"Ramzy, I must admit it, it's so hard being a Palestinian these days.." That's how a friend of mine, a dedicated individual who is spending her days and years advocating justice for the Palestinian people, ended a distressing message to me a few months back. I recall her words often, and as often I recall my grandfather who died in a refugee camp's mud home, away from his village and land.
My grandpa believed that being a Palestinian was a blessing. "You cannot be entrusted to defend a more virtuous cause than the cause of Palestine, unless Allah has blessed you greatly," he once told me.
I often wondered what kept the old man going. He lost his home and the pride of his life, his land, and was forced at gunpoint to haul his family away and leave the village of Beit Daras where they once lived happily. He spent the rest of his life, getting old and tired in a refugee camp, for many years in a tent, then in a mud house subsidized by the United Nations. He died there, next to a transistor radio.
Grandpa's radio was once green, yet its color faded to white somehow. It was battered, and covered with duct tape, just enough to keep it whole. The old man cared little for the look of the radio. All that mattered was that the radio managed to broadcast the news, the "Voice of London" in Arabic, the "Middle East Radio" or the "Voice of the Arabs" were constantly on. At night, he tucked the radio beside him and went to bed, to start his next morning with the latest news.
He fancied that one of these days the radio would declare that Palestinian refugees were allowed to go back home. He carried that fantasy until he died, at the age of 95, decades after he was forced out of Palestine.
We would see grandpa walking toward the radio briskly from the kitchen, or waking up abruptly from an afternoon nap, fervently asking, while pointing at the radio: "Did they just say something about refugees?"
"No grandpa, they haven't," one of us would reply with a juvenile smile. He would return back to his chore, carrying the weight of many years, and his unending hope.
But grandpa died, a few years before the start of the Palestinian uprising of 1987. He was too old to walk, to argue with grandma for not feeding the chickens on time, or to converse with an equally ailing neighbor. But never too old to hold his little radio, lovingly, with a final desperate hope that the long awaited news segment about his return to his village would be declared.
When grandpa gasped his last breath, all of his friends and family stood by muttering verses from the Quran as many tears were shed that day. I, too, stood close to him, frightened of confronting my first experience with death. He made it easy on me, as he had a smile on his face, and near him was a radio with the volume lowered, but never muted.
The year of his death was a year that many older refugees also passed away. They were buried in a graveyard surrounded by the graves of younger refugees, mostly martyrs who fell throughout the years.
I wish I could have managed to keep grandpa's old radio. But when I left my refugee camp, I did manage to smuggle many memories, his undying hope, and his pride of being a Palestinian.
Very often, and now more than ever, I recall the words of my friend about how difficult it is being a Palestinian these days. I recall it with every Palestinian child killed or home demolished, with every speech that President Bush makes outlining his visionless vision of the Middle East; I recalled it when a Brussels's court denied Palestinians the right to try Ariel Sharon for his massacres in Lebanon; I recalled it when a Dutch officer held me for a long time delaying the entire flight while investigating me for the mere fact that I was born in Gaza; I recall it when my father talks to me on the phone just to tell me that the Israelis are bombing his neighborhood; I recall it not every day, but every hour.
But I also recall my grandpa's words: "You cannot be entrusted to defend a more virtuous cause, the cause of Palestine, unless Allah has blessed you greatly."
I often wondered why old, dispossessed and ailing grandpa died in a mud house with a smile on his face. We will all die one day, rich and poor, citizens and stateless, Palestinians and Israelis, presidents and refugees. It's that final and decisive moment, when grandpa gasped his last breath that counts. He lived a hard life, a refugee, with his dearest possession, a battered transistor radio. But he died a Palestinian, who never compromised on his rights. He died proud, with a smile, leaving us with nothing but a transistor and an abundance of hope.
Grandpa never returned to his village of Beit Daras, but I know that one day my children will.
Ramadan Ended! Now What?
Date posted: October 26, 2006
By Dana Shalash for MIFTAH
So today is the third day of Eid Al Fitr that all Muslims worldwide celebrate right after the culmination of the month of Ramadan. Not sure if it’s only me, but Ramadan seems to have lost its glory. Years ago when I was a child, people’s attitudes towards both Ramadan and Eid (festival) were way different than now. Maybe I have grown up to the extent that I see in them nothing but the mere fact that few arrogant relatives come for a visit for a couple of minutes, and everyone just sucks them up.
It has been a gloomy day in deed. Being self-centered often times, I thought that my own family never enjoyed the Ramadan that other people celebrate. But the night prior to the Eid, I went for a drive to Ramallah with my uncle and three sisters, we toured around Al Manara and the mall a bit, and felt the legendary atmosphere. People were happy. That hit me; I am not accustomed to seeing them vividly preoccupied with the preparation for the big “day.”
So I came back home and wrote to all my contacts wishing them a Happy Eid and expressed my astonishment and satisfaction to see promising smiles in the crowded streets of Ramallah. But the sad part was that I knew it was merely fleeting moments and that those smiles would be wiped off soon. Not only have my fears become true, but I was blind. Yes, blind. Or may be I just chose not to see it. May be I wanted to believe that we are actually happy.
Would I miss Ramadan? NO. Not really. It has been made hell this year.
While Ramadan is believed to be the holy month during which people get closer to Allah by fasting from food and drink all day long and focus on their faith instead, I am not pretty sure this was the case with us Palestinians. It was only a drug. Ramadan numbed our pain. We could handle both the Israeli and Palestinian political, economic, and security pressure knowing that the day of salvation was approaching; the Eid. But after the three days elapsed, then what?
Now thousands of Palestinians are waiting for the next phase. It has been seven months now. Seven months, and thousands of the PA employees have not received their salaries. And two months elapsed with millions of students deprived form their right of education. I have three sisters and two brothers who do nothing but stay at home. They have not attended school from the very beginning of this term. It is both sad and frustrating that they have to “do the time” and pay a high price.
Reading the news headlines on the first days of Eid is not healthy at all. It lessens the effect of the drug, and one starts to get sober. Sounds funny in deed, but that was the case.
Few minutes ago, I surfed some of the blogs and came across few Iraqi bloggers writing on both Ramadan and Eid. If the titles did not mention “in Iraq,” I swear I could never tell the difference between Iraq and Palestine. The hunger, misery, constant killing, and lack of security are all Palestinian symptoms.
I am speechless now; I can hardly verbalize the so many conflicting thoughts. Heaven knows how things would be like next Ramadan, but I would not speculate it already. It is not time to worry about it now, other issues are on stake; food, money, and education. Until then, there are a lot of things to sort out.
