On August 7, 2008, an Amsterdam court ruled that an exhibition at the Tropenmuseum commemorating the sixtieth anniversary of al-Nakba, a term used by Palestinians to refer to their catastrophe of 1948, could remain open. The case against the museum was brought by a visitor who accused the museum of using the exhibition to incite hatred and discrimination against Jews. As the initiator of the show, in my capacity as the Tropenmuseum’s curator for Middle Eastern history, I had felt it was of great importance to highlight al-Nakba, not least since many in the Arab world see it as one of the most decisive periods in recent history. From the outset it was clear that this would be a complex undertaking because Palestinian history and identity are longstanding taboos in Dutch society, not least because the Dutch government always has given strong support to Israel. In the Netherlands, al-Nakba has always remained a secret history – a story that was simply not allowed to be true in a country burdened by guilt. Today, sixty years after the events, it is still unmentionable in many ways. And while the key objective of the Tropenmuseum’s work is to “exchange knowledge of and enhance understanding for different cultures”, it is also clear that most people in the Netherlands feel that museums are cultural institutions and should not be dealing with politicized issues. This combination of factors meant that once the museum proceeded with the exhibition it entered a field riven with tensions, and had to decide on how to respond to this challenge.
In light of the above, it does not come as a surprise that the museum’s director could only give the green light to the exhibition provided that I try to stay clear of politics. But can any event that deals with the Israel-Palestine conflict – one of the most contentious issues in Dutch discourse – be stripped of its political dimension? And should it be tailored to its audiences?
The exhibition Palestine 1948, which opened in March 2008 and ran until January 2009, told the story of the creation of the State of Israel largely from a Palestinian perspective. It featured personal stories narrated by Palestinians who were forced to flee their homes and, in many cases, were displaced to refugee camps following the events of 1948. As the curator, my aim had been to treat al-Nakba as more than simply a historical event; this year also marks the loss of Palestine as a physical entity and the beginning of a period of alienation and exile for the Palestinian people. This longing for a homeland left behind, which has structured the experience of several generations of Palestinians for the last sixty years, was the central theme of the show. The exhibition examined this critical period of Palestinian history in different sections, connected by the overarching idea of ‘memory and loss’. The exhibition was structured chronologically, and began with a series of historical photos by Lebanese photographer Khalil Raad (1854-1957), which provided a nostalgic glimpse of everyday life in Palestine during the 1920s.
Exhibition Palestine 1948 featured at the Tropenmuseum Amsterdam in conjunction with the 60-year commemoration of Al-Nakba.
Khalil Raad (ca. 1930), Picking oranges, Collection Institute for Palestine Studies Beirut.
Photographers American Colony (ca. 1880), View of the village of Isdud, Collection Jewish Historical Museum Amsterdam.
The main section of the exhibition consisted of personal stories recorded with first generation Palestinian refugees living in Lebanon. In recently filmed video testimonies, interviewees told their personal and often deeply moving stories, about their memories of 1948 and their journey into exile and about their experiences of living in exile. The interviews were provided by the Nakba Archive, a grassroots oral history project initiated by a collective of local and international researchers in Beirut. Since 2002, the Nakba Archive has recorded 500 interviews on video with elderly Palestinian refugees, and the collection consists of around 1,000 hours of filmed interview. A selection of twelve interviews were chosen for the exhibition and displayed as a series of video installations. These interview excerpts were intended to provide visitors with first-hand accounts of the events of al-Nakba and of life in Palestine before 1948.
A Palestinian visitor watching the testimony of Sa’da Kayed from Hawasah (Palestine) and now living in Burj al-Shamali Refugee Camp, Lebanon. In the video Sa’da sings Palestinian folk songs from her childhood and various resistance songs that were popular during the 1948 war. All testimonies featuring in the exhibition can be watched at the Nakba Archive website www.nakba-archive.org.
In addition to the video exhibits supplied by the Nakba Archive, Palestine 1948 featured contemporary photographic testimonials. For two years, British-American photographer Alan Gignoux took photos of Palestinian refugees and combined these with contemporary pictures of the precise locations where they had lived until 1948 in a project entitled Homeland Lost. Each photo was accompanied by a detailed caption containing the individual testimony of the person photographed. Poems by the late Mahmud Darwish and two video works by Palestinian artist Jumana Emil Abboud completed the exhibition.
Alan Gignoux (2004), Portrait of Fawzi Muhammad Tanji, a refugee from al-Tantura and now living in Tulkarm Refugee Camp on the West Bank. He is holding his discharge papers from the British Mandate police force.
Alan Gignoux (2004), View of al-Tantura. The building on the photo currently serves as the Archaeological Museum.
Alan Gignoux (2004), Portrait of Zeinab al-Saqqa, a refugee from al-Nahr and now living in Burj al-Barajneh Refugee Camp in Lebanon. She is shown wearing her wedding dress, the only possession she brought with her from Palestine.
