Remembering/Imagining Palestine from Afar: The (Lost) Homeland in Contemporary Palestinian Diaspora Literature // Nina Fischer

For thousands of years Jews have longed, prayed, and waited for the return to Zion, and culture – literature in particular – has had a significant role in upholding collective memory and identity as related to place.1 Through the political movement of Zionism and Israel’s establishment in 1948, leaving the diaspora for a once spiritual homeland became a lived reality for many Jews. But the Israelis’ fight for their state led to the displacement of fifty percent of Mandate Palestine’s Arab inhabitants. The Nakba – the destruction of historical Palestine and the displacement of a large percent of the Arab inhabitants – thus functions inversely to the Jewish experience. Now, Palestinians, whether Christian or Muslim, long for and write about their homeland, which has similar geographical outlines as the land Jews have held dear for so long. Focusing on the English-language literature of diaspora Palestinians, I will use Sidra Ezrahi’s thinking about the role of Zion in Jewish literature and cultural identity as a springboard to explicate the role of the homeland in Palestinian collective memory, identity, and political aspirations. Contemplating the hold this land has on both peoples might aid in understanding the intricacies of the ongoing conflict over it.