Palestinian memory, Protective Edge and the Nakba

Since the commencement of Operation Protective Edge, various Israeli leaders have regurgitated the rhetoric of blame, imposition and the appropriation of memory. Justifying settler-colonial violence is linked directly to the promulgation of a false narrative based upon partial historical facts embedded within the framework upholding the UN-sanctioned state. Victimisation, therefore, is perpetually linked to, and endorsed as an identity by, the perpetrators of the violence. The sequence reveals a permanent consequence; that of displacing Palestinian memory in relation to the genocide perpetrated since the 1948 Nakba.

The image of Israel as a victim has undergone rapid transformations linked to settler-colonial expansion, becoming comprehensible only to itself. As the size of Palestinian territory dwindles, Zionism magnifies the challenge it faces from Palestinian resistance while attempting to minimise the vast repercussions of its precision strikes on civilians in Gaza. This is always done within the mainstream-accepted concept of genocide and extermination that fails to take other massacres of magnitude into account.

Hence, in current rhetoric, Zionist deconstruction of Palestinian resistance is an attempt to obscure the immediate events with the aim of fragmenting memory since the start of the Nakba. As resistance continues to advance through a phase that has generated its renewal, memory becomes an even more contentious issue for the oppressor. The massacres and forced displacement perpetrated during the Nakba were fortified with extreme measures to prevent the preservation of memory. Dispossession, therefore, was a meticulous exercise in which colonial violence embarked upon widespread destruction, including the elimination of cultural and historical references while coercing Palestinians into negotiating a forced compromise between land and survival.

If Palestinian memory is to strengthen itself, reference to the Nakba is imperative. Zionism has constantly depicted Palestinians as interlopers, a problematic detail manifested through a physical presence that needs to be vanquished. Hence, the rabid Zionist insistence upon various forms of land grab and aggression, including the continuation of targeted assassinations of Hamas leaders in the aftermath of a brief ceasefire during which compromise was presented as negotiation.

Palestinian resistance has managed to overturn what Israel seeks to portray as “self-defence” into a natural (and legitimate) process of continued resistance against the prolonged Nakba endured by Palestinians, which challenges the hegemonic narrative attempting to depict Palestinians merely as a humanitarian problem separated from history. While Zionism was allowed to determine its identity at the expense of a massacred and displaced population, Palestinian identity was forced to inherit a complex geophysical, historical and colonial complexity induced by the Nakba, Israel’s refusal to be held accountable and the international community’s wilful condoning of such impunity.

Zionist propaganda has sought relentlessly to portray Protective Edge as an interspersed, necessary exercise, devoid of colonial ramifications. This projection is a self-serving, fabricated identification intended to sever Palestinian memory, albeit appended to the probability that such efforts will prove to be futile. That is, unless Palestinian memory is subjected to distortion from within, such as attempting to evoke equivalence with regard to the atrocities inflicted upon the indigenous population. Including references to distorted narratives with the aim of facilitating dissemination might intrigue a disassociated audience temporarily. However, omitting references to the ongoing Nakba process by aligning Palestinian history and memory to mainstream discourse of what constitutes genocide would ultimately be of immense detriment to the achievements of Palestinian resistance and its centrality to the necessary process of obliterating Israel’s settler-colonialism.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.