Palestinians Born In Exile

by Hammer, Juliane

• ISBN13: 9780292702950
• ISBN10: 0292702957
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2005-01-31
• Publisher: Univ of Texas Pr

Summary

"Juliane Hammer has written an excellent book that captures the Palestinian experience of exile, life in the Diaspora, and return to Palestine." --Philip Mattar, United States Institute for Peace, editor of Encyclopedia of the Modern Middle East and North Africa "Juliane Hammer's book is a welcome addition to the relatively meager literature on Palestinians who were born in exile and "returned" to Palestine...." -- Journal of Palestine Studies In the decade following the 1993 Oslo Peace Accords, some 100,000 diasporic Palestinians returned to the West Bank and Gaza. Among them were children and young adults who were born in exile and whose sense of Palestinian identity was shaped not by lived experience but rather through the transmission and re-creation of memories, images, and history. As a result, "returning" to the homeland that had never actually been their home presented challenges and disappointments for these young Palestinians, who found their lifeways and values sometimes at odds with those of their new neighbors in the West Bank and Gaza. This original ethnography records the experiences of Palestinians born in exile who have emigrated to the Palestinian homeland. Juliane Hammer interviews young adults between the ages of 16 and 35 to learn how their Palestinian identity has been affected by living in various Arab countries or the United States and then moving to the West Bank and Gaza. Their responses underscore how much the experience of living outside of Palestine has become integral to the Palestinian national character, even as Palestinians maintain an overwhelming sense of belonging to one another as a people.

Table of Contents

Preface	vii
Acknowledgments	xi
Introduction: Palestinian Migration, Refugees, and Return	1	(22)
Palestinian National Identity, Memory, and History	23	(27)
The Country of My Dreams	50	(25)
Return to Palestine: Dreams and Realities	75	(40)
The Return Process in Comparison	115	(52)
Rewriting of Identities in the Context of Diaspora and Return	167	(33)
Home and the Future of Palestinian Identities	200	(23)
Epilogue	223	(4)
Appendix List of Respondents	227	(2)
Notes	229	(10)
Bibliography	239	(22)
Index	261