Gaza Writes Back: Short Stories from Young Writers in Gaza, Palestine

by Refaat Alareer

We love the story because it is about our homeland, and we love our homeland even more because of the story.

This book shows the world that despite Israel’s continuous attempts to kill steadfastness in us, Palestinians keep going on, never surrendering to pain or death, and always seeing and seeking liberty and hope in the darkest of times.

Gaza Writes Back provides conclusive evidence that telling stories is an act of life, that telling stories is resistance, and that telling stories shapes our memories.

No family gathering ever lacks one or more stories of those good old days when Palestine was the Palestine that current generations have not known or experienced directly. And since everyone has been subjected to stories and storytelling, there is a Palestine that dwells inside all of us,

Gaza writes back because storytelling helps construct Palestinian national identity and unity. Gaza writes back because there is a Palestine that needs to be rescued, at least textually for the time being.

Baba, what would make this kind of human rejoice over the fact that I am living the agony of being fatherless, with an uncompleted story?

We were clinging to the assumption that only other people’s trees could get uprooted, but certainly not our beautiful, unmatched olives.

By replanting their trees over and over again, Palestinians are rejecting Israel’s rules.

All that had complicated our lives and made them intolerable was nothing other than those regular power failures, the food price crisis, the continuing closure of the borders that kept us from traveling abroad, the transportation crisis, and the desperate struggle for a living. Only these and nothing more.

Laila did not hate the little baby whose file was sent instead of her father’s. She only hated Israel for making it so that the doctor had to choose.

Longing for that time when the only authority he had over him was that of his father, or that of his grandfather, became a daily ritual.

I am destroying what was taken from me, by force, without my consent. And I am doing this when all other means failed.

I did not want my wound to heal. I was satisfied with such tangible shame that could at least make me always remember those who lost their lives so others could survive.

I liked how he dramatized things. I laughed. No one loses his arm that way, I thought. But I suddenly realized that I did not care about the truth.

In his own words: Palestine was first occupied metaphorically, i.e. in words and stories and poems. So, we ought to write back, to use all efforts and pens, and promote our cause to educate both ourselves and all the peoples of the world about our cause. Telling our own tales is resistance—resistance to forgetfulness and to occupation.