This week we closely engaged with Edward Said’s The Question of Palestine and Phyllis Bennis’ Understanding Palestinian-Israeli Conflict. Both these pieces in conversation with each other offer a framework and important socio-cultural and legal history for understanding the “conflict.” The use of “conflict” to describe the relationship between Palestine and Israel has also been critiqued, given the clear deprivation of autonomous power for the Palestinian people. Nonetheless, as articulated by Edward Said, we come to know the “Palestinian Question” as a question intimately involving self-determination as Israel and the West have cultivated an image “to deny their humanity and legitimacy.” Said further elaborates how Palestinians have essentially been erased from history, and what little history is presented, is framed with a negative light on Palestinians. The reading by Phyllis Bennis’, similarly covers the socio-cultural and historical construction of the issue; however, it does it in a manner of a question and answer format. While this format could be somewhat helpful to someone who has little to no knowledge about the complex relationship between Palestine and Israel, the questions could fall short or provide a particular framing of Palestinians. Three common themes that we found in both readings were zionism/colonialism, representation and agency. These themes interact quite closely in how the narrative about Palestinians is constructed, and more specifically, Said explains how Palestinians have taken it up for themselves to engage in practices that preserve Palestinian identity, culture and history as the West does not take much interest in the cause. In all, I believe Said sums up his argument with the simple rhetorical question of “By what moral or political standard are we expected to lay aside our claims to our national existence, our land, our human rights?” (xvii / pdf 17). Colonialism and the expansion of empire often confines moral and political standards to a small margin by which causes such as Palestine are seen as obscure, as they further their attempts to expand empire by controlling the narrative. As I have engaged with the question with my research project, a quote from Dr. Sarah Ihmoud stands out as she articulated that “Palestine is a paradigm for our alternative futures that we are working to create” during a CentroPR webinar titled “Beyond Borders: Traversing Settler Colonial Logics.” I think this quote provides a point to further explore the relationality of the Palestinian Question and further explore land as we have done so thus far in this class.
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