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ePALESTINE NOTES
ePalestine.ps - Sam Bahour

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News & opinions from a Palestinian-American
living & working in Ramallah/Al-Bireh, Palestine

Books

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The Bible Is Not a Baton [Book Review]

The Bible Is Not a Baton [Book Review]

by | September 15, 2023 | Books, Writings

The opening line of Decolonizing Palestine: The Land, the People, the Bible says it all: “For Palestinians, including the Palestinian Christian community, Palestine is a real land with real people.” It seems self-evident, but in a time when more people are in love with some majestic idea of Israel/Palestine rather than the real Israel/Palestine, it needs to be reiterated. This short read debunks many falsehoods that have taken root in parts of the Christian community over time and have been kept alive by constant watering by the State of Israel and the Zionist movement.


“A Day in the Life of Abed Salama” [Recommended]

“A Day in the Life of Abed Salama” [Recommended]

by | August 13, 2023 | Books

Nathan Thrall received the 2024 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction for A Day in the Life of Abed Salama. Five-year-old Milad Salama is excited for a school trip to a theme park on the outskirts of Jerusalem. On the way, his bus collides with a semitrailer. His father, Abed, gets word of the crash and rushes to the site. The scene is chaos—the children have been taken to different hospitals in Jerusalem and the West Bank; some are missing, others cannot be identified. Abed sets off on an odyssey to learn Milad’s fate. It is every parent’s worst nightmare, but for Abed it is compounded by the maze of physical, emotional, and bureaucratic obstacles he must navigate because he is Palestinian. He is on the wrong side of the separation wall, holds the wrong ID to pass the military checkpoints, and has the wrong papers to enter the city of Jerusalem. Abed’s quest to find Milad is interwoven with the stories of a cast of Jewish and Palestinian characters whose lives and histories unexpectedly converge. (Publisher’s description)


Non-violently resisting Israeli military occupation, with a scalpel [Book Review]

Non-violently resisting Israeli military occupation, with a scalpel [Book Review]

by | December 3, 2022 | Books, Writings

Through recounting his own spectacular life, Dr. Shawki Harb’s memoir, “A Surgeon Under Israeli Occupation,” depicts Palestinian reality from the British Mandate to today. Born a Christian and breastfed by a Muslim, Dr. Harb embodies the best of both traditions. If you are from my generation or older in Palestine, you know and respect the person even if you have never crossed paths with him.


“Rooted in Palestine: Palestinian Christians and the Struggle for National Liberation 1917-2004” [Recommended]

“Rooted in Palestine: Palestinian Christians and the Struggle for National Liberation 1917-2004” [Recommended]

by | October 15, 2022 | Books

Palestinian Christians are not only an integral part of the Palestinian struggle for freedom and independence, but they have also been pillars of Palestinian politics, resistance, business, culture, art, and so much more. Rooted in Palestine is a commendable synopsis of the Palestinian Christian community, interwoven with the history of the Church in Palestine and the inner dynamics of Palestine’s liberation movement. I congratulate my friend Xavier Abu Eid for this invaluable contribution to the documentation of Palestine and Palestinians.


“Stranger in My Own Land: Palestine, Israel and One Family’s Story of Home” by Fida Jiryis [Book Review]

“Stranger in My Own Land: Palestine, Israel and One Family’s Story of Home” by Fida Jiryis [Book Review]

by | September 8, 2022 | Books, Recommended!, Writings

I am ecstatic to be able to share with you the first review of the forthcoming book, Stranger in My Own Land: Palestine, Israel and One Family’s Story of Home, by Fida Jiryis. It was published in Le Monde diplomatique (English edition), September 2022 Issue, as part of their Palestine special report. For over a decade, I witnessed the making of this landmark memoir from concept to publishing. All I can say is R-E-S-P-E-C-T to the author and publisher. Order your copy today; this is not one to be missed!


An American Evangelical Christian Man’s Awakening to Palestine [Book Review]

An American Evangelical Christian Man’s Awakening to Palestine [Book Review]

by | July 6, 2022 | Books, Writings

The author of this memoir, Glory to God in the Lowest: Journey to an Unholy Land, Rev. Don Wagner, is a longtime friend. Back in the day, Rev. Wagner was based in Chicago, Illinois and I was in Youngstown, Ohio. We both were engaged in the same struggle for Palestine. Subsequently, when I relocated to Palestine, I would speak to the various eyewitness delegations he led to the Holy Land, or what he prefers to call the “unholy land” — which, he writes, “serves as a place of injustice that awaits the arc of the moral universe bending to usher in justice, peace, and reconciliation.”


Palestinians never stop conceding, for nothing in return [Book Review]

Palestinians never stop conceding, for nothing in return [Book Review]

by | June 30, 2022 | Books, Writings

Jerome M. Segal’s book has one main goal, which is to highlight the 1988 Palestinian Declaration of Independence as a lost inflection point: a rare, pivotal moment that the US, Israel, and even the Palestinian leadership who issued it, could have seized (but did not) to advance Palestinian statehood and peace between Palestinians and Israelis. “If it seems odd that a Jew should offer his thoughts on how Palestinians can be successful in their struggle, let me only add that the struggle for an independent Palestinian state is also the struggle for a humane and safe Israel, and that there can be no Judaism without a commitment to Justice.”