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The Revolution of 1936-1939 in Palestine
Publicado originalmente em árabe em 1972, A revolução palestina de 1936-1939 é um modelar exercício de síntese de Ghassan Kanafani sobre as bases políticas e econômicas por trás da criação do Estado de Israel, em 1948. Nascido em 1936 em Acre, na Palestina, Kanafani começa a experimentar o exílio com sua família aos 12 anos, sendo obrigado a viver entre Líbano e Síria na juventude. Formado em literatura na Universidade de Damasco, tornou-se professor de artes de crianças palestinas deslocadas. Em decorrência de perseguição política, trabalha como professor entre 1955 e 1960 no Kuwait. Aos 24 anos, retorna a Beirute e aprofunda seus estudos e militância marxistas, tornando-se membro da Frente Popular para a Libertação da Palestina e editando sua revista semanal. Ao longo de sua breve mas intensa vida, escreveu 18 livros e diversos artigos tematizando a luta de seu povo. Foi assassinado em Beirute, aos 36 anos, num atentado à bomba assumido pelo Mossad. Focando nas raízes imperialistas subjacentes aos conflitos locais, a presente edição do livro ainda conta com textos recentes da educadora popular Layan Fuleihan, do chefe do departamento de pesquisa do Instituto de Estudos sobre a Palestina, Maher Al-Charif e do jornalista e pesquisador Breno Altman.
- GenresNonfictionHistory
118 pages, Paperback
Published July 14, 2023
8 people are currently reading
124 people want to read
About the author
Ghassan Kanafani
94 books2,136 followersGhassan Kanafani (Arabic: غسان كنفاني)
Ghassan Kanafani was a Palestinian journalist, fiction writer, and a spokesman for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). Kanafani died at the age of 36, assassinated by car bomb in Beirut, By the Israeli Mossad
Ghassan Fayiz Kanafani was born in Acre in Palestine (then under the British mandate) in 1936. His father was a lawyer, and sent Ghassan to a French missionary school in Jaffa. During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, Kanafani and his family fled to Lebanon, but soon moved on to Damascus, Syria, to live there as Palestinian refugees.
After studying Arabic literature at the University of Damascus, Kanafani became a teacher at the Palestinian refugee camps in Syria. There, he began writing short stories, influenced by his contact with young children and their experiences as stateless citizens.
In 1960 he moved to Beirut, Lebanon, where he became the editor of several newspapers, all with an Arab nationalist affiliation. In Beirut, he published the novel Men in the Sun (1962). He also published extensively on literature and politics, focusing on the the Palestinian liberation movement and the refugee experience, as well as engaging in scholarly literary criticism, publishing several books about post-1948 Palestinian and Israeli literature.
Ghassan Kanafani was a Palestinian journalist, fiction writer, and a spokesman for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). Kanafani died at the age of 36, assassinated by car bomb in Beirut, By the Israeli Mossad
Ghassan Fayiz Kanafani was born in Acre in Palestine (then under the British mandate) in 1936. His father was a lawyer, and sent Ghassan to a French missionary school in Jaffa. During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, Kanafani and his family fled to Lebanon, but soon moved on to Damascus, Syria, to live there as Palestinian refugees.
After studying Arabic literature at the University of Damascus, Kanafani became a teacher at the Palestinian refugee camps in Syria. There, he began writing short stories, influenced by his contact with young children and their experiences as stateless citizens.
In 1960 he moved to Beirut, Lebanon, where he became the editor of several newspapers, all with an Arab nationalist affiliation. In Beirut, he published the novel Men in the Sun (1962). He also published extensively on literature and politics, focusing on the the Palestinian liberation movement and the refugee experience, as well as engaging in scholarly literary criticism, publishing several books about post-1948 Palestinian and Israeli literature.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
May 4, 2025
Free Palestine. You just gotta take a step back and admire that a literary writer as accomplished as Ghassan Kanafani could also write such an astute, objective political analysis, one that still seems helpful/definitive about this era (definitely worth waving a copy around whenever Zionism's defenders resort, as they will, tirelessly and tiresomely, to tropes about religious enmity lasting for millennia-- Kanafani situates the revolution in a particular political and economic moment, where poverty and joblessness and stigmatizing of Arab workers finally produced the conditions for anti colonial action). You can read this one in a day and probably should!
December 25, 2025
Dang that’s quick AND thorough !
April 18, 2025
video book review: https://youtu.be/1iFxBQoz1qs
Sometimes we can be so impressed with Kanafani's fiction writing that we can be distracted from his political and historical works, which provide vital commentary on some documents and records that are now under Israel lock and key.
My enduring lesson from this book is that 1936-1939 present in a nutshell what has been happening since the Balfour Declaration:
Jews and Zionists expel Palestinians from their historic land with the assistance of a colonial power
Palestinians don't take it lying down, fight back
Palestinians are brutally repressed and murdered
Cycle repeats
Sometimes we can be so impressed with Kanafani's fiction writing that we can be distracted from his political and historical works, which provide vital commentary on some documents and records that are now under Israel lock and key.
My enduring lesson from this book is that 1936-1939 present in a nutshell what has been happening since the Balfour Declaration:
Jews and Zionists expel Palestinians from their historic land with the assistance of a colonial power
Palestinians don't take it lying down, fight back
Palestinians are brutally repressed and murdered
Cycle repeats
March 19, 2025
“Ghassan Kanafani paid great attention to the great Revolution of 1936-1939... because he recognized that it was the defeat of that revolution that paved the way for the occurrence of the Palestinian Nakba in 1948." - from the afterword.
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Kanafani concludes that "the trinity of enemies” are “Zionist colonization, the British Mandate, and Arab reactionary forces locally [feudal landowners] and regionally [Arab regimes]". He is highly critical of the bourgeoisie and emphasizes the role played by peasants at the time.
“[the 1967 war] also created a new mechanism for imperialist invasion and aggression in the region, marking the first time a United Nations (UN) member state would justify initiating military conflict using the threat of anticipated attack; a tactic indispensable to the imperialist playbook in the region still today." Unreal how prescient this statement is. Think: Iraq invasion, countless Gaza ‘wars’… etc.
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"a colonizer who cannot accept the humanity of the colonized, because, like the clarity of a polished mirror, it forces him to confront his own inhumanity." - from the foreword.
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Kanafani concludes that "the trinity of enemies” are “Zionist colonization, the British Mandate, and Arab reactionary forces locally [feudal landowners] and regionally [Arab regimes]". He is highly critical of the bourgeoisie and emphasizes the role played by peasants at the time.
“[the 1967 war] also created a new mechanism for imperialist invasion and aggression in the region, marking the first time a United Nations (UN) member state would justify initiating military conflict using the threat of anticipated attack; a tactic indispensable to the imperialist playbook in the region still today." Unreal how prescient this statement is. Think: Iraq invasion, countless Gaza ‘wars’… etc.
- - -
"a colonizer who cannot accept the humanity of the colonized, because, like the clarity of a polished mirror, it forces him to confront his own inhumanity." - from the foreword.
January 19, 2025
I read the original pamphlet by Ghassan Kanafani many years ago. This translation is a masterpiece with respect to the care that was given to the process. Also, the ancillary material - timeline, glossary, introductions and afterword all bring a great deal more context to Kanafani's meaningful analysis of the Palestinian Revolution.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews