It didn't exist! It doesn't exist.
Thank you from my heart if you read this. It means a lot to me. I don't feel right as a stone if it doesn't ever matter that I think about this stuff. I get so sick and tired of taboos. If someone isn't interested, fine, but in my life it is like one isn't ALLOWED to address that the law is set up to screw the defenseless. Why does the big asshole get to pretend he's in the right? Just be an asshole and admit it, at least.
I felt so bad these past days in a silence that I couldn't talk about not wanting to sleep all of the time. A friend of mine gave me a hard time because I cared about what they didn't care about. No one has to care, lives have to be lived. But does that mean that I can't care? Why does that mean that I can't care? It was the worst feeling.
I know it won't change anything. I wrote in my review of David Grossman's The Yellow Wind that you can't live for other people. That is still what I feel most strongly about past bleeding into the present and stealing the future. It is living for someone else to do it. I feel guilty talking about this stuff because I don't want to do that (I feel guilty if I don't because that's denying to me that they mark me). I want to remember because I find it so hard to live with people being lied to so that you can live for them.
Speaking of (and sorry for another sidetrack), I read in a DG interview that Shehadeh criticized Grossman and other Israelis who felt they had to be strong to be able to live beside Arabs out of their fear of antisemitism. I feel that a lot in the states when I read that us Southern states have to be controlled by law to not be racist. I can't deny that people who were not me, who lived long before me, affect my relationship with people. It's inherited guilt that I want nothing to do with and have no choice about. (What I think makes no difference but I hope for a two-state solution just like DG.)
Anyway, this is a really good book. It's trying to live when your life is stolen from all around you. I thought it was beautiful. I would have loved it for the description of how the sea rolling hills were formed in the West Bank (I have an inner sarha just reading about geology. How could those old farts ever claim that Palestine had to be scripture perfect to be spiritual?). I would have loved it for the footing in the law and the land.
In my summing up I had anticipated the possibility that they might invoke this article and had written: "If Article 5 is not interpreted strictly and the Custodian then believes that whatever action he takes (even if based on improper legal considerations) would be retroactively validated by imputing to it good faith, without using strict criteria to ascertain whether or not it in fact existed, the Custodian would in effect be given a free hand to act arbitrarily... If this happens, a mockery would have been made of the law."
Shehadeh's home is Ramallah. Ramallah is not mentioned anywhere in the bible so the people are allowed to stay there. Then progress walls them in. The roads belong to Israel after the Oslo accords. Walls built to avoid seeing their Arab neighbors and to avoid seeing the land. I kind of think that belief in a God probably has nothing to do with it's legal because we say it is asshole moves.
I wasn't looking forward to reviewing this book on goodreads. I'm worried that after I've done my thing I'm going to have one of my guilt episodes about adding another drop to the (already kicked) bucket in an exhausting and never-ending blight. Who am I to weigh down on anyone's shoulders? It's the don't tread on me butterfly effect of living in the world with other people and disrupting the business of trying to live with the same small voice in the crowd that everyone has. "Hey, wait! But what about-" and "I'm trying to live here". Everything you wish wasn't another wire in a fortress stronger than Sting could build around your heart. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been at the back of my mind for as long as I can remember. I think at least since the fifth grade in elementary school. I would sit in the room with the adults in my family watching the news about the first Iraq war. I'd ask questions and then they'd remember to tell me to shut up and go to bed (this was also when we first had cable television so that may have also been a factor in my news watching beginnings). Israel is unavoidable, really. If you think about it or not the foreign policy in my country still considers them first. I guess it was in middle school sometime when I first heard the excuse that the West Bank people were oppressed because they "had their chance" in 1948 and didn't want it. I've read since then many times that the settlements aren't illegal, or some kind of pussy foot way to deny that they are building more settlements. International law says it is illegal and what not.
What I really want to know is why all the lying about it? Why not just admit that they are continuing to conquer the land out from underneath the Palestinians to this day? If it is just then why say you are not breaking the law when that law is it is the law because we say so. Shehadeh discovers that all of the land is registered to the Israeli government, not just what is officially Israel. The only difference is in name. Why lie? Doesn't everyone know they are, anyway?
It's too late to stop it just like it's far too late to change the atrocities committed on the Native Americans back in the day. It turns out we are going to need that land too. Horrible. I wouldn't be alive if that hadn't happened. Side note that's not really a side note because it's connected to all this jumbled mess of people shit. Anyone else get a headache thinking about that who is or isn't responsible for what shit? The internet seems to be a happy place for people who like to point the finger for history bullshit. I'm a Yank and slavery was all the Souths fault! (I guess if they want to pretend that the sellers weren't yanks that's their deal.) My family heritage is Cherokee and post WWI immigrants from Wales and France. Going by their rules I could start blaming myself for civil rights (I wasn't alive) but not the other stuff. It's ridiculous, right, to live your life by foot notes? You're born and if you're lucky you get to live enough of your own life outside the dark shadows of the past. I don't get the divine right because of the bible. I think it would be silly if it weren't so frightening that "It says in the bible the land belongs to us because this is proof we were here first". I don't see how you can deny that the Arabs were already there too. The cruel "If you've left in the last ten years the land automatically belongs to us" boggles my mind (coupled with equally restrictive and cruel time bounds on Jordanian immigration). I don't get how all Jews own the land because of the bible but property rights to Arabs have to be proven within the last ten years (corruption to fuck them over anyway notwithstanding). I don't get how it is different to march Arabs from their homes, to say "Why doesn't the rest of the Arab world just take them?" Why pretend it isn't the same as what they wouldn't forget about historical bad shit for Jewish peoples.
Raja Shehadeh had a good point about PLO hopeful after the Oslo accords not understanding why the settlers were even there. They want ALL of greater Israel. That also includes lands in Jordan and Syria. I have a theory that public opinion is the reason behind the lies about going with the law. Lie enough, change the language to say what is not true, and maybe people will sleep enough and by the time they wake up it will be too late. If you're taking land from someone else that is what you are doing. Why pretend you are doing anything else? I don't understand why it is such a huge taboo to talk about something that is happening anyway. If it isn't bad then why do you need to lie? No doubt it is to shut up Israelis and Americans (the bank rollers) who wouldn't and don't agree with what they are doing. It is only their dead children in the armies to protect those settlements that were deliberately placed to antagonize ("We won!") Arab villages. Why else pretend they weren't building settlements when that is exactly what they were doing, and undeniably so? I also suspect that it is the fall out when they take the land from Jordan and Syria. I wish people DID face up to that and the story sold wasn't "We are protecting ourselves" and not the imprisonment of Palestinians (just like I wish that wars weren't raged in the middle east for oil profits or because Israel didn't like their neighbor. My theory is that people wouldn't sacrifice their lives if the line given resembled the truth). Two billion in foreign aid every year isn't to fight terrorists (in fact, the first two billion was to build settlements, and the money continues to magically direct towards that now). Foreign aid has to be spent on American corporations. Money that in theory belongs to tax payers who in theory pay taxes for their own country (it's called "entitlements" in the states and "foreign aid" elsewhere). The money goes to the corporations and not to help a country help itself. Two billion a year for how long? Since I've been on this Earth, at least. Why all the cloak and dagger bullshit about this, anyway?
A man going on a sarha wanders aimlessly, not restricted by time and place, going where his spirit takes him to nourish his soul and rejuvenate himself. But not any excursion would qualify as a sarha. Going on a sarha implies letting go. It is a drug-free high, Palestinian-style.
It isn't my life, or my home. I wish I could have an out of body experience and travel over the lands in a way that would be like a sarha. (Reading at the best of times is like this. I long for writing to be that way.) I fell in love with sarhas after reading Palestinian Walks. None of isolating walls to keep out. I had an ache when I read about sarhas. I pine for what they lost. It is hard to blink back the frustrated tears in the face of the injustice (in the best case that he had, a civil case for plaintiff Albina [he only found out by chance!] who had never left and could be proven, they brought in a mystery "witness" with his face wrapped in traditional Arabic headgear that covers all but the eyes. His identity they refuse to reveal. He is too young to have been alive to say if Albina had left to fight in the Jordanian army. The sham proceedings... Why call this law?). It must have been so hard to fight in a fraudulent legal system. Shehadeh built his life around fighting for human rights for his people. The Oslo accords made his legal accomplishments and career redundant. Did they ever stop taking? Yet he still writes about them as people, not monsters, albeit people who sleep in centuries ago. The unreachable minds of those who believe they are in the right and will do anything to get what they feel that they alone deserve. Palestinian Walks may sound like another stone in the shoe on a path that's too hard to keep walking. It's not, it's a wonderful book. I'm dreading the remorse I'm going to feel for not getting this right! It's so frustrating. The hills around Ramallah where Shehadeh took his walks as a young man in the seventies before they were lost to him forever. Shehadeh is himself a Christian. I didn't know that until I looked up his biography after reading his book. I don't connect me to any domination in name. If it is about life, and his I did connect to, I can. Would I belong to anything? I really just want the sarha. It hurts so much that he can't go outside and sleep under the sky. My favorite walk is the first one he takes when he returns home after studying law in the United States. He discovers a chair that his grandfather's cousin, a stonemason, had made for himself in the rocks. It is the perfect fit for himself. Shehadeh marvels that he had ever had the free time to make them for himself. It later gets destroyed when he takes his nephew to find his discovery. Why do they have to lose that for some more ugly condominiums?
Shehadeh writes not so much bitterly or in overwhelming anger. If you are familiar with Glenn Greenwald that would be a great shorthand for me to describe his sarcastic humor (this is highest compliment from me. I admire Glenn Greenwald so much). I would take their cue to write about people shit and feel less helpless to it that way. This is right and the hell mouth inside doesn't open wider to talk incomprehensible dentist talk. Maybe it's just something that people wrote down but it's less lonely if it applies to you and them equally. The rug isn't pulled out from underneath you. I feel too emotional and standing on nothing myself. How can a man of law take seriously that the Israeli big men feel "torn" if they don't have all of greater Israel as the only justification that they need to do whatever they can to get it. Putting it that way, though, only reminds me how cruel it was to try and fight their lies with law. It didn't exist! It doesn't exist.
Thank you from my heart if you read this. It means a lot to me. I don't feel right as a stone if it doesn't ever matter that I think about this stuff. I get so sick and tired of taboos. If someone isn't interested, fine, but in my life it is like one isn't ALLOWED to address that the law is set up to screw the defenseless. Why does the big asshole get to pretend he's in the right? Just be an asshole and admit it, at least.
I felt so bad these past days in a silence that I couldn't talk about not wanting to sleep all of the time. A friend of mine gave me a hard time because I cared about what they didn't care about. No one has to care, lives have to be lived. But does that mean that I can't care? Why does that mean that I can't care? It was the worst feeling.
I know it won't change anything. I wrote in my review of David Grossman's The Yellow Wind that you can't live for other people. That is still what I feel most strongly about past bleeding into the present and stealing the future. It is living for someone else to do it. I feel guilty talking about this stuff because I don't want to do that (I feel guilty if I don't because that's denying to me that they mark me). I want to remember because I find it so hard to live with people being lied to so that you can live for them.
Speaking of (and sorry for another sidetrack), I read in a DG interview that Shehadeh criticized Grossman and other Israelis who felt they had to be strong to be able to live beside Arabs out of their fear of antisemitism. I feel that a lot in the states when I read that us Southern states have to be controlled by law to not be racist. I can't deny that people who were not me, who lived long before me, affect my relationship with people. It's inherited guilt that I want nothing to do with and have no choice about. (What I think makes no difference but I hope for a two-state solution just like DG.)
Anyway, this is a really good book. It's trying to live when your life is stolen from all around you. I thought it was beautiful. I would have loved it for the description of how the sea rolling hills were formed in the West Bank (I have an inner sarha just reading about geology. How could those old farts ever claim that Palestine had to be scripture perfect to be spiritual?). I would have loved it for the footing in the law and the land.
In my summing up I had anticipated the possibility that they might invoke this article and had written: "If Article 5 is not interpreted strictly and the Custodian then believes that whatever action he takes (even if based on improper legal considerations) would be retroactively validated by imputing to it good faith, without using strict criteria to ascertain whether or not it in fact existed, the Custodian would in effect be given a free hand to act arbitrarily... If this happens, a mockery would have been made of the law."
March 25, 2022
Of all the Palestinian books I’ve read, this is my favorite so far. A friend recommended it (is there anything more beautifully intimate than a thought-out book recommendation?) and I was stunned. Shehadeh is a Palestinian lawyer and an avid trekker. Each chapter of the book describes different travels, peppered with his own experiences.
Many times I will read a Palestinian book and become frustrated. The gap is simply too big, we can’t work together, there’s nothing I can do as an Israeli, etc. This was the first time I read a Palestinian book that actually made me feel like the demands are not too steep. Shehadeh doesn’t demand right of return for all Palestinians to Israel-proper. He doesn’t want the land from the river to the sea. He stands behind the two state solution, firmly and dedicated. It was quite sad for me to realize that if the majority of Palestinians and Israelis shared his stance, the conflict would have been over years ago.
This book is lovely because Shehadeh artfully combines beautiful descriptions of the nature with political thoughts. He ties them together through the land and it works beautifully. I often feel so immensely grateful to be here in this land and Shehadeh really pinpoints those feelings as well as the frustration over the political situation.
The book starts with pointing out that people have a tendency to transform this land to what they’d like it to be, rather than what it is. The West is truly obsessed with it but they are not the only ones. Both Israelis and Palestinians have an urge to see in this land what they'd like, to warp away what doesn't fit into the narrative. We struggle to see what is, to truly soak into the beauty of this place without letting antagonism towards the other sneak in.
Reading this book made me realize that on some level, the construction of the barrier fence/ wall was a crucial step in order to change the mental reality to two states. Shehadeh mourns his inability to reach parts of what he refers to as 1948 Palestine but in a two state solution, that isn’t Palestine. It’s Israel. Meanwhile, I cannot mourn my inability to reach Nablus because I have never been able to. Unlike the older generation, younger people no longer see this as feasible. This tragedy that Shehadeh is describing is the necessary steps for a two state solution, for Palestinians and Israelis to realize and accept that certain land is not their land.
Really, up until I read this, I didn’t fully understand that in the past, Israelis and Palestinians could just go to each other’s areas. Just like that. No wonder so many people support one-state solutions when the border was so blurry that the idea of your side getting all the land felt feasible and justified. In retrospect, Israel’s open border’s policy was a mistake if anyone was intending to create two states.
Shehadeh points out that this has caused an inability to know each other. He realizes that the younger generation doesn't know what Israelis (beyond soldiers) look like. Or, in the words of a Palestinian friend: "Israel is so diverse??".
I often think that Israelis do not comprehend the damage of the settlements. On some level, I get it- there’s a housing crisis in Israel, we feel like we don’t owe anything to Palestinians, we struggle to respect what foreign countries and bodies say when they never bother to recognize Jewish heritage or holy sites, etc. But all of this doesn’t mean we are excused from understanding what settlements do to Palestinians.
We are slowly killing the two state solution on our end and yes, it was already mostly dead due to the Palestinians but we are dooming ourselves by doing our part. We are forcing Palestinians to see their potential state be destroyed every day, bit by bit. The ugliest parts of the Israeli society become our ambassadors. Most of us sit in 1967 borders and ignore the impending crisis. This is unforgivable and reading this book made me see it even clearer. How can we do this?
Shehadeh criticizes much of the Palestinian leadership, especially Arafat. This was also something that increased my trust in him. Shehadeh foresaw that the Oslo Accords would fail as they prioritized recognition over specific changes on the ground. Instead of fixing systematic problems, it created Palestinian symbolism. That’s not peace. That’s not justice. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is fought by civilians every day in millions of ways, not by the government.
A few days ago, four Israeli civilians were murdered in a terror attack. A state owned Palestinian news outlet wrote a celebratory post but when Israel complained to the PA, they removed it. This is state level. Oslo solidified a government relationship but let me tell you, removing that one post by the news did not stop my social media feeds from being crammed with other triumphant voices (although to be fair, Palestinian Israelis vastly condemned it and this should be said). Oslo has brought to life a failed system, added an extra level of challenges.
Shehadeh also criticizes that the Oslo Accords were led by the Palestinian diaspora. I’ve never thought about that. I would never ever let the Jewish diaspora lead negotiations for Israel. The Palestinian diaspora had their own priorities that don’t necessarily align with the locals. They also weren’t often able to see what was going on the ground. He also criticizes the Palestinian leadership for their behavior in autonomy, for the fact that there was potential that was squandered by corruption, especially in the 90s.
At times, this book was inaccurate. For example, Shehadeh asks an Israeli why he won’t visit Ramallah and implies that a lack of willingness to do so means they view Palestinians as savages. And yet, I ask Shehadeh, can I come to Ramallah without hiding my identity as an Israeli? Can I speak Hebrew publicly? If I were to look religious, could I feel safe? I’ve yet to meet a Palestinian who doesn’t add to their invitation reservations about speaking only English, only saying that I’m American.
It’s convenient for Palestinians to suggest that Israelis don’t visit their areas cause we’re all racist. At the same time, Palestinians feel comfortable to visit Israel, despite the alleged Israeli racism. Palestinians are blind to the genuine fear Israelis feel and how that fear has roots in the stream of lynches and public support for terrorism.
Sometimes, during his meetings with Israelis in the book, there are certain nuances that he misses. However, reading this book was cool precisely because I got to see what certain interactions look like from someone else’s perceptive. For example, he describes a situation when he was hiking and got help from an Israeli. He presents it as though he was hiding his Palestinian-ness but as an Israeli, I am convinced they knew. I mean, come on. Just as he knew the person was Israeli, it’s usually very clear. Ethnic tension is always tangible, it has a shape and a form.
To conclude, compared to other books, I felt this had more nuance. Shehadeh comes across as passionate, intelligent and an excellent tour guide. It is easy to sympathize with his struggles. I didn't agree with everything written but I think it's well worth a read.
What I'm Taking With Me:
- He blames the Norwegians for “exploiting the weakness” of Arab generosity and I have to say, I’ve seen many takes about Oslo but this might be my favorite, as if the Norwegians were good hosts because it was a ploy to befriend and then cheat them.
- An Israeli asks him, “what guarantee will I have that you won’t ask to get Haifa and Jaffa?” and he does not respond. What a shame.
- The legal battle vs armed resistance- the idea that so far, the legal battle for Palestinians hasn't worked. Honestly, as a Politics student, I have so little faith in law. Law presumes neutrality but laws are man-made.
-There is also a legal imbalance, Shehadeh claims that Israel is much more savvy and skilled at negotiations. We learned about this imbalance of negotiations in one of my courses. Poorer and smaller countries often can’t be able to truly utilize international arenas.
-Shehadeh’s urge to present the settlements and broadly, Zionism, as though it is an irrational religious belief is unfair and simply false. He also assumes that a large part of Israeli opinions are based on lies. We would go further if we'd stop assuming the other side isn't as intelligent and understanding as us.
- Shehadeh complains about homes being built in general. That is, his complaint is broader than Israeli settlements- it reaches the idea of natural land being transformed into cities and villages. Really interesting perspective. The Palestine of endless walks in nature is slowly being destroyed by development.
--------------------------------
Me ranking a Palestinian book highly? It's more likely than you think. Review to come but for now, some thoughts on Palestinian political strategizing!
There’s an argument to be made that Palestinians cannot utilize both decolonization methods and anti-apartheid movements, even if in essence, they mean the exact same thing. Both are talking about a free Palestine, from the river to the sea, with no or limited forms of Jewish self determination. The end of Israel as we know it. Palestine, from the river to the sea.
However, if the fight is for a decolonized Palestine, demanding rights in Israel doesn’t make sense. You are trying to build post-colonial Palestinian institutions. Israel is the settler colonist so cooperation with Israeli institutions validates the colonizer. Don’t normalize. This is the fight Palestinians have fought until now, why many East Jerusalemers refuse citizenship, why Hamas and Israel haven’t been able to sort out the Gaza sewage problem and so on.
Right now, we are seeing a gradual shift to an apartheid argument. This is a brilliant move because it changes the goal posts. Instead of Palestinians being asked to accept a two state solution, it becomes on Israel to explain why it rejects a one state solution. It's not an Israeli-Palestinian conflict but rather, an Israeli apartheid. Every Palestinian issue becomes a result of Israeli intentions and policies. Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad are fighting each other in Gaza? That’s part of Israel’s malicious policies. Families in Hebron are shooting each other? That’s Israel’s fault. It’s much harder to prove a lack of malicious intent than it is to claim that a policy is intentional discriminatory.
(as a side note, Israel should stop responding to this by crying antisemitism. Instead, I would love to see an Israeli response be “you want our army out? excellent, so do we, let’s go to Oslo”. This is a bit of dirty move as it’s clear no such deal can happen and Oslo was a massive failure but no dirtier than framing a century old conflict as an apartheid.)
At the same time, by changing the goal posts, the apartheid argument also has some costs to the prior Palestinian argument. First, it removes the validation for opposing the settlements. What’s the difference between Rehovot and Kiryat Arba? There’s no more temporary occupation, it’s all apartheid, governed under one body. De facto annexed. In fact, surely settlements should be welcomed as a way to mix up the two racial groups? Really, the zero Jews (sorry, 1 kidnapped Jew) of Gaza is a concerning sign for our upcoming bi-nationalism. This type of thinking also highlights some kind of realism- recognition that cities like Ariel aren't going anywhere.
Moreover, by giving up on the concept of separation, of “Palestinian fragmentation”, as coined by Amnesty International, the apartheid argument also recognizes that Israel has a right to exist in some way. This is a massive shift. It is also a subtle way of acknowledging that Israel is a functional state, a state that could, in theory, become the state for all Palestinians and Jews. More power sharing within the Israeli framework while dismantling the Jewish elements of Israel.
So then, ironically, the framework of apartheid marks the end of the Palestinian national struggle. No more national collective rights, this is about equal civil and political rights for Palestinians as an ethnic group in sovereign Israel from the river to the sea. Where is the State of Palestine in the so called Israeli apartheid? What does the Palestinian flag or anthem symbolize in the reality of one state Israel? When does it become Palestine?
That’s the reason why some Palestinians complained about the Amnesty report- the report doesn’t talk about settler-colonialism or occupation. It has an absurd paragraph about how occupation and apartheid can exist together and it shrugs the challenging issues here by suggesting that they are only talking about human rights, not self determination. It doesn’t validate Palestinian resistance because it does not acknowledge that Palestinians are a nation who are fighting for national independence. They’re just an ethnicity, a race in Israel.
I hold that the lack of clarity about these two strategies is what will continue to hold Palestinians back. Both the apartheid argument and the decolonization argument don’t really give Israelis any moves. They offer nothing to Israelis, not even the prospect of peace or the end of violence. Both settler colonial frameworks and apartheid arguments push aside the national elements of Judaism and it is precisely these elements of Judaism that matter the most to Israelis (and let’s be honest, to the Diaspora when things go wrong). No self determination for Jews is a nonstarter.
Moreover, they contradict each other. Is Israel meant to increase its reach in order to end the “apartheid” or to minimize its reach in order to “decolonize”? Should Israel step out of the West Bank or annex it? There’s a vagueness, both in explaining what a decolonized Palestine looks like and in proving where the apartheid is (the West Bank? Gaza? East Jerusalem? All of the land? Depends on who’s speaking).
Interestingly, the more I dig into the conflict, the more I respect that the international community clutches the two state solution. We all see that the two state solution isn’t happening but the grain of truth in the two state solution is recognition of Jewish and Palestinian self determination. Without such recognition, more violence is assured. This precisely bothers both Palestinians and Israelis who refuse the self determination of the other.
And ultimately, I ask, okay, if there’s an apartheid, how is it dismantled? And here we find that this is exactly like the question “how do we dismantle the occupation?” or "how do we dismantle the settler colonialism?". Exactly the same as the question asked by the British and the UN in 1947. The language is harsher towards Israel but it is exactly the same. We beat around the bush but it's not changing anything. It’s been here for a century and if we don’t face it, it’ll be here for another century.
Two people, one land. How can we govern? How do we live in this land together in a way that is both just and equal? In a way that recognizes the valid Jewish right for self determination but also allows Palestinians the self determination that they deserve? Claiming Palestine needs to be decolonized doesn’t solve this. Claiming Israel is an apartheid state doesn’t solve this. Signing documents that no one follows doesn’t solve this. Our way out needs to start with radical acceptance of a complex reality.
Many times I will read a Palestinian book and become frustrated. The gap is simply too big, we can’t work together, there’s nothing I can do as an Israeli, etc. This was the first time I read a Palestinian book that actually made me feel like the demands are not too steep. Shehadeh doesn’t demand right of return for all Palestinians to Israel-proper. He doesn’t want the land from the river to the sea. He stands behind the two state solution, firmly and dedicated. It was quite sad for me to realize that if the majority of Palestinians and Israelis shared his stance, the conflict would have been over years ago.
This book is lovely because Shehadeh artfully combines beautiful descriptions of the nature with political thoughts. He ties them together through the land and it works beautifully. I often feel so immensely grateful to be here in this land and Shehadeh really pinpoints those feelings as well as the frustration over the political situation.
The book starts with pointing out that people have a tendency to transform this land to what they’d like it to be, rather than what it is. The West is truly obsessed with it but they are not the only ones. Both Israelis and Palestinians have an urge to see in this land what they'd like, to warp away what doesn't fit into the narrative. We struggle to see what is, to truly soak into the beauty of this place without letting antagonism towards the other sneak in.
Reading this book made me realize that on some level, the construction of the barrier fence/ wall was a crucial step in order to change the mental reality to two states. Shehadeh mourns his inability to reach parts of what he refers to as 1948 Palestine but in a two state solution, that isn’t Palestine. It’s Israel. Meanwhile, I cannot mourn my inability to reach Nablus because I have never been able to. Unlike the older generation, younger people no longer see this as feasible. This tragedy that Shehadeh is describing is the necessary steps for a two state solution, for Palestinians and Israelis to realize and accept that certain land is not their land.
Really, up until I read this, I didn’t fully understand that in the past, Israelis and Palestinians could just go to each other’s areas. Just like that. No wonder so many people support one-state solutions when the border was so blurry that the idea of your side getting all the land felt feasible and justified. In retrospect, Israel’s open border’s policy was a mistake if anyone was intending to create two states.
Shehadeh points out that this has caused an inability to know each other. He realizes that the younger generation doesn't know what Israelis (beyond soldiers) look like. Or, in the words of a Palestinian friend: "Israel is so diverse??".
I often think that Israelis do not comprehend the damage of the settlements. On some level, I get it- there’s a housing crisis in Israel, we feel like we don’t owe anything to Palestinians, we struggle to respect what foreign countries and bodies say when they never bother to recognize Jewish heritage or holy sites, etc. But all of this doesn’t mean we are excused from understanding what settlements do to Palestinians.
We are slowly killing the two state solution on our end and yes, it was already mostly dead due to the Palestinians but we are dooming ourselves by doing our part. We are forcing Palestinians to see their potential state be destroyed every day, bit by bit. The ugliest parts of the Israeli society become our ambassadors. Most of us sit in 1967 borders and ignore the impending crisis. This is unforgivable and reading this book made me see it even clearer. How can we do this?
Shehadeh criticizes much of the Palestinian leadership, especially Arafat. This was also something that increased my trust in him. Shehadeh foresaw that the Oslo Accords would fail as they prioritized recognition over specific changes on the ground. Instead of fixing systematic problems, it created Palestinian symbolism. That’s not peace. That’s not justice. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is fought by civilians every day in millions of ways, not by the government.
A few days ago, four Israeli civilians were murdered in a terror attack. A state owned Palestinian news outlet wrote a celebratory post but when Israel complained to the PA, they removed it. This is state level. Oslo solidified a government relationship but let me tell you, removing that one post by the news did not stop my social media feeds from being crammed with other triumphant voices (although to be fair, Palestinian Israelis vastly condemned it and this should be said). Oslo has brought to life a failed system, added an extra level of challenges.
Shehadeh also criticizes that the Oslo Accords were led by the Palestinian diaspora. I’ve never thought about that. I would never ever let the Jewish diaspora lead negotiations for Israel. The Palestinian diaspora had their own priorities that don’t necessarily align with the locals. They also weren’t often able to see what was going on the ground. He also criticizes the Palestinian leadership for their behavior in autonomy, for the fact that there was potential that was squandered by corruption, especially in the 90s.
At times, this book was inaccurate. For example, Shehadeh asks an Israeli why he won’t visit Ramallah and implies that a lack of willingness to do so means they view Palestinians as savages. And yet, I ask Shehadeh, can I come to Ramallah without hiding my identity as an Israeli? Can I speak Hebrew publicly? If I were to look religious, could I feel safe? I’ve yet to meet a Palestinian who doesn’t add to their invitation reservations about speaking only English, only saying that I’m American.
It’s convenient for Palestinians to suggest that Israelis don’t visit their areas cause we’re all racist. At the same time, Palestinians feel comfortable to visit Israel, despite the alleged Israeli racism. Palestinians are blind to the genuine fear Israelis feel and how that fear has roots in the stream of lynches and public support for terrorism.
Sometimes, during his meetings with Israelis in the book, there are certain nuances that he misses. However, reading this book was cool precisely because I got to see what certain interactions look like from someone else’s perceptive. For example, he describes a situation when he was hiking and got help from an Israeli. He presents it as though he was hiding his Palestinian-ness but as an Israeli, I am convinced they knew. I mean, come on. Just as he knew the person was Israeli, it’s usually very clear. Ethnic tension is always tangible, it has a shape and a form.
To conclude, compared to other books, I felt this had more nuance. Shehadeh comes across as passionate, intelligent and an excellent tour guide. It is easy to sympathize with his struggles. I didn't agree with everything written but I think it's well worth a read.
What I'm Taking With Me:
- He blames the Norwegians for “exploiting the weakness” of Arab generosity and I have to say, I’ve seen many takes about Oslo but this might be my favorite, as if the Norwegians were good hosts because it was a ploy to befriend and then cheat them.
- An Israeli asks him, “what guarantee will I have that you won’t ask to get Haifa and Jaffa?” and he does not respond. What a shame.
- The legal battle vs armed resistance- the idea that so far, the legal battle for Palestinians hasn't worked. Honestly, as a Politics student, I have so little faith in law. Law presumes neutrality but laws are man-made.
-There is also a legal imbalance, Shehadeh claims that Israel is much more savvy and skilled at negotiations. We learned about this imbalance of negotiations in one of my courses. Poorer and smaller countries often can’t be able to truly utilize international arenas.
-Shehadeh’s urge to present the settlements and broadly, Zionism, as though it is an irrational religious belief is unfair and simply false. He also assumes that a large part of Israeli opinions are based on lies. We would go further if we'd stop assuming the other side isn't as intelligent and understanding as us.
- Shehadeh complains about homes being built in general. That is, his complaint is broader than Israeli settlements- it reaches the idea of natural land being transformed into cities and villages. Really interesting perspective. The Palestine of endless walks in nature is slowly being destroyed by development.
--------------------------------
Me ranking a Palestinian book highly? It's more likely than you think. Review to come but for now, some thoughts on Palestinian political strategizing!
There’s an argument to be made that Palestinians cannot utilize both decolonization methods and anti-apartheid movements, even if in essence, they mean the exact same thing. Both are talking about a free Palestine, from the river to the sea, with no or limited forms of Jewish self determination. The end of Israel as we know it. Palestine, from the river to the sea.
However, if the fight is for a decolonized Palestine, demanding rights in Israel doesn’t make sense. You are trying to build post-colonial Palestinian institutions. Israel is the settler colonist so cooperation with Israeli institutions validates the colonizer. Don’t normalize. This is the fight Palestinians have fought until now, why many East Jerusalemers refuse citizenship, why Hamas and Israel haven’t been able to sort out the Gaza sewage problem and so on.
Right now, we are seeing a gradual shift to an apartheid argument. This is a brilliant move because it changes the goal posts. Instead of Palestinians being asked to accept a two state solution, it becomes on Israel to explain why it rejects a one state solution. It's not an Israeli-Palestinian conflict but rather, an Israeli apartheid. Every Palestinian issue becomes a result of Israeli intentions and policies. Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad are fighting each other in Gaza? That’s part of Israel’s malicious policies. Families in Hebron are shooting each other? That’s Israel’s fault. It’s much harder to prove a lack of malicious intent than it is to claim that a policy is intentional discriminatory.
(as a side note, Israel should stop responding to this by crying antisemitism. Instead, I would love to see an Israeli response be “you want our army out? excellent, so do we, let’s go to Oslo”. This is a bit of dirty move as it’s clear no such deal can happen and Oslo was a massive failure but no dirtier than framing a century old conflict as an apartheid.)
At the same time, by changing the goal posts, the apartheid argument also has some costs to the prior Palestinian argument. First, it removes the validation for opposing the settlements. What’s the difference between Rehovot and Kiryat Arba? There’s no more temporary occupation, it’s all apartheid, governed under one body. De facto annexed. In fact, surely settlements should be welcomed as a way to mix up the two racial groups? Really, the zero Jews (sorry, 1 kidnapped Jew) of Gaza is a concerning sign for our upcoming bi-nationalism. This type of thinking also highlights some kind of realism- recognition that cities like Ariel aren't going anywhere.
Moreover, by giving up on the concept of separation, of “Palestinian fragmentation”, as coined by Amnesty International, the apartheid argument also recognizes that Israel has a right to exist in some way. This is a massive shift. It is also a subtle way of acknowledging that Israel is a functional state, a state that could, in theory, become the state for all Palestinians and Jews. More power sharing within the Israeli framework while dismantling the Jewish elements of Israel.
So then, ironically, the framework of apartheid marks the end of the Palestinian national struggle. No more national collective rights, this is about equal civil and political rights for Palestinians as an ethnic group in sovereign Israel from the river to the sea. Where is the State of Palestine in the so called Israeli apartheid? What does the Palestinian flag or anthem symbolize in the reality of one state Israel? When does it become Palestine?
That’s the reason why some Palestinians complained about the Amnesty report- the report doesn’t talk about settler-colonialism or occupation. It has an absurd paragraph about how occupation and apartheid can exist together and it shrugs the challenging issues here by suggesting that they are only talking about human rights, not self determination. It doesn’t validate Palestinian resistance because it does not acknowledge that Palestinians are a nation who are fighting for national independence. They’re just an ethnicity, a race in Israel.
I hold that the lack of clarity about these two strategies is what will continue to hold Palestinians back. Both the apartheid argument and the decolonization argument don’t really give Israelis any moves. They offer nothing to Israelis, not even the prospect of peace or the end of violence. Both settler colonial frameworks and apartheid arguments push aside the national elements of Judaism and it is precisely these elements of Judaism that matter the most to Israelis (and let’s be honest, to the Diaspora when things go wrong). No self determination for Jews is a nonstarter.
Moreover, they contradict each other. Is Israel meant to increase its reach in order to end the “apartheid” or to minimize its reach in order to “decolonize”? Should Israel step out of the West Bank or annex it? There’s a vagueness, both in explaining what a decolonized Palestine looks like and in proving where the apartheid is (the West Bank? Gaza? East Jerusalem? All of the land? Depends on who’s speaking).
Interestingly, the more I dig into the conflict, the more I respect that the international community clutches the two state solution. We all see that the two state solution isn’t happening but the grain of truth in the two state solution is recognition of Jewish and Palestinian self determination. Without such recognition, more violence is assured. This precisely bothers both Palestinians and Israelis who refuse the self determination of the other.
And ultimately, I ask, okay, if there’s an apartheid, how is it dismantled? And here we find that this is exactly like the question “how do we dismantle the occupation?” or "how do we dismantle the settler colonialism?". Exactly the same as the question asked by the British and the UN in 1947. The language is harsher towards Israel but it is exactly the same. We beat around the bush but it's not changing anything. It’s been here for a century and if we don’t face it, it’ll be here for another century.
Two people, one land. How can we govern? How do we live in this land together in a way that is both just and equal? In a way that recognizes the valid Jewish right for self determination but also allows Palestinians the self determination that they deserve? Claiming Palestine needs to be decolonized doesn’t solve this. Claiming Israel is an apartheid state doesn’t solve this. Signing documents that no one follows doesn’t solve this. Our way out needs to start with radical acceptance of a complex reality.
April 29, 2024
Moving, melancholy, and educational. Shehadeh, a Palestinian Christian lawyer, structures this book around six sarhat between the 1970s and 2006, explaining of his grandfather’s era:
It was mainly young men who went on these expeditions. They would take a few provisions and go to the open hills, disappear for the whole day, sometimes for weeks or months. They often didn’t have a particular destination. To go on a sarha was to roam freely, at will, without restraint. The verb form of the word means to let the cattle out to pasture early in the morning, leaving them to wander and graze at liberty. The commonly used noun sarha is a colloquial corruption of the classical word. A man going on a sarha wanders aimlessly, not restricted by time and place, going where his spirit takes him to nourish his soul and rejuvenate himself.”
He shares his love of the landscape in the West Bank, contrasting it with the view presented by orientalist travellers of the past who dismissed it as bleak and benighted. At the same time, Shehadeh is filled with mourning and struggling with anger as he sees the landscape vanishing through land seizures and the construction of Israeli settlements and highways that tear through the hills, adding concrete, sewage, and danger. He vividly describes the increasing restrictions on Palestinian sarhat and lives over the years, as new highways abut villages, the entrances of which are filled with concrete blocks, and prior journeys become impossible and fraught with peril.
This offered me a lot that I was unfamiliar with, and I really appreciated learning more about the geography, history, and experiences Shehadeh described. I was interested to read of his efforts to challenge land seizures in the legal system (especially tough once Palestinians were no longer allowed access to the land registry), and his critique of the Oslo Accords, which he saw as driven by the diasporic PLO’s desire for political recognition but lack of understanding of the realities of life and land for those in the West Bank. At the end of the book, Shehadeh shares a hashish pipe offered to him by a young Israeli settler with a gun who has grown up in a settlement and who loves the same landscape- but there is a strong sense that the divide between these two groups of neighbours may have grown too great to bridge. And all of this was almost 20 years ago. Much to think about. 4.5.
It was mainly young men who went on these expeditions. They would take a few provisions and go to the open hills, disappear for the whole day, sometimes for weeks or months. They often didn’t have a particular destination. To go on a sarha was to roam freely, at will, without restraint. The verb form of the word means to let the cattle out to pasture early in the morning, leaving them to wander and graze at liberty. The commonly used noun sarha is a colloquial corruption of the classical word. A man going on a sarha wanders aimlessly, not restricted by time and place, going where his spirit takes him to nourish his soul and rejuvenate himself.”
He shares his love of the landscape in the West Bank, contrasting it with the view presented by orientalist travellers of the past who dismissed it as bleak and benighted. At the same time, Shehadeh is filled with mourning and struggling with anger as he sees the landscape vanishing through land seizures and the construction of Israeli settlements and highways that tear through the hills, adding concrete, sewage, and danger. He vividly describes the increasing restrictions on Palestinian sarhat and lives over the years, as new highways abut villages, the entrances of which are filled with concrete blocks, and prior journeys become impossible and fraught with peril.
This offered me a lot that I was unfamiliar with, and I really appreciated learning more about the geography, history, and experiences Shehadeh described. I was interested to read of his efforts to challenge land seizures in the legal system (especially tough once Palestinians were no longer allowed access to the land registry), and his critique of the Oslo Accords, which he saw as driven by the diasporic PLO’s desire for political recognition but lack of understanding of the realities of life and land for those in the West Bank. At the end of the book, Shehadeh shares a hashish pipe offered to him by a young Israeli settler with a gun who has grown up in a settlement and who loves the same landscape- but there is a strong sense that the divide between these two groups of neighbours may have grown too great to bridge. And all of this was almost 20 years ago. Much to think about. 4.5.
May 20, 2021
This was such an incredibly moving account of the ways the landscape of Palestine has shifted through the ongoing occupation and settlements of Israelis. Told from a human rights lawyer who loves to take long walks through the Palestinian countryside, we are given a more intimate insight into who change has taken place not just in terms of the law, but in the very geography of the simple act of walking.
June 29, 2021
Przejmująca książka. Pod pięknymi opisami okolic, przyrody, pagórków, kamieni, krzewów i kwiatów kryją się ludzkie historie wysiedlania i zawłaszczania. Kiedy więc zmienia się krajobraz, przekształcany przez inwazyjne izraelskie osiedla, zmienia się także polityka, narasta wrażenie klaustrofobii, pod betonem znikają ludzie i ich dziedzictwo w imię "prawa". To jednocześnie piękny list miłosny do ojczyzny i jadowity komentarz na temat sytuacji w Palestynie.
December 12, 2021
The author, a native of Ramallah, is a Palestinian activist, land rights attorney and passionate walker. This is a collection of 6 essays organized around 6 hikes through the hills of Palestine over a span of 3 decades. These essays are directed to an international audience addressing the plight of Palestine. In these essays, he celebrates the beauty of the natural landscape and decries its destruction by the building of Israeli settlements, tells of being shot at by Palestinian soldiers and harassed and humiliated by Israeli soldiers, explains the unfairness of the Oslo Accords and their further violations by Israeli expansion, introduces Palestinians who had their ancestral land confiscated in violation of Israeli law or have been blocked from reaching their farm land by walls and check points. The reader leaves with an understanding of the anger, frustration and powerlessness felt by many Palestinians.
January 12, 2024
"Empires and conquerers come and go, but the land remains."
Shehadeh has written a spectacular, devastating, and highly informative memoir, wrapped in itself like layers of an onion: at its most simple, we as readers follow Shehadeh on his walks around the land he and his family have called home for generations, commenting on its natural beauty, its biblical history, and, of course, its status under israeli settler colonialism.
On another level, then, this book is an encounter: an encounter with fear, organized terror against Palestinians by settlers, which crops up in both expected places like military checkpoints, and in unexpected places, such as rock faces and picnic spots. Greenwashing invades even Shehadeh's hopes for the preservation of Palestine's natural beauty, whether in using "nature protections" as temporary diversions to make space for more settlements, or, even more sinisterly, in the creation of national parks out of seized land whose origin and exclusivity mirror the u.s.'s own system.
Finally, we are treated to the author's critical legal background, his tireless efforts to document and resist the occupation of Palestine and the concerted erasure of his work. We bear witness –– we bear witness, full stop –– but bear witness to the pained entreaties of his friends and colleagues as they seek legal redress against settlers who bend the law to their will.
Amidst it all, though Shehadeh is a generative and even fun companion, an energetic storyteller of even the most heartwrenching stories, and something of a polymath, whose legal expertise, longstanding interest in Palestine historically and geographically, and clear skill at the craft of writing blend to produce this powerful text.
Shehadeh has written a spectacular, devastating, and highly informative memoir, wrapped in itself like layers of an onion: at its most simple, we as readers follow Shehadeh on his walks around the land he and his family have called home for generations, commenting on its natural beauty, its biblical history, and, of course, its status under israeli settler colonialism.
On another level, then, this book is an encounter: an encounter with fear, organized terror against Palestinians by settlers, which crops up in both expected places like military checkpoints, and in unexpected places, such as rock faces and picnic spots. Greenwashing invades even Shehadeh's hopes for the preservation of Palestine's natural beauty, whether in using "nature protections" as temporary diversions to make space for more settlements, or, even more sinisterly, in the creation of national parks out of seized land whose origin and exclusivity mirror the u.s.'s own system.
Finally, we are treated to the author's critical legal background, his tireless efforts to document and resist the occupation of Palestine and the concerted erasure of his work. We bear witness –– we bear witness, full stop –– but bear witness to the pained entreaties of his friends and colleagues as they seek legal redress against settlers who bend the law to their will.
Amidst it all, though Shehadeh is a generative and even fun companion, an energetic storyteller of even the most heartwrenching stories, and something of a polymath, whose legal expertise, longstanding interest in Palestine historically and geographically, and clear skill at the craft of writing blend to produce this powerful text.
June 25, 2020
Can you imagine that the meadows and hills you enjoy hiking on can be annexed by people, deciding to settle on the land which had belonged to your nation and establishing that land theirs? This is exactly what happened when the state Israel was created and to this day Israelis illegally grab larger and larger areas of Palestine and give them to their citizens and Zionist immigrants.
Raja Shehadeh’s “Palestinian Walks. Notes on a Vanishing Landscape” is a nostalgic, personal reflection on six walks/treks, called in Arabic ‘sarha’, he has taken since the late 1970s. With each walk Shehadeh, esteemed lawyer and human rights activist, discovers the landscape changed, destroyed, and realises his own growing estrangement to previously well knows routes, hills and valleys. These realisations are always bitter and the grief is accompanied by the sensation of being a foreigner in his own country, to this day not recognised by all others. Shehadeh often reminiscences about the past, his family, the tribulations of his clients, or ponders on nature being obliterated for greedy settlers. Olive groves, wadis rich in wild flowers, fruit orchards - many still enchant only in memory of those who once knew them like their own backyard.
Israel carries out the systemic obliteration of Palestine and Palestinians and that’s a well known fact. For decades Israeli government has encouraged lawless land grabbing and discriminated against Palestinians in a variety of ways. Many lives were lost. Appeals to international organisations and pleas to world leaders haven’t yet brought Israeli leaders to human rights courts. Shehadeh shares his disappointment and his loss of hope that things will improve with the readers. In Palestine and Israel even walking and breathing gain a political dimension.
The book is a beautiful, full of sorrow and nostalgia diary which needs to be read. It shouldn’t be treated as a compendium on Palestinian-Israeli relations as it rewards most those who are familiar with history and the plight of Palestinians, and especially those who have been to Palestine. Still, everyone can reflect on the notions of home and loss with Shehadeh.
Raja Shehadeh’s “Palestinian Walks. Notes on a Vanishing Landscape” is a nostalgic, personal reflection on six walks/treks, called in Arabic ‘sarha’, he has taken since the late 1970s. With each walk Shehadeh, esteemed lawyer and human rights activist, discovers the landscape changed, destroyed, and realises his own growing estrangement to previously well knows routes, hills and valleys. These realisations are always bitter and the grief is accompanied by the sensation of being a foreigner in his own country, to this day not recognised by all others. Shehadeh often reminiscences about the past, his family, the tribulations of his clients, or ponders on nature being obliterated for greedy settlers. Olive groves, wadis rich in wild flowers, fruit orchards - many still enchant only in memory of those who once knew them like their own backyard.
Israel carries out the systemic obliteration of Palestine and Palestinians and that’s a well known fact. For decades Israeli government has encouraged lawless land grabbing and discriminated against Palestinians in a variety of ways. Many lives were lost. Appeals to international organisations and pleas to world leaders haven’t yet brought Israeli leaders to human rights courts. Shehadeh shares his disappointment and his loss of hope that things will improve with the readers. In Palestine and Israel even walking and breathing gain a political dimension.
The book is a beautiful, full of sorrow and nostalgia diary which needs to be read. It shouldn’t be treated as a compendium on Palestinian-Israeli relations as it rewards most those who are familiar with history and the plight of Palestinians, and especially those who have been to Palestine. Still, everyone can reflect on the notions of home and loss with Shehadeh.
December 12, 2023
tyle tu miłości i czułości do Palestyny, że również obecne gorycz i bezradność łamią serce, tym bardziej w kontekście bieżących wydarzeń
July 4, 2024
While I didn’t absorb all of this, it was a really great way to learn more about the occupation of Palestine from a new perspective. The descriptions of the hills was very evocative and reading about how the growing settlements have marred Palestine’s beautiful natural landscape is heartbreaking. Definitely want to read more of Shehadeh’s books after this one!
January 4, 2026
1st book of 2026.
Beautiful and sad.
5-stars.
Beautiful and sad.
5-stars.
Read
June 20, 2022Nonfiction essays centered around walks the author has taken, mostly in the hills around Ramallah. He is a Palestinian lawyer who has handled land use cases, which I felt provided a unique perspective. You get childhood memories, the beauty of nature, hiking for fun with friends.... and you ALSO get the past, present and future of the occupation of the West Bank from a legal and human rights point of view, which goes all the way from individual cases involving plots of land to international politics, PLO decisionmaking, etc.
All of this is written in an assured literary voice that brings across the splendor of the hills. The personal and the political are wonderfully intertwined, and there is something memorable at every step of the walk, be it a patch of wildflowers or a fossil or details about the PLO negotiating the Oslo Accords. The last walk is fictional, which I found unexpected and thought-provoking.
A standout book and now I need to read more from Raja Shehadeh!
____
Source of the book: Lawrence Public Library, who ordered it on my request, thank you!
All of this is written in an assured literary voice that brings across the splendor of the hills. The personal and the political are wonderfully intertwined, and there is something memorable at every step of the walk, be it a patch of wildflowers or a fossil or details about the PLO negotiating the Oslo Accords. The last walk is fictional, which I found unexpected and thought-provoking.
A standout book and now I need to read more from Raja Shehadeh!
____
Source of the book: Lawrence Public Library, who ordered it on my request, thank you!
November 19, 2022
a collections of memoirs reporting several walks around the hills of Ramallah, Jerusalem and the Dead Sea, through which the author narrates his struggles as a palestinian lawyer against the establishment of illegal isreali settlements in the occupied territories, and all its devastating consequences to the geography and identity of the palestinian land.
i was honestly impressed by the depth of the author’s historical, legal and geological knowledge of this area, knowledge that he used to fuel his purpose and his lifelong resistance against the occupation.
overall a very insightful and informative read, which however does come from a pretty nationalistic point of view: this doesnt take away from the legitimacy of the information and the history shared but obv not all of the author’s takes on them are 100% agreeable imo.
(no disrespect to mr shehadeh but when he said “they seemed to define themselves more in terms of Islam than as Palestinian nationalists” when talking about a group of young palestinians he met during his last walk… well sir GOOD FOR THEM, i stan!)
i was honestly impressed by the depth of the author’s historical, legal and geological knowledge of this area, knowledge that he used to fuel his purpose and his lifelong resistance against the occupation.
overall a very insightful and informative read, which however does come from a pretty nationalistic point of view: this doesnt take away from the legitimacy of the information and the history shared but obv not all of the author’s takes on them are 100% agreeable imo.
(no disrespect to mr shehadeh but when he said “they seemed to define themselves more in terms of Islam than as Palestinian nationalists” when talking about a group of young palestinians he met during his last walk… well sir GOOD FOR THEM, i stan!)
June 3, 2021
A tender love letter to the hills of Palestine, that also expresses the bitter heartbreak that flows from the settler colonial violence enacted upon the land and its people. Devastating and beautiful.
January 6, 2026
"Iść na sarhę znaczyło tyle, co wędrować swobodnie, tak jak się chce, bez ograniczeń." (s.28).
Shehadeh tak doskonale opisuje wzgórza Palestyny, że ma się wrażenie niemal fizycznego współuczestniczenia w sarha: czuje się nierówne podłoże, zapach oregano, raduje z zejścia w przyjemny cień, a przede wszystkim widzi się pełne kolorów i różnorodności krajobrazy. Tak jak inni ludzie Zachodu (choćby cytowany Mark Twain) miałam dotąd przed oczami tylko ponure pustkowia. Bez odpowiedniego, lokalnego przewodnika ciężko zmienić swoją optykę na wiele spraw, nie tylko przyrodniczych.
Każdy rozdział to jedna wędrówka (sarha), a te wydają się być coraz krótsze, coraz bardziej niebezpieczne, coraz bardziej zmienione – stopniowo ulatuje z nich dawny spokój, zachwyt przyrodą, a coraz więcej w nich żalu, melancholii i strachu.
Dokumentacja zanikania krajobrazu to równocześnie dokumentacja postępującej zagłady Palestyny, zamykania perspektyw na (pokojową) walkę, tłumienia nadziei na już nawet nie lepsze, ale jakiekolwiek jutro. Wiele jest tu symbolicznych porównań, wykorzystywania dwuznaczności terminów z zakresu topografii i architektury. Najbardziej zapamiętam jedną z ostatnich, gdy autor zabłądził, bo nic na terenie, w którym się wychował, nie wyglądało już znajomo: naturalne niegdyś wzgórza stały się labiryntem złożonym z osiedli osadników.
Shehadeh tak doskonale opisuje wzgórza Palestyny, że ma się wrażenie niemal fizycznego współuczestniczenia w sarha: czuje się nierówne podłoże, zapach oregano, raduje z zejścia w przyjemny cień, a przede wszystkim widzi się pełne kolorów i różnorodności krajobrazy. Tak jak inni ludzie Zachodu (choćby cytowany Mark Twain) miałam dotąd przed oczami tylko ponure pustkowia. Bez odpowiedniego, lokalnego przewodnika ciężko zmienić swoją optykę na wiele spraw, nie tylko przyrodniczych.
Każdy rozdział to jedna wędrówka (sarha), a te wydają się być coraz krótsze, coraz bardziej niebezpieczne, coraz bardziej zmienione – stopniowo ulatuje z nich dawny spokój, zachwyt przyrodą, a coraz więcej w nich żalu, melancholii i strachu.
Dokumentacja zanikania krajobrazu to równocześnie dokumentacja postępującej zagłady Palestyny, zamykania perspektyw na (pokojową) walkę, tłumienia nadziei na już nawet nie lepsze, ale jakiekolwiek jutro. Wiele jest tu symbolicznych porównań, wykorzystywania dwuznaczności terminów z zakresu topografii i architektury. Najbardziej zapamiętam jedną z ostatnich, gdy autor zabłądził, bo nic na terenie, w którym się wychował, nie wyglądało już znajomo: naturalne niegdyś wzgórza stały się labiryntem złożonym z osiedli osadników.
June 23, 2024
As with any book written by a Palestinian, this is an essential read. Palestinian Walks: Forays into a Vanishing Landscape takes place between 1978 and 2006 and is told from the perspective of a Palestinian who takes walks in the West Bank. As each chapter goes by, the nature so loved dwindles, the safety Palestinians have lessens, and the land that is rightfully theirs is no more.
This was incredibly hard hitting. To see something so simple as a walk, something that we can step outside and do easily without a second thought, be ripped from Palestinians so easily with no action from those outside was heartbreaking. From the River to the Sea.
“Before we left the hills I turned around. The sun was setting. The side of the hill we were on was shaded. Across the valley the limestone rocks reflected the muted light. I bid this valley farewell. I would not be coming back here for a long time. Perhaps not before this damned conflict with Israel with all its nasty consequences ends, if this should happen in my lifetime.”
This was incredibly hard hitting. To see something so simple as a walk, something that we can step outside and do easily without a second thought, be ripped from Palestinians so easily with no action from those outside was heartbreaking. From the River to the Sea.
“Before we left the hills I turned around. The sun was setting. The side of the hill we were on was shaded. Across the valley the limestone rocks reflected the muted light. I bid this valley farewell. I would not be coming back here for a long time. Perhaps not before this damned conflict with Israel with all its nasty consequences ends, if this should happen in my lifetime.”
March 2, 2024
An extremely important book for the current year and all the years since 1948. It’s hard to read knowing the state of the land and people now but necessary imo
Free Palestine
Free Palestine
January 16, 2024
This book is a documentation of Raja Shahadeh’s six walks in Palestine, starting from 1978 to 2006. He’s a Palestinian lawyer and author who used to assist his clients in matters of the land. When settlers began taking over Palestinian land, the author was faced with many such cases where Palestinians would contest their land and Israel would use the ambiguities in the law to take advantage and use the law against them.
The physical treks in this book described showcase the beauty of the Ramallah hills, and how aesthetically pleasing the land was but the settlers made their homes on top of hills. Permanent structure which had no consideration for the topography, and to top it all, the settlers had no regard for the Palestinians who now faced a lot of trouble commuting between hills.
Areas where the author could initially walk without any interruption changed, as Israeli settlements grew with time. He has been shot at in these hills, he has been threatened with arrest and constantly talks about the olive trees, and their brutal uprooting which has been taken over by the Israels.
The book is a little bit dense, and it takes time but it is one that I would highly recommend.
The physical treks in this book described showcase the beauty of the Ramallah hills, and how aesthetically pleasing the land was but the settlers made their homes on top of hills. Permanent structure which had no consideration for the topography, and to top it all, the settlers had no regard for the Palestinians who now faced a lot of trouble commuting between hills.
Areas where the author could initially walk without any interruption changed, as Israeli settlements grew with time. He has been shot at in these hills, he has been threatened with arrest and constantly talks about the olive trees, and their brutal uprooting which has been taken over by the Israels.
The book is a little bit dense, and it takes time but it is one that I would highly recommend.
July 27, 2022
This is an incredible book that was both enjoyable and informative. The introduction alone was beautifully written. The only part that I did not love was the ending, but it is hard to write a satisfactory ending for an ongoing tragedy, so this is no fault of the author.
It is troubling to read some of what has transpired in the past years, and even more daunting to face the fact that so much more has happened since he wrote this in 2007.
It is troubling to read some of what has transpired in the past years, and even more daunting to face the fact that so much more has happened since he wrote this in 2007.
May 18, 2021
Israel didn’t just wake up one day and suddenly become an apartheid state. It spent decades using legal manipulation, physical violence, and a whole lot of US dollars to systematically oppress Palestinians and tear apart once beautiful landscapes. Shehadeh reminds us of what is at stake and what has already been lost to Palestinian families who have cared for the West Bank over generations.
May 25, 2012
I really enjoyed reading this book. It is full of emotions and facts that would help the reader how it feels to live in Palestine. Looking forward reading other books by the author
January 21, 2024
4.5 stars
This was very good. The ending was equally heartbreaking and enraging.
This was very good. The ending was equally heartbreaking and enraging.
on-hold
March 26, 2024@20%
October 15, 2025
Written with emotion & delicacy, Palestinian Walks tells the honest truth of the changes Palestine has encountered within the last three decades. Raja speaks from his many sarhas (walks) through his land guided by himself & others & the dangers that have risen since Israel started claiming that land.
This book is a true example of the generosity, kindness, & compromise Palestinians have shown despite living in the most gruesome of times.
A quote that will stay with me is: “I was fully aware of the looming tragedy & war that lay ahead of us… but for now, he & I could sit together for a respite… joined temporarily by our mutual love of the land. “
This book is a true example of the generosity, kindness, & compromise Palestinians have shown despite living in the most gruesome of times.
A quote that will stay with me is: “I was fully aware of the looming tragedy & war that lay ahead of us… but for now, he & I could sit together for a respite… joined temporarily by our mutual love of the land. “
September 22, 2024
Spojrzenie na konflikt izraelsko palestyński i Zachodni Brzeg z perspektywy tej ziemi, krajobrazu, przyrody. Świat zmienia się, ginie i jest tracony bezpowrotnie, wszyscy przegrywają. Ważna książka, smutny obraz i pewnie nierozwiązywalny konflikt.
December 14, 2023
Six walks in the hills and the valleys of the West Bank over two decades with thoughts and discussion about the changing ecological landscape, encroaching Israeli illegal settlements, entrenched occupation, and the author's changing mood over the years about his attempts to fight against Israel occupation using the legal system. I'm going to look for more books by Raja Shehadeh.
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