Samaa Abu Sharar
DURING A VIRTUAL CONVERSATION with a South African friend at the beginning of the month of June, Nurah made a striking contrast between what is happening in Palestine and the apartheid system that had existed in her home country. Watching the ethnic cleansing taking place in the Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan neighborhoods in Occupied East Jerusalem brought back memories of horrific stories Nurah had heard from her parents during apartheid in South Africa.
Nurah and several other foreign friends felt the resemblance more than ever during the Palestinian Habah, the rise of Palestinians everywhere during the uprising of May 2021. “Something seems different this time,” they all agreed. Something actually does seem different, even for us, Palestinians. The world’s championing of our cause for the first time ever, along with the rise of promising new, young activists, eloquent and capable of reaching out to millions of audiences on social media, while live-streaming unfolding events in Palestine and, ultimately, spurring the relative change in the terminology used to describe the long-term Israeli colonization of Palestine—all are notable changes.
My generation has inherited the defeats of our parents and grandparents before them and I thought, until very recently, that I would pass on these defeats to my daughter, Meena. Nothing on the horizon seemed to give me a glimmer of hope that this would not be the case, until the Palestinian Habah heralded a new reality which, if not sabotaged by the Palestinian “leadership,” could be the first step on the long road to dignity, liberation and return to our homeland.
We are often told that “our life choices are those of our making.” In the case of most Palestinians, I believe choice is a luxury that we often dare not indulge in, as we have inherited a heavy load—a lingering political cause, from even before we were born. I was born to Palestinian parents from Hebron: my father, Majed Abu Sharar, originated from the village of Dura while my mother, Fatima Al Azzeh, originated from the village of Beit Jibrin. Their marriage and, later, their life choices have certainly framed my journey, despite their early and abrupt departure from my life.
My life was a rollercoaster of events, thanks to my parents and more so to my father, who chose to include us in the life he was leading and not exclude us as other Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) leaders did with their children.10 This meant that we would follow the PLO to wherever it took as a base.
My parents brought me to life in Khoubar, Saudi Arabia, where my father worked at the time as a Chief Editor of Al Ayam newspaper before joining and heading the “Fatah” movement in the Gulf country. Jordan was his next obvious stop, where we lived for a few years, until the PLO’s departure following the events of Black September in 1970. My only vague recollection of that period, as a kid, is that of my brother Salam and I hiding under the dining table, believing what our mother would repeatedly tell us—that this would protect us from the shelling outside.11
Lebanon was our next stop, as it was for many of the PLO cadres and families. Lebanon, the closest to what I would ever call home, became the country where my life took some shape. The land of cedars is where I witnessed, and continue to witness, all forms of wars, conflicts, injustices, discrimination and suffering. This tiny country would become the place where I would become reconciled with the many losses I endured on both the public and personal level, would discover the pride of being a Palestinian and translate it into activism, despite all odds.
I lost my birth mother to cancer at the age of eight and, along with her, my safe haven in life. My brother, Salam, and I spent the next few years moving from one boarding school to another. My father, overwhelmed by the loss of a wife and the heavy responsibility of two children, probably thought it was best to enroll us in a boarding school. He thought wrong because, despite his busy schedule, the little time we spent with him on some weekends was the closest we ever felt to the warmth of a home after my mother’s death.
Between boarding schools, occasional stays with my father and sleep-ins at his friends’ houses, Salam and I managed to survive and cope with the huge void left by our mother. We celebrated our father’s decision to get married after resenting it initially, since our compensation was to leave boarding school and live at home with him and his new wife, Inam, and her daughter, Azza, from a previous marriage.12 The unusual setting, although bumpy at the beginning, turned out to be the home which I had longed for, for years. All of a sudden, Salam and I were under the same roof with our father, and I had gained a sister and a second Mom. Our father Majed and Inam decided to have my sister, Dalia, to crown us as a real family, not only bonded by their marriage but also by blood.
My father embraced Lebanon in all its aspects but remained loyal to his identity and convictions and made sure he passed this on to us. “You can choose to speak the Lebanese dialect with your friends outside the house but at home we speak the Palestinian dialect,” he would often tell us, explaining that we are mere guests in the country.
Majed was a master at passing on subtle messages without enforcing his opinion. Nonetheless, at times, he pushed us to our limits by expecting us to abide by his decision for a benefit that we might not realize instantly. Introducing us to new things, ideas and people was probably Majed’s subtle way to trigger our curiosity to ask questions and instill pride in our Palestinian and Arab culture and identity.
I did not realize Majed’s worth in his lifetime; I actually only discovered who he was, on the political and national front, following his assassination. I only learned, years after his death, of the numerous death threats he had received. At the time, Edward Said shared his concerns with us. Said sent, with a mutual friend, a cutting from an American newspaper on which it was written “Majed Abu Sharar: the rising star of the PLO,” with a note warning him that this was a bad sign and an indication that he was being watched. Despite that, he was never cautious about his security.
Majed’s abrupt departure devastated our lives. October 9, 1981 will be engraved in my heart and soul as the day my world collapsed, the day when I lost my rock in life. My initial feelings of anger and resentment towards my father for choosing Palestine over us and my feelings of jealousy and outrage at Palestine for stealing my only remaining parent, stayed with me for years. For my sanity, I buried my problematic relationship with my father and Palestine in the back of my mind, in order to move forward. Little did I know that, a few years later, both my Dad and Palestine would become the very compass of my existence!
The Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982 came a few months after my father’s assassination and I swallowed my personal pain temporarily in the face of the collective devastation. My encounter with the war had, until then, been relatively sheltered, despite the fact that we were living in war-torn Lebanon. The Israeli invasion of Lebanon was like nothing I had previously experienced until then, as I witnessed, first-hand, the displacement and suffering of people and the devastation of the war.
I volunteered at a Talmudic center, hastily turned hospital in Hamra, lending a helping hand to the injured.13 Many horrifying images of the atrocities of the war still linger in my mind, one of which is the unforgettable image of a young man bleeding all over while rushing into the center, holding his ear in his hand and screaming, “Save my ear, save my ear.”
The suffering of people went hand in hand with numerous daily challenges. Long humiliating queues of people waiting for their turn to fill a bottle or a gallon of water became a regular scene, as did spending hours by candle light due to severe power cuts, as well as struggling to find basic commodities because Israel and its collaborators prevented international and humanitarian aid from entering West Beirut. Sadly, Lebanon of 1982 resembles, in many aspects, Lebanon in 2021.
All of us cheered for the Palestinian and Lebanese Resistance in the South, while following the news, believing that our fighters had a chance against one of the strongest and most cruel war machines in the world. As it became apparent that Israel was planning to enter Beirut, many of our acquaintances and friends started to leave the country through East Beirut, the only point of exit available at the time.
Taking the trip was a risk many people undertook in order to flee the hell of a war that was taking place in parts of the tiny country. When the decision was taken for us to leave for Jordan, upon the advice of some of my father’s friends, I dreaded the trip. I am not sure which I dreaded more, the idea of leaving Beirut or the trip through the forbidden part of the capital. Up until then, we were strictly prohibited from even thinking of visiting East Beirut, which was controlled by the Phalange’s forces, known for their hostility towards Palestinians. All the stories that we had heard about the atrocities taking place at checkpoints in East Beirut came rushing into my mind and I imagined the worst. For me, facing the war was easier than taking this trip.
The trip was surreal from start to end. Leaving Beirut felt like a betrayal of every person I left behind and of every corner of the city that had embraced me for many years. The feeling of betrayal grew as we were approaching safety, thanks to the fake Jordanian passports that we carried, which secured our journey to Syria.14 Images of Israeli soldiers amicably chitchatting with members of the Phalange’s forces, or those of young Lebanese women wearing T-shirts that read “We love Israel,” or the strange contrast between East Beirut, beaming with life and people, and war-torn and dilapidated West Beirut, still linger in my mind.
As I returned to Lebanon in 2001 and lived through the 2006 Israeli war, countless conflicts in the country and, most recently, the horrifying massive explosion at the Beirut port and the unprecedented economic collapse we are experiencing at present, I came to understand that the Lebanese people would never share one common friend or one common enemy. Thus, an entity like Israel will remain a friend for some and an enemy for others, as long as the interest of the sectarian leaders or the sects comes before that of Lebanon.
The undeclared war we are living through today is proof of this. The complex sectarian mosaic of the country, along with the corrupt sectarian leaders, each with an outside agenda that serves their pockets more than anything, makes of this country a fertile soil ready to embrace all kinds of conflicts and wars. Sadly, even in the most dire of times, such as the one we are living through at present, the Lebanese still fail to unite against these corrupt sectarian leaders for their own good and that of their country.
As a Palestinian married to a Lebanese, I have been privileged to enjoy the rights denied to my people in Lebanon. My return to Lebanon in 2001 came after years of living abroad for the purpose of study and work. Palestine was never absent from anything I did. In the US and France during my university studies, I was a fierce defender of our cause and gained, along the way, many friends and a number of enemies.
Upon my return to Jordan, I landed a job as an editor and a contributing writer at The Star English weekly newspaper, an affiliate with Ad Doustour daily Arabic newspaper. Issues pertaining to Palestine always took center stage in my writings for The Star and other media outlets outside the country for which I was freelancing.
It was in Jordan that I became more familiar with Palestinian refugee camps through my numerous visits while accompanying foreign journalists. It was also in Jordan that I got to meet, as a journalist, Palestinian icons and PLO figures that I had only heard of previously, like Leila Khaled, Mohammed Oudeh (Abu Daoud) or Abdel Rahim Malouh and others.
It was not, however, until I moved to Lebanon that I truly understood the meaning of being a Palestinian refugee. A Palestinian refugee in Lebanon is like no other Palestinian refugee elsewhere in his/her place of displacement. The successive generations of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon have been deprived, ever since they took refuge in this country, of their basic human rights such as the right to work in tens of professions and the right of ownership, to name a few. I cannot even count the number of times I heard Palestinian refugees speak of the scams they experienced because they were forced to register their life savings for an apartment, a piece of land or a shop in the name of a Lebanese relative or friend.
The Palestinian camps are bastions of poverty, high unemployment and numerous social and security problems. The unprecedented economic crisis in Lebanon today has hit everyone in the country, but particularly Palestinian refugees, who already suffer from extremely harsh living conditions and are left to face their fate on their own.
Most live in dwellings that resemble caves rather than houses, that do not see the sunlight and lack any kind of ventilation, from which the unpleasant smell of humidity emanates, allowing all kinds of illnesses to affect the residents. People spend their days and nights in the narrow streets of the camp to escape the unbearable summer heat of their homes due to permanent power outage and the absence of diesel fuel to operate generators. Most survive on a day-to-day basis as the purchasing power of refugees has decreased significantly, since the prices of basic commodities have skyrocketed due to the severe devaluation of the Lebanese lira against the US dollar. Apart from random humanitarian aid—food, baby milk, diapers and medication—from different non-governmental organizations and volunteer groups, refugees are literally on their own. Today, like they did previously, they hold the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNRWA), the Palestinian factions, the PLO and the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) responsible for failing them again and again, especially at such times of crisis.
Despite my strong feelings against the injustice, discrimination and racism to which Palestinian refugees have been subjected by the consecutive Lebanese governments, I also believe that the PLO has failed them on more than one level. Failure to set up sustainable projects in the camps that could have created hundreds of job opportunities for refugees and allowed them to sustain themselves rather than to continue to rely on relief for their livelihood, as well as failure to improve the poor infrastructure in the camps and gatherings—these are major shortcomings, given the political and financial power that the PLO has enjoyed in Lebanon for years. Given the high concentration of refugees in Lebanon, albeit significantly diminished since then, the PLO officials were either short-sighted or the issue of refugees was never their priority.
My knowledge of the camps and the living conditions of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon was, upon my return to Lebanon, superficial and limited to the one- to three-minute reports I made for “Future TV,” for which I worked for a few years. It was not until I started working as an independent researcher that my knowledge developed, thanks to the countless readings on the issue and the numerous long focus groups I had with Palestinian refugees of all ages and genders in camps and gatherings across Lebanon.
In 2014, a dream came true. With the help of my siblings and some loyal friends, The Majed Abu Sharar Media Foundation (MASMF) came to fruition. On the one hand, the mission of the organization is to carry on the legacy of Majed and continue his unfinished work in the field of media and, on the other, fill an existing gap in the refugee camps in that domain. Majed was a firm believer in the power of media to reach out to the world and gain Arab and international supporters for our cause.
MASMF was set up to engage, empower and train Palestinian youth in refugee camps to produce various types of media in a professional manner, away from the stereotypes of the mainstream media. This stemmed from our firm belief that no one is more capable of conveying the stories of refugees than the refugees themselves, since no one knows better the living conditions and problems facing Palestinian camps and gatherings than they do. In a country like Lebanon, where countless misconceptions and stereotypes exist about Palestinian refugees, this kind of work is extremely crucial.
The Lebanese people are either strong supporters of Palestinians, aggressively hostile or simply indifferent. During a conversation with a renowned Lebanese journalist when I first moved back to Lebanon, he pinpointed the problematic relation of the Lebanese people with the “other,” Palestinians included, by saying: “The Lebanese don’t like each other, how on earth can you want them to like Palestinians or anyone else for that matter!”
Although a small organization with limited human and financial resources, MASMF was able to operate in partnership with local and international organizations and institutions, offering training in all forms of media under the guidance of renowned journalists free of charge. This training attracted hundreds of aspiring young journalists in the camps and gatherings around Lebanon.
The work produced by the youth at the end of these trainings touched on issues highlighting different aspects of life in the camps, existing problems and potential solutions and success stories. Selected work was published in different media outlets such as Al-Hal newspaper of the Birzeit University Media Development Center, The Palestine Chronicle, and MASMF’s website and Facebook page, amongst others.
The need to find an outlet to continue the learning process following our training, or in its absence, urged us to establish Shababeek. The four-year-old Shababeek provides young journalists with continuous supervision to empower them in the field of media, along with the space to publish their work. We do aspire, with time, to have Shababeek develop into a vibrant web magazine that reflects the voice of refugees by refugees themselves and to become their window into the outside world.
Our work falls short, though, in the face of the huge challenges that non-governmental organizations (NGOs) like ours, civil society organizations (CSOs) and even volunteer groups encounter in the field in the camps and gatherings across Lebanon. The enormous problems facing Palestinians in their places of residence not only puts the priority of refugees elsewhere but also makes the work being done a drop in the ocean! I say this from first-hand experience of observing our work, and that of other organizations, during the last few years.
When we first launched Shababeek with two consecutive funds from two renowned Palestinian organizations, the enthusiasm of the trainees was contagious. Shababeek was set up as a training website, not one for employment, that primarily aims to sustain the learning journey in the field of media, and symbolic remuneration would be given to the young journalists for their efforts only when funding is available. With this understanding, tens of journalists joined Shababeek. However, with the challenge of sustaining the funding came the challenge of holding on to these young journalists, as the challenges of life in the camps were bigger than both of us. “I have always dreamt of becoming a journalist and I found myself in a place like Shababeek in which I was able to train and write at the same time, and gain a bit of money, but I had to find a job that pays me to live,” said one of our best trainees, whom we lost along the way.
I genuinely believe that the Palestinian cause deserves a better media apparatus and more eloquent spokespersons than those existing at the official level. Unfortunately, we have spent the last 73 years mainly talking to ourselves rather than addressing the Other to present a credible narrative and mobilize supporters for our cause. Our failure to have a sound and unified media discourse in the face of a very sophisticated Israeli propaganda machine has brought our just cause nothing short of disasters. Through our work with the youth in the camps, we hope to start the long process of empowering refugees in the field of media in order for them to become spokespersons of their people and cause in the Diaspora.
This does not mean that the work MASMF and others are doing is in vain, but it does mean that our work will always remain secondary to the real work that needs to be done to ensure refugees are granted the basics to live a dignified life, until the internationally-enshrined Right of Return—a right all refugees consider sacred—is reached, and they are able to return to their homeland.
Those in charge of the Palestinian refugees, like the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), the Palestinian factions and the popular committees, in addition to the PLO, Palestinian Authority and various host countries, should each assume the responsibility of transforming the lives of refugees in the camps. UNRWA should resume the services it reduced, or cut altogether, under the pretext of lack of funding. The Palestinian factions and the popular committees should put their factional differences aside and work together towards improving the lives of refugees while embracing initiatives that come from outside their frameworks, especially those by youth, in order to pump in new blood. The PLO, quasi-inexistent at present, should regain its role as the representative of the Palestinian people and start acting as such for the benefit of its people.
As long as these continue to fall short in assuming their mandate and fail to do the job for which they were created, the enormous lack of trust will continue to exist between them and the Palestinian refugees. As long as the refugees feel they only have God to resort to and have to create WhatsApp groups to solicit and exchange medicine and collect food items to distribute to those in need, we will continue to lose people on many levels. As long as the disastrous current policies adopted by the Palestinian leaders and all parties involved in relation to refugees and the Palestinian cause, in general, persist, we will continue to see our people and our cause slip further away from us.
Majed’s dream was to retire, after the liberation of Palestine, in a small village called Fkekise, next to Dura, where he could spend his time writing and gazing at the Mediterranean Sea in Gaza. Majed was not naive to envision the liberation of Palestine during his lifetime; he was convinced that Palestine will be liberated principally because of the unbeatable will of its people and the indisputable justice of its cause. I do, too. I firmly believe that Palestine might not be attainable in the near future, but with our most powerful weapon, the Palestinian people, their invincible will and contagious zest, Palestine will be liberated.
My bet was, and remains, on martyrs like Bajes Abu Attwan, Basel al-Aaraj, Naji el-Ali, Ghassan Kanafani, Kamal Naser, Kamal Adwan, Majed Abu Sharar and so many others to keep inspiring us with their teachings. My bet was, and remains, on the young generation of Palestinians, inside and outside of Palestine, to keep inspiring us with their confidence, vision and innovative ideas to challenge the Israeli occupier on more than one level. My bet is, and will remain, on every Palestinian refugee to keep the flame of the Right of Return burning until we all return to our villages and towns in Palestine. The Palestinian cause was never solely the issue of a stolen land but also that of a stubborn, steadfast people who, despite the cruelty of their colonizers, continue to hold on to the dream of a free Palestine and their return to what is rightfully theirs.
10 A number of PLO leaders chose, for security reasons, to distance their families from where the PLO was based and, accordingly, many lived in countries such as Syria, Jordan, Kuwait, Egypt, etc.
11 Clashes were taking place in the streets of Amman and elsewhere in Jordan between the Jordanian Army and Palestinian Fedayeen, which came to be known later as the “Black September.”
12 Inam Abdel Hadi was first married to PLO leader Hani el Hassan, with whom she had her daughter, Azza.
13 Hamra was a safe haven in comparison to other areas in West Beirut, and was spared from the Israeli bombardment thanks to the presence of foreign journalists and diplomats.
14 Many people who left through East Beirut during the Israeli invasion carried fake passports and we were no exception, since it was dangerous for us to leave with our father’s name on the real passports.