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Memories of Revolt: The 1936–1939 Rebellion and the Palestinian National Past
Memories of Revolt treats a subject that resonates with anyone who studies the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and particularly Palestinian nationalism: that how Palestinian history is remembered and constructed is as meaningful to our understanding of the current struggle as arriving as some sort of ‘complete empirical understanding’ of its history. Swedenburg studies how a major anti-colonial insurrection, the 1936–38 strike and revolt in Palestine [against the British], is remembered in Palestinian nationalist historiography, western and Israeli ‘official’ historical discourse, and Palestinian popular memory. Using primarily oral history interviews, supplemented by archival material and national monuments, he presents multiple, complex, contradictory, and alternative interpretations of historical events. The book is thematically divided into explorations of Palestinian nationalist symbols, stereotypes, and myths; Israeli national monuments that simultaneously act as historical ‘injunctions against forgetting’ Jewish history and efforts to ‘marginalize, vilify, and obliterate’ the Arab history of Palestine; Palestine subaltern memories as resistance to official narratives, including unpopular and controversial recollections of collaboration and assassination; and finally, how the recodification and revival of memories of the revolt informed the Palestinian intifada that erupted in 1987.
259 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1995
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
February 3, 2016
Interestingly enough, similar to the rebels’ fears of being labeled as anti-Semitic, I am hesitant to discuss a broader scope of views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for fear of being misconstrued, at worst- as a Zionist sympathizer. Swedenburg is highly attuned to the nuances of partial truths. Yet he concurrently appears to ignore the partial truths he reifies, primarily through his pro-Palestinian affiliations that are deeply saturated within Memories of Revolt: 1936-1939 Rebellion in the Palestinian Past. On one hand, I was delighted to read that Swedenburg did not paint resistance, and subsequently liberation, as a primarily male undertaking. Instead, he argues that women (and their bodies) are a key site of manipulating national discourses and how these women are “burdened” with having to realize nationalist aspirations. Furthermore, his brief gendered analysis exemplifies limits of practicality in ethnographic methodologies. On the other hand, Swedenburg’s apparent affiliations also detract from his intended “objectivist” stance.
According to the Introduction, one of Swedenburg’s aims is to “uncover the objective truth.” While I respect his beliefs, I remain troubled by his inability to further distance himself from the politics of his writing, especially because he seeks a particular mode of objectivity. In my opinion, his arguments appear to solely support the Palestinians’ exclusive claim to Palestine. For example, he focuses exclusively on the Israeli government’s systemic erasure of Palestinian Arabs. However, from an objectivist perspective, would it not be more helpful for Swedenburg to simultaneously study similar erasures of Jews by Arabs? This study could possibly inspire a more vivid account of historical memories. Additionally, Swedenburg’s pro-Palestinian focus might exacerbate the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with respect to further “legitimizing” Palestinians’ exclusive land claims.
The author also discusses how historical memories can be used to analyze later events. More specifically, in his sixth chapter, Swedenburg explores the connection between the Intifada and Palestinian memories of the 1936-39 revolt. Unfortunately, he does not address historical memories that inspired the aforementioned revolts, implying a rupture of sorts in the Palestinian memory of oppression. It would be fruitful to question how and what memories sparked the 1936-39 rebellion. Additionally, with respect to food for thought on more contemporary events, I wonder if categorizing the Intifada into “stages” reifies a timeless, ahistorical clash between Palestinians and Jews that can never be resolved?
According to the Introduction, one of Swedenburg’s aims is to “uncover the objective truth.” While I respect his beliefs, I remain troubled by his inability to further distance himself from the politics of his writing, especially because he seeks a particular mode of objectivity. In my opinion, his arguments appear to solely support the Palestinians’ exclusive claim to Palestine. For example, he focuses exclusively on the Israeli government’s systemic erasure of Palestinian Arabs. However, from an objectivist perspective, would it not be more helpful for Swedenburg to simultaneously study similar erasures of Jews by Arabs? This study could possibly inspire a more vivid account of historical memories. Additionally, Swedenburg’s pro-Palestinian focus might exacerbate the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with respect to further “legitimizing” Palestinians’ exclusive land claims.
The author also discusses how historical memories can be used to analyze later events. More specifically, in his sixth chapter, Swedenburg explores the connection between the Intifada and Palestinian memories of the 1936-39 revolt. Unfortunately, he does not address historical memories that inspired the aforementioned revolts, implying a rupture of sorts in the Palestinian memory of oppression. It would be fruitful to question how and what memories sparked the 1936-39 rebellion. Additionally, with respect to food for thought on more contemporary events, I wonder if categorizing the Intifada into “stages” reifies a timeless, ahistorical clash between Palestinians and Jews that can never be resolved?
September 27, 2021
Professor Swedenburg is a pro-Palestinian and a terrorism supporter, so one has to take this book with a bag of salt. Nonetheless, considering the paucity of English-language works on the 1936-39 Arab Revolt in Mandate Palestine, there are still some things to learn here, as the author persuaded a few of the veterans of that conflict to share their memories and impressions, both in Israel and the West Bank. At least Swedenburg is upfront about the weaknesses and failures of the Revolt, especially the fact that, of the 6000 Arabs who died violently in the Revolt, 5000 of them were killed by their fellow Arabs, as the Revolt dissolved in a welter of murders of collaborators, attacks on non-participating members of the community, and blood feud-driven vengeance attacks by relatives of the victims. Like contemporary Intifadas, the Revolt made Palestinian Arab society more conservative, as fanatical religious elements began imposing dress and behavior codes by force. As a Marxist, Swedenburg is also obsessed with class, so the efforts of the urban middle and upper classes to take part in the Revolt are dismissed out of hand. The fissiparous nature of that society caused the Revolt to seriously weaken the powers of resistance of the Arabs, and would contribute in no small way to their disastrous defeat in Israel's War of Independence in 1947-9. One should keep in mind that this book is not a history, but rather an anthrop0logy text, and so is not about filling in gaps in the historical record, but rather about exploring how memories are constructed and reconstructed.
July 25, 2011
An intriguing read...Author has clearly stated pro-Palestinian stance, but the work is not about filling in gaps in the historical record, but rather about exploring how memories are constructed and reconstructed. The book, therefore, is moe of an interdisciplinary rather than a solidly historical work.
August 18, 2020
a pretentious conflagration of academic jargon offered without any cohesive thesis. quotes benjamin or gramsci every other page and has trouble formulating original thoughts
August 19, 2024
Ted Swedenburg's extensive Mideast experience gave him the creds to tackle one of the thorniest legacies of the Palestinian issue: the 1936-1939 Thawra, the anti-British revolt that opened the door for the successful Zionist revolt a decade later. Rather than reconstruct a conventional political, diplomatic, and military history, Swedenburg chose to explore its social and cultural legacy in Palestine/Israel fifty years later. Writing in the 1980s, during the first Intafada, he was close enough in time to find several cognate veterans, and compare its legacy to the ongoing uprising.
What he found was, really, not surprising. Palestinian intellectuals had framed the Revolt's legacy for their own needs, and the veterans had selectively interpreted their experience in light of current community values. National unity was always uppermost; the unsavory aspects of the Revolt - its violence toward collaborators, strongarm enforcement of Palestinian conformity in speech and dress, its "taxes" which often amounted to extortion, and its anti-Jewish attacks were downplayed in the old veterans' recollections.
Instead, they chose to view their movement as enjoying broad, unquestioning support; as anti-British, not anti-Jewish; and anti-Zionist, not pro-Axis. There were also local pitfalls: clan divisions over executions and reprisals were touchy subjects, even a half century on. And there was the desire to fit their memories into the ongoing national struggle of the Intifada years.
This utility is what Swedenburg sought to explore: not just the Israeli/Zionist erasure of Palestinian history, memory, and identity, down to razing the very scenes of the uprising, but the construction and editing of it by the Palestinians themselves. Class differences of the time have been obscured; modern intellectuals look down on the "backward village people" who constituted the Revolt's guerrilla army and support network. The marginalized use of women was also a thorn: male honor could not give them equal weight, but without this domestic support - down to bomb-planting and gun-running - their revolt could not have lasted three years.
Perhaps the sharpest criticism to be made - one Swedenburg alludes to - is that the Palestinians launched a "premature revolt", crushed by the British using very Israeli-style techniques, leaving the Palestinians crippled when the real showdown came during Partition. This might be true; the rebels, not being prophets, hoped that an ungovernable Palestine would pre-empt this outcome. It took WW II to change British attitudes, and by then this could only play to Zionist advantage.
In relating the Revolt to the later Nakhba and Intifada and beyond, there is a telling quote from Benjamin Netanyahu given in 1989, of special interest as we witness the fourth Nakhba in a century: "Israel should have taken advantage of the suppression of the [Tiananmen] demonstrations in China in [summer 1989], while the world's attention was focused on these events, and should have carried out mass deportations of Arabs from the territories. Unfortunately, the plan I proposed did not gain support, yet I still suggest to put it into practice." (p. 75.)
The Palestinian national past was not only still present, but writing the future.
What he found was, really, not surprising. Palestinian intellectuals had framed the Revolt's legacy for their own needs, and the veterans had selectively interpreted their experience in light of current community values. National unity was always uppermost; the unsavory aspects of the Revolt - its violence toward collaborators, strongarm enforcement of Palestinian conformity in speech and dress, its "taxes" which often amounted to extortion, and its anti-Jewish attacks were downplayed in the old veterans' recollections.
Instead, they chose to view their movement as enjoying broad, unquestioning support; as anti-British, not anti-Jewish; and anti-Zionist, not pro-Axis. There were also local pitfalls: clan divisions over executions and reprisals were touchy subjects, even a half century on. And there was the desire to fit their memories into the ongoing national struggle of the Intifada years.
This utility is what Swedenburg sought to explore: not just the Israeli/Zionist erasure of Palestinian history, memory, and identity, down to razing the very scenes of the uprising, but the construction and editing of it by the Palestinians themselves. Class differences of the time have been obscured; modern intellectuals look down on the "backward village people" who constituted the Revolt's guerrilla army and support network. The marginalized use of women was also a thorn: male honor could not give them equal weight, but without this domestic support - down to bomb-planting and gun-running - their revolt could not have lasted three years.
Perhaps the sharpest criticism to be made - one Swedenburg alludes to - is that the Palestinians launched a "premature revolt", crushed by the British using very Israeli-style techniques, leaving the Palestinians crippled when the real showdown came during Partition. This might be true; the rebels, not being prophets, hoped that an ungovernable Palestine would pre-empt this outcome. It took WW II to change British attitudes, and by then this could only play to Zionist advantage.
In relating the Revolt to the later Nakhba and Intifada and beyond, there is a telling quote from Benjamin Netanyahu given in 1989, of special interest as we witness the fourth Nakhba in a century: "Israel should have taken advantage of the suppression of the [Tiananmen] demonstrations in China in [summer 1989], while the world's attention was focused on these events, and should have carried out mass deportations of Arabs from the territories. Unfortunately, the plan I proposed did not gain support, yet I still suggest to put it into practice." (p. 75.)
The Palestinian national past was not only still present, but writing the future.
January 15, 2026
It is very well written, but the weekly response papers are absolutely killing me. The author focuses on the suppressed Palestinian Great Revolt of 1936–39 and, in the 1980s and 1990s, traveled to rural areas to conduct oral history interviews with surviving elderly villagers. His aim is to trace how memories of the revolt—particularly those centered on rural men—were shaped under domination by urban elites.
He begins by examining Israel’s systematic state-led memory projects in fields such as archaeology and environmentalism, and then categorizes rural men’s memories of the revolt into three types: dominant memories that align with the PLO narrative (patriotism, lack of anti-Jewish sentiment, no land sales, no killing of “traitors”); counter-memories that challenge official accounts (critiques of urban elites, emphasis on spontaneous village-based struggle and peasant sacrifice); and memories of accommodation or collaboration with Israel (British orchestration, killing of rebels, the role of the Druze). Finally, drawing on secondary sources, the author reconstructs the experiences of Palestinian rural women during the revolt—experiences that are largely inaccessible through direct interviews.
The author’s reflexivity is clear, and the introduction is excellent. My main frustration, however, lies in his analysis of rumors and conspiracy theories, which feels rather thin and veers toward cultural essentialism. I am also unconvinced by his tripartite classification of memory into official, resistance, and accommodation categories, which seems overly shaped by political positioning.
He begins by examining Israel’s systematic state-led memory projects in fields such as archaeology and environmentalism, and then categorizes rural men’s memories of the revolt into three types: dominant memories that align with the PLO narrative (patriotism, lack of anti-Jewish sentiment, no land sales, no killing of “traitors”); counter-memories that challenge official accounts (critiques of urban elites, emphasis on spontaneous village-based struggle and peasant sacrifice); and memories of accommodation or collaboration with Israel (British orchestration, killing of rebels, the role of the Druze). Finally, drawing on secondary sources, the author reconstructs the experiences of Palestinian rural women during the revolt—experiences that are largely inaccessible through direct interviews.
The author’s reflexivity is clear, and the introduction is excellent. My main frustration, however, lies in his analysis of rumors and conspiracy theories, which feels rather thin and veers toward cultural essentialism. I am also unconvinced by his tripartite classification of memory into official, resistance, and accommodation categories, which seems overly shaped by political positioning.
July 17, 2024
As an academic work this investigation does tend to be somewhat repetitive however I learned a lot about the Palestinian state movement and I read about a perspective I haven’t been exposed to much over the years and was able to read the actual words and hear the sentiments of people who were really there at the beginning, fighting for, the birth of a nation. That was pretty cool.
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November 12, 2016Emotional read
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews