How the Nakba erased great Palestinian cities, and their women, from our collective memory

Previous contributions to such discourse include, but are not limited to, books such as The Mountain Against the Sea: A Study of Palestinian Modernity by Palestinian sociologist Salim Tamari (2005) and Before Their Diaspora: A Photographic History of the Palestinians 1876-1948 by Palestinian historian Walid Khalidi (1987).

As for Hassan's book, it examines the obscurement of Palestinian cities and their women through a variety of research tools and sources, including antiquities, oral history, photographs, stories, autobiographies, and newspaper clippings.

Hassan had to adopt these cross-methodological tools to compensate for a dearth of readily available information. Palestinian cities lack organised archives, including municipal archives and urban institutions, as many records have been destroyed or looted by Israeli colonisation.

The resulting diversity of sources creates a layered narrative, as Hassan compiles Palestinian accounts about vanished cities and their ruins – as though they were a lost paradise.

Overcoming 'official' records

The use of alternative sources and tools, following in the footsteps of Indian studies on subalterns (marginalised people), have been crucial in writing history from the "bottom up". Here, they've helped tell the story of colonised Palestinians, as reflected in the question, "Can the subaltern speak?"

Palestinians have had to develop their oral history and social history, as well as related methodological tools, to compensate for an absence of official sources. Even in cases where official records exist, they are often controlled, biased and prejudiced against Palestinians.

Thus, by using less conventional methods, Hassan is able to reveal parts of Palestine's vanishing narrative.

Before the Nakba, Palestinian cities held a high status. They experienced expandsion, both in number and in quality. Journalism thrived, cinemas and cafes opened, and a cultural scene (spanning visual arts and literature) emerged.

In addition, political and trade union associations were established, and women participated in them at both political and cultural levels.

Women also played a military role, as the history of the "Chrysanthemum (Zahrat al-Uqhowan) Organisation" shows. As part of feminist organising efforts, scout troops and first aid squads were founded in Palestinian cities.

Decline of the patriarchy

The modernisation of Palestinian society before the Nakba led to the decline of patriarchal structures. The city was liberated, as women, families, and other members of society were freed from the burden of traditional structures.

In this way, the city played a major role in reviving the spirit of civilisation, transitioning it from traditional and paternalistic lifestyles to more contemporary ones.

This is the essence of the debate that the researcher weaves in the book about the destruction of the Palestinian city as a civil, cultural, political, and social space that contributed to the emancipation and development of women at institutional, social, and cultural levels.

The disappearance of the Palestinian city on the eve of the 1948 Nakba led to the subsequent disappearance of Palestinian women. It also collapsed the ladder of modernity in Palestinian urban society.

Before Palestinian cities and women were hidden from view, women were prospering in various fields and were encouraged to both study and work.

They established specialised maternity and children's hospitals and kindergartens. They founded workshops, associations and aviation clubs. Women even set up sports committees and organised summer camps and trips.

Women in culture

Not only were women more visible in the professional arena, but in daily leisure, too.

They visited recreational spaces like public parks, Mediterranean beaches, and the shores of Lake Tiberias. They sat in cafes and cinemas alongside their husbands, brothers, and fathers.

Cultural spaces were no longer exclusive to men; they were playgrounds for entertainment, work, culture, and business for women, as well.

Women additionally became involved in the theatre, public lectures, opera performances, and more. They also contributed to creating in-between spaces (i.e. women's heterotopic spaces) in cities, such as reception parties.

These events brought together dozens of women and took place in private homes, typically in the salon or the garden.

Attendance was limited to adult women, mostly from the middle and upper classes, and neither men nor underage girls were allowed to attend. These receptions turned into recreational, educational, and sometimes political spaces in which women discussed various social issues.

Some assume that the Palestinian women's movement during the British Mandate in Palestine emerged from these heterotopic spaces. This notion has some validity, as evidenced by women's protests and feminist conferences (involving middle- and upper-class women) that broke out in cities like Jerusalem and Jaffa.

While these receptions were often a meeting spot for women of a certain class, rural women were instead involved in intensive fieldwork, which prevented them from participating in protests, unions, and cultural activities held in major Palestinian cities.

Financial independence

The modernisation of Palestinian society was not limited to trade union struggles and political or social initiatives. It also impacted consumption patterns and led to the rise of new tastes, particularly among wealthy men and women.

Sewing and fashion design became more popular in Palestinian society, as traditional garment factories did not adequately meet the needs of the market. The growth of the tailoring profession provided women with financial independence.

This, in turn, facilitated the professional development of women who learned the trade of seamstresses and provided opportunities for self-education.

Many women ran sewing workshops in their private spaces – often a room in their homes – making them more active members of the labour market, too.

The Nakba's devastating impact

But the Nakba put an end to much of this advancement. It led to the fragmentation and dispersion of Palestinian society. The catastrophe had a devastating impact on Palestinian cities and their paths of modernisation.

This affected the growth of the Palestinian women's movement, political organisations, trade unions, cultural clubs and other recreational and professional activities that had flourished and begun to develop before the Nakba.

This significant rupture in progress created turmoil within the Palestinian community, which remained rooted in occupied Palestine after 1948.

Most were living in rural areas and villages, due to the absence of Palestinian cities, especially central cities such as Haifa and Jaffa. Although the city of Nazareth remained and was not destroyed, it was subjected to Israeli military rule, like the rest of the Palestinian community, until 1966.

And so, the process of modernising Palestinian society in the territories of 1948 led to an urbanisation that lacked a physical city, instead evoking an imagined one. Here, the course of ruralisation became more pronounced.

Forgotten memories of the real Palestine

The disappearance of the Palestinian city in 1948 has not proven to be a momentary or temporary situation. I

nstead, the absence of the city as an urban and civic space continues to influence the structure of Palestinian consciousness and the processes of remembrance, narration, and imagination today.

When thinking of Palestine today, whether culturally or politically, the mind invokes a rural landscape that simultaneously hides the view of both the city and its women, while disrupting the course of Palestinian modernisation, which has been eradicated due to violence, erasure, and displacement.

This has been mirrored in various forms of self-expression, including visual arts, cinema and embroidery.

Hassan's book adds a serious argument to discussions of the Palestinian memory and to academic discourse: the Palestinian city and a group of its women – or, rather, an elite group of the city's women – were on the path to refinement.

Indeed, Hassan portrays Palestine as a land with a people, dispelling any depictions of Palestinians as primitive or exotic beings, as seen through the lens of colonial anthropology.

Hassan's book is worth reading and studying, as it valiantly resists the ongoing erasure, looting, obliteration, and disruption that Palestine has been subjected to ever since the Nakba.