My Palestine

To my satisfaction, by the end of the pandemic the first draft of the manuscript was ready. Yet as fate would have it, time was not on his side and my father very sadly passed away in January 2022 before the editing of his manuscript was complete, his heart weakened by old age. There are not enough pages to describe the immeasurable sense of loss and grief I felt at the passing of my father. My only consolation was that I held in my hands a manuscript that he cherished and on which he had worked during the final years and days of his life. In trying to dampen the feeling of his absence, I felt a certain solace in dedicating my time to bringing to fruition this project, and I was pleased when Haus Publishing expressed a desire to take over where my father had left off and publish the book that you now hold in your hands. I am grateful that my father’s last words to the world have been eternalised in this memoir.

The theme of this book is Palestine and its history, and the displacement and exile of its people. But it is, above all, a human story. Personal tragedy and national tragedy cannot be decoupled. And no one can fully grasp the seismic events that have transformed the Middle East over the past hundred years, including the gradual erasure of Palestine – or begin to consider solutions to the ongoing injustice faced by the Palestinian people – without first understanding the very real and transformative consequences of these events for ordinary Palestinians and their lives, identities and culture. Many people know about Palestine, but fewer know about the Palestinians themselves, who continue to experience prejudice and dehumanising portrayals in the Western media. My father’s story makes the basic point that, like all people, the Palestinians are made of flesh and blood and their children feel the agony of pain as strongly as they enjoy the warmth of happiness.

His personal odyssey, against all odds, is also an inspiring account of how determination, modesty, the kindness of strangers, intellectual curiosity and vision can help overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles. His journey from Palestine to Europe was filled with bumpy roads and any external onlooker would have deemed his plan to hitchhike from Jericho to Switzerland, inspired by a Swiss postcard featuring the Alps, to be veering on fantasy. His personal success conveys the message that with resilience and hard work nothing is impossible. Despite that, his exile was impossible – to him – because he could never leave Palestine behind. His attachment to his homeland was too strong and his identity as a Palestinian too endangered to ever forget or move on.