Extract from 'Here, There, In Between' a book of poetry and stories by members of the Kinsale Road Accommodation Centre Writers’ Group.
This morning is the most joyful in our lives. The noise of celebration from people in the refugee camp has awakened everyone. People are running down to the streets to celebrate. The United Nations has just unanimously adopted the long-awaited resolution that all Palestinians who were displaced from their homes in 1948 and 1967 must be allowed to return to their own places. The third generation is entitled to live in the lands that have been occupied and used by Israel for 70 years. Israel is ordered to facilitate the return of the indigenous people by all means, and any resistance to this resolution will be met with force.
Israelis are panicked. Their military forces are not blocking our city entrances, we can’t find them in our sight! People run into their cars, leaving their homes in the camp open and unattended. They are running to kiss the soil of their grandparents. I drive the car, taking my brothers and sisters to our abandoned city of Beit Jibrin.
We start dancing and singing the national anthem. For the first time in our lives, we are crossing street junctions, passing one village after another without seeing any Israeli soldiers. Oh my God, the breath of freedom is exciting.
Now, we are in front of the apartheid wall gate. The scene is amazing! The gate
that used to hold us for 3 hours before letting us pass is collapsed. Soldiers who used to persecute tens of thousands of people every morning are no longer there. We are seeing the whole world through this collapsed gate that used to block our dreams and our vision. A few hundred meters beyond the apartheid wall, the domain of our beloved abandoned town begins. Israelis had a huge investment in altering its Palestinian identity and converted it to a tourist attraction. But the town recognizes us. We feel like it is opening its arms to welcome us back.
“Where are your grandparents?” the town asks.
“Oh my love, these are 70 years, do you expect them to live this long?” I answer.
“So sad, I miss you all my descendants, life is meaningless without you!” the
town replies.
“Don’t worry my love, finally justice has been enforced and we are back. My
parents passed the house keys and title deeds to us. Where are our properties?” I asked.
“Come on in. Forget about the keys, they didn’t leave doors for you. Here is your
grandparents’ house, and here is your farm. You will find the well at its corner, full of grass and rubbish.”
Every one of us is walking in a different direction. We can’t believe we are being
allowed to walk around on such a vast piece of land. For three generations, we were left to live in a house of 150 square meters, that was build to replace the United Nations tent. The family has grown to become 25 men and women. Finding ourselves claiming back our 20 acre piece of land is just like taking us from prison to freedom. I step into my grandparents’ abandoned house.
Although we could keep rust away from the key,
the door is too rusty. The door is half open, and it seems as if it used to be a shelter for wild animals. Grass has grown into the wall cracks and between the tiles. Wind blows and passes through the windows freely; the lean years have eaten the glass and most of the woody frames. The remains of the bathroom and kitchen tell the story of my grandparents’ lifestyle. The authenticity of our indigenousness is being proved by every stone, and everything that remains.
We spend the whole day looking around the farm. Every time we finish
navigating the place, we start from the beginning as if we have just started. We look like children who were lost, and have just returned home. The sun is setting and we must leave. The place needs a lot of rehabilitation to become habitable. Although we are keen to spend our night lying on the grass, we decide that it isn’t safe to stay overnight. Although we were born and raised in the refugee camp, we feel so scared to return to it. Who likes to return to the prison after serving a life sentence?
I start the car, hoping it won’t start. Drive away slowly, hoping it won’t drive. No
one is singing or celebrating this return route. The closer to the refugee camp we get, the sadder we become. We feel the sadness covering the whole town.
“There are no colonizers anymore, why are you leaving, descendants?” says the town.
“Don’t worry my love, we will be bringing our tools and coming back tomorrow”, I
reply.
We arrive at the refugee camp, just realizing that we didn’t lock the doors in the
morning. None of us touch the door handle to enter the house. Our neighbors gather to chat about their experiences during the day, and how beautiful they found their towns as well. People no longer want to enter their tents that developed into houses, as if the United Nations want to lock them in again.
My mother awakens me to have my breakfast before I go to work in the camp’s
UN school.
I ask her, “aren’t we going to Beit Jibrin?”
“Beit Jibrin? Huh, what did you dream last night?” said my mother.
“Oh mom, don’t say I was dreaming!” I reply.
“If it was Beit Jibrin, then it’s a dream, my son. A return to Beit Jibrin needs you
to awake, needs our people to awake, needs international conscience to awake, and needs international laws to be enforced equally on the powerful and the weak. Son, what was taken by force, can’t be returned by dreams”.
Download the book in PDF format at http://www.corkcitylibraries.ie/aboutus/librarypublications/here_there_in_between.pdf
