An Oral History of the Palestinian Nakba
Page 25
There had been other manifestations of urban life reflecting the modern space. Haifa also had a nightlife. The city had two different styles of nightlife: cabarets and nightclubs for men, and artistic soirees for families and the middle class:
My mother says that Abdel-Wahab came to Ein Dor Cinema; the one they destroyed. There was a woman who kept saying Oh My Love … Oh My Love. Her husband told her if he is your love, I am divorcing you. Oum Kolthoum and Farid Al-Atrash also came to Ein Dor … Central Café was in Al-Abyad market; they danced there for the whole night. All the Egyptian dancers performed in Central Haifa. It started at eight o’clock in the evening and lasted until one after midnight. There was an Egyptian dancer called Ne’amat. A man from the city fell in love with her, and took her as a second wife. His first wife burnt herself, and then died. Ne’amat married him, and lived in our neighbourhood, behind the churches’ neighbourhood. It seems that she left with the others, at the outbreak of the war. (Interview with Zahra Khamra, quoted in Igbarieh 2010: 223)
Why did indigenous Palestinians leave Haifa? The Nakba from the perspective of Haifa’s people
While historical studies (e.g. Khalidi 2005) rightly highlight the military and political reasons behind the Palestinian displacement, Palestinian family ties, and being an integral part of the Arab world, as the following argument suggests, were among the motives for Haifa’s residents to leave the city following the escalating confrontations between the Palestinian Arabs and the settler Zionist residents in the city. These family ties, I also argue, were crucial for the return of some Haifa families after their displacement.
The displacement of Haifa’s residents followed the 1947 Partition Plan had increased following the terrorist attacks against them early in 1948:
I remember that we were frightened, especially after they shot the priest in the church’s yard, while he was walking around reading the Evangel. Following that event, the situation did not calm down; instead, the attacks increased, and that enhanced fear. We used to go to Lebanon, to my maternal uncles, once a year and stay there for three months, regardless of the war. In 1948, we left earlier. My father told my mother, take the kids to your parents [in Lebanon]; and you will come back when the situation calms down. (Abu Nour)
In this regard, Samira related:
when the shooting towards the building started, the building in which we and my uncle’s family lived … My uncle used to live in Haifa because he was a railroad employee. When the shooting started, he [my uncle] returned to my grandparents’ [his parents’] house in Bethlehem region. We went to my maternal grandparents; I mean to my maternal uncles in Nazareth.
These findings are consistent with those of Faris (2010); he indicates that the rural women joined the groups that left Haifa before its fall:
The Palestinian farmers had first sent the women out of Haifa towards their villages. For example, the residents of Silwad village gathered their wives and children; who rode big trucks. Some managed to take some goods, while others left everything behind. The vast majority of the rural women thought that they would return. (Faris 2010: 74)
Another testimony by Abu Jeryis, a ninety-three-year-old interviewee, highlights the impact of the family ties, especially women’s ties, on the decision to leave and on the destination they headed to:
We are originally from Shefa-’Amr; we came to Haifa in the twenties, because of my father’s work. We were nine siblings, all living in Haifa. During the confrontation, my siblings and I moved to Shefa-‘Amr, but my brothers whose wives were from Lebanon moved to Lebanon; their wives are from there [Lebanon], and they insisted on going to their parents.
The role of family ties in the displacement of Haifa’s indigenous Palestinian residents, intending to return in due course, is further asserted by the fact that this was not the only time they had made such a decision. However, it was the last time, after which they could not return; thus, they paid a very high price.
The Nakba had been preceded by World War II, when Haifa was bombarded. During that period, as in all times of war, fear caused people to leave their houses and take refuge with their families in various regions in Palestine and its neighbouring Arab countries:
During the war [World War II] we were very frightened ‒ Haifa was bombarded by airplanes. We left the house and went to Ramallah. We stayed there for about two years. My parents stayed there and enrolled me in a boarding school. I studied in the Sisters’ school for two years. (Umm Elias)
This was echoed in Umm Nabil’s testimony:
During the great war [World War II] I studied in the Sisters’ school in Isfiya. We were children and we were frightened. My mother took me and my sister out of Haifa’s school and enrolled us in Isfiya Sisters’ school. I stayed in Isfiya for a year and returned to our house in Haifa after the war ended and the situation calmed down.
The same applies to Abu Roni’s family:
We are originally from Zamrin [Arabic for Zikhron Ya’akov]. During the Great War, we were living in Haifa; we came to Haifa because my father found work there. But during the war [World War II] my parents took us back to Zamrin until the situation calmed down.
The Nakba was not the only crime committed by the Zionist institutions. There was also the Zionist authorities’ decision banning the refugees from returning. That was explicit in Ben Gurion’s letter to Abba Hushi, dated 2 June 1948, declaring: “I have just learnt that Mr. Marriott20 is interested in the Arabs’ return. I do not know how he is interfering; but until the end of the war, we are not interested in the enemy’s return, and all the institutions have to follow this line”.21
This was also evident in a report sent by Ya’acov Salomon to Ben Gurion, entitled “The Liberation of Haifa”:
I am the legal counsel of the Patriarch Hakim, so in some way, we are kind of friends and we talked on current affairs … He (Patriarch Hakim) just came back from Beirut inquiring into bringing Christians Palestinian refugees back to Haifa … I told him my opinion (emphasizing it is my personal opinion), during wartime no refugee will be allowed to be back22.
Why did the Palestinians remain/return? The nation, the homeland and the home
The indigenous Palestinians of Haifa did not remain idle or passive in the face of the policies that attempted to eliminate their physical existence. They achieved this by staying in their homeland or by doing almost everything they could to return. As endurance is deemed an act of resistance for the Palestinians in exile (Allen 2008), their return and the original residents of Haifa remaining was an act of resistance against attempts at physical elimination.
As mentioned previously, the people did not expect the borders to be closed; they intended to stay in Haifa or to return to it. Samira talked of the reasons behind their staying:
I will tell why we stayed here; here we have our home and our land; it is our homeland and we were born here. In the 2006 Lebanon war,23 my daughter told me to go to Nazareth, she said I would die if I stayed in Haifa. I told her that we left in 1948 and our house was taken away. I prefer to die here than leave my house. During the Nakba we went down to the church and stayed there; later on, we went to the port. I do not remember why we left the church; but what I know is that the British were encouraging the people to take small boats and go to Beirut. My mother said no, we are not leaving: I want to go to Akka and then to Nazareth. I want to go to my parents’ house. I will not leave my homeland and my parents, no matter what happens. We left our house, but we stayed in our homeland and among our family.
Infiltrations and “illegal” border crossing have always been ways of resistance for indigenous people; a way to re-live the lives they had before being forcibly fragmented (Ghanim 2015). When the indigenous Palestinians of Haifa learnt that Israel intended to close the borders and prevent the refugees from returning to their homes, they were ready to face all hazards in order to return. The Arab countries that hosted them were considered like a homeland; yet Haifa was the “Home” to which everyone wanted to return, even if “
infiltration” was necessary.
As in the novel Bab Al-Shams,24 my father was daily going to Yaroun [in Lebanon]. People were calling my mother to go and see him. My grandmother used to tell my mother, beware Nejma! they might kill him tomorrow. You’d better go to your husband, return to your home. That is how we escaped back. They put us, the small kids, in boxes, and we were “smuggled” back home at night. (Umm Nour)
This story was repeated in Abu Nour’s testimony:
We went to Lebanon and my father was constantly visiting us. Later on, they closed all the ways while he was still in Lebanon. He infiltrated the borders back home, and then he filed a request to bring us back.
Following the declaration of the establishment of the State of Israel, the families of Haifa fought for the return of their relatives. Those who had previously sent their children away until the war ended wanted them to return directly after the fall of Haifa. Despite the harsh conditions in Haifa during that period,25 they insisted on going back:
I left, while my mother, father and eldest siblings stayed. I left with my paternal uncle, aunt and grandmother to Lebanon. In Lebanon, we stayed with people who had previously worked at my father’s quarry. They gave us a house, and in the first three months, they did not ask for rent. After the war, my father wanted to bring me back from Lebanon; it took a while. After a year and a half, I obtained a permit and returned via Ras an-Nakura. I was a little boy and the whole family was living in Haifa. That’s why they [the authorities] approved my return. (Abu Raed)
The story of a communist leader in Haifa, Tawfik Toubi,26 better demonstrates this. Tawfik Toubi struggled first to bring his family members back through “legal” means. On 5 October 1948, he sent a demand to the Minister of Labour and Construction (Mordechai Bentov) to allow the return of his two brothers (Shafik and George), his sister (Maggie) and his paternal aunt (Jawhara Toubi). He also demanded the return of the wife and daughter of the other communist leader Emile Habibi: Nada (twenty-four years old) and Juhaina Habibi (fourteen months old), in addition to the wife and son of Ahmad Kawwas: Samira Kawwas (nineteen years old) and Basem Kawwas (thirteen months old). He indicated in his request that the authorities had approved the return of the family of Shehadeh Shalah27 (deputy mayor of Haifa) from Lebanon.28
On 11 November (a week after filing the request), the Minister of Labour and Construction sent a letter to the Minister of Minority Affairs (Bechor Sheetrit) recommending the approval of Toubi’s request. He indicated that he knew Toubi personally and that the latter was an employee at the labour and construction bureau in Haifa’s branch. On 31 November, the Minister of Minority Affairs, Sheetrit, addressed a letter to the Minister of Defence (Ben Gurion) and to the Minister of Foreign Affairs recommending the approval of the request, based on the recommendation presented by the Minister of Labour and Construction.29
Archival documents indicate that the authorities rejected Tawfik Toubi’s request. In a letter from Yaavoc Shimoni of the Middle East department in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, dating back to 9 November 1948, to the Minister of Minority Affairs, the former wrote “I do not find a reason for handling this request inconsistently with the decision that prohibits the return until a full agreement is reached”. He added: “when we approved the return of the family of Shehadeh Shalah, we had strongly emphasized that the present case cannot be handled like the preceding one”.30
Despite the rejection of the official request, the family’s will to return was undiminished, as testified by Maggie (the sister of Tawfik Toubi):
Following Tawfik’s visit to us, that lasted for a week, and his return to Palestine, my mother decided that we should return at any price; she could not leave Tawfik alone. Some people were running away through the Galilee, from the last Lebanese village near the borders, Rmaich. We took our clothes (we did not have anything) and came to Rmaich by bus. At Rmaich we had to pay money to people who helped us escape from one village to another. We arrived from Rmaich to Hurfeish. We, my mother, siblings and I, walked during the nights from Hurfeish to Kafr Sumei, and from Kafr Sumei to Julis. Every night, the (Druze) residents of these villages were accommodating and feeding us. We were walking the whole night; my siblings were riding a donkey, while my mother and I walked after them. From Julis we arrived to Kafr Yasif. We stayed in Kafr Yasif for two months. The registration in Abu Snan was still in process. We went there to get registered, as if we had never left the country. After a month, Tawfik succeeded in bringing us back to Haifa.31
Despite the harsh conditions in Haifa, its original residents insisted on returning home:
When I returned, my neighbour told me, from now on you will be dreaming of eating an apple [an indication of the lack of resources]. I told him what matters is that we returned to our homeland. I am Palestinian, and I do not have another land. (Abu Nour)
THE ISRAELI MILITARY GOVERNMENT
The Palestinian Nakba did not end in 1948, as the Zionists remained hostile towards the Palestinians who remained in their homeland. The expulsion continued after the Nakba; hundreds of Palestinians were uprooted and expelled from the territories that Israel had occupied.32
The Palestinians who remained in the occupied areas were subject to military government until the end of 1966, following a decision made by the Provisional State Council. During the 1948 war, specifically on 19 May 1948, it was determined that in wartime a state of emergency should be declared in certain regions, based on the recommendations of the commander-in-chief, and the approval of the Minister of Defence (Ozacky-Lazar 1996; Salomon 1980: 284).
The constitutional authority of the military government was based on the mandatory defence regulations that applied to the state of emergency (1945), adopted by the Provisional State Council. It implemented five out of 162 articles of the emergency regulations.33 The military government was also based on the Israeli Defence Laws 1949 (Security Zones) enacted by the Minister of Defence. In addition to the Mandatory Emergency Regulations, these regulations allowed the authorities to expel residents from a certain district by order of the Minister of Defence (Jiryis 1968: 20).
The military government system was established in the “Occupied Territories”34 in September 1948. It included three areas in which 755 of the country’s Arab inhabitants lived: the Galilee, the Triangle and the Naqab, in addition to the cities Ramlah, Al-Lydd, Yafa (Jaffa) and Asqalan (Ashkelon) (Masalha 1992; Jiryis 1968; Ozacky-Lazar 1996).
Implementation and enforcement was assigned to the military governor, according to a “fixed command” distributed to all military governors on 17 March 1950. This command gave the military governors broad authority to enforce these regulations where necessary (Ozacky-Lazar 1996: 71).
Although the Mandatory Defence (Emergency) Regulations (1945) were imposed on the whole State of Israel, they were actually implemented only in the areas that were subject to the military government. These regulations empowered the military government and the military governor to intervene in all the affairs of Palestinian society, without any supreme civil authority and with limited judicial authority (Jiryis 1968: 27).35 However, the boundaries of the military government areas and the closed areas were not precisely known, except by the military government administrators, and the Palestinians could only identify them through daily practices (Jiryis 1968: 24).
Despite the impact of this period on the lives of the Palestinians who remained in their homeland, studies on this subject have been scarce; and they have been mainly conducted by Jewish scholars (Ozacky-Lazar 1996; Bauml 2007; Lustik 1980; Korn 2000; Pappe 2013).36 These studies have focused on analysis of the military government’s policies and their implications for the Palestinians and their status in the Jewish state. They were mainly based on various official Israeli documents, without giving a voice to the Palestinians or researching their experiences dating back to that period.
There have also been some Palestinian studies addressing that period. Most of these studies did not give voice to ordinary Palestinians, focusing o
n the implications of that period for different aspects of Palestinians’ status (Mustafa 2014; Khamaisi 2014; Kabha 2014; Abdo 2011).37 The studies by Ghanim (2015), Hawari (2011) and Ghanayem (2014) differ, as they placed an emphasis on people and their experiences,38 interviewing Palestinians who lived through that period.
The military government and the Palestinian city: the case of Haifa
Despite the importance of these studies and their contribution to demarcating this phase in Palestinian history and its implications for various aspects of life, they have largely marginalized the Palestinian city. None of these Palestinian studies has addressed the reality experienced by the residents of these cities during that period, although it greatly contributed to destroying the process of Palestinian urbanization.
During the Nakba, the cities were almost totally emptied of their original residents. The cities of Al-Lydd, Ramlah and Yafa were officially subject to the military government.39 The remaining residents of these cities were put in ghettos: Yafa’s residents were all gathered in Al-‘Ajami, Al-Lydd’s were all put in a ghetto at Al-Kaneesa (the church) neighbourhood. The remaining residents of Ramlah were obliged to move to the Ghetto neighbourhood40 (Nuriely 2005; Yacobi 2009).
While Haifa was not among the cities officially subject to the military government,41 its indigenous Palestinians were gathered in Wadi Nisnas (Ghetto) and were subjected to the same policies practised towards the Palestinians who were under official military government in Yafa, Al-Lydd and Ramlah.
In the first week following the occupation of Haifa, 3,200 Palestinians were obliged to live in just two areas: Wadi Nisnas and Wadi Salib. To guarantee tight surveillance, the authorities established two “information and guidance” offices for the remaining residents of the city: the first was at 130 Al-Iraq Street, the house of Muhammad Abdel Hafiz, while the other one was at 35 Allenby Street, in the Archbishop’s house.42 Although these bureaus were given a civil name, their main mission was to issue permits to move out of the areas in which the Arabs were allowed to live.43