PALESTINE Memories of 1948 - Photographs of Jerusalem | Page 190

youth of Beit Jala had called on everyone to do their
bit, especially since international aid was very limited. 17
We, the youth of Beit Jala, were shocked. Shocked
but galvanized: so we very quickly organized a group
to assist the refugees to find some land, to build them
decent housing, to bring them food and put them in
touch with doctors. We were all against the United
Nations decision to partition Palestine in two in order
to create Israel. Our watchword was ‘If neither he, nor
you, nor I light the fire to show the way, where will
the light come from?’ We called that “being patriotic”,
which meant that we wanted solidarity with all Pal-
estinians in opposition to Zionism. We were united.
They, the Palestinian refugees, were the same as us in
the end: we were all victims looking for justice.
Our daily lives were further complicated because
the Arab countries had sent a few armed units with the
aim of fighting against the Jewish state and liberating
us. Realistically, that meant that in Beit Jala we had to
feed, house and clothe the Egyptian soldiers. Finally,
the Zionists were the victors thanks to their interna-
tional backing, both political and military. As for us,
our support was insufficient.
Over the coming months and years, the refugee
camps transformed themselves into places of misery.
All the United Nations resolutions remained dead in
the water, all the more so when a Zionist group of the
Lehi assassinated Folke Bernadotte, 18 the UN mediator
for Palestine. What struck me was that everyone con-
sidered the Palestinian question not as a question of
the right of return of a people, 19 but as a humanitarian
problem of refugees! Moreover, Palestinian refugees
have remained refugees, even if all those living in the
West Bank – annexed by Jordan on April 24, 1950 –
were given Jordanian nationality.
And yet, in spite of everything, hope remained alive.
It was maintained like a sacred fire, in the family, among
friends. Only much later was it extinguished completely,
giving way to a feeling of rage mixed with sadness.
Our group of militants was expanding. We expressed
our displeasure vociferously, we opposed the idea of
resigning ourselves to letting them take what was ours,
to give it to someone else, to foreigners. That made us
into opponents and our demonstrations were a mis-
demeanour in the eyes of the Jordanian authorities.
Women and men, Jordanians and Palestinians belong-
ing to the group all spent some time in prison: the
women in the town’s prison, the men in Bethlehem in
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Memories of 1948
Palestinian territory, then in Irbid and Mafraq in the
north of Jordan, and later in Al Jafr in the south. We
lived in tents in camps out in the desert, without cells,
without doors – no one escaped from the desert – and
we slept on a mattress huddled under four blankets. The
temperature, in summer, went up to 50°C, and went
down to -10°C in winter. It was so cold one night that
my feet froze, to the point that when I woke up I fell
over because I was unable to stand on my legs. I had
to have injections so that I could eventually stand up.
We were considered to be political prisoners and were
separated from common prisoners. We would remain
around six months on average, then we would be
released and they would come to fetch us again some
months later for another stay of a few months. The first
time, I was 16 years old, the second time I was 20. By
adding up all the incarcerations, I ended up spending
close to eight years behind bars; the whole of my youth.
What saved me, in a way, was that a member of my
family got a job in the Jordanian Ministry of Interior.
He asked for me to be released and I was freed on one
condition: that I leave the territory. Given the choice
between prison and exile – but exile with no possibility
of returning, I was to learn later – I chose to head for
South America: one of my sisters had left Beit Jala for
Chile in 1951 and she could put me up.
She had not chosen this country hidden behind the
cordillera of the Andes by chance: by the end of the
nineteenth century, 20 Chile had attracted thousands of
Palestinians because of the risks run by Christian boys 21
under Ottoman domination. 22 From 1914 onwards, all
young men could be conscripted, up to the age of 45. 23
The majority came from the triangle formed by
Beit Jala, 24 Beit Sahur and Bethlehem and were Greek
Orthodox Christians. 25 My family, the Shahwans, had
been among the first migrants. 26 So I took the same
road as my ancestors but for different reasons, arriv-
ing in Santiago by boat in 1961, at the age of 26. But
my heart and my head had remained in Beit Jala. How
could it be otherwise? My father, my grandfather, all
my ancestors were part of that town, working hard to
build a life and suddenly, it all went up in smoke! I felt
guilty being so far away. Far from the refugees who
needed help and from my militant friends in prison.
More than once I packed my bags to go back to Beit
Jala, especially as I did not speak the language and did
not know Chilean culture: but gradually, as I began
to speak Castilian, everything became possible. I