Samiha Al-Khalil (1923-1999) was born in Anabta in Tulkarem. Her father, Yousif Al-Qabaj, was the chairman of the municipality of Anabta for thirty-six years. Her mother is Halima Tukan. Samiha was a charity worker and a prominent figure in Palestinian politics.

She was enrolled in a private school in the city of Nablus when she was seven years old. She studied until the second grade of elementary school. In the early thirties, she joined a school in TulKarem and studied until seventh grade, and then she joined “The Friends” School in Ramallah and studied until second grade in high school. She continued her studies of the Arabic language until her third year in Beirut Arab University but could not finish her studies because she was banned from travelling by the Israeli occupation.

She earned her high school degree twenty-five years after she got married. In 1940, she married Salama Khalil.

In 1948 Samiha and her family became refugees. They lived in Gaza where she used to sell jewelry to survive until leaving by boat to Lebanon. IN 1952, all the family left Gaza by boat to Beirut and returned to the West Bank.

The experience of war and of being a refugee shaped her life as she struggled to gain back her country by shaking off the effects of Israeli occupation and oppression.

Samiha was an active women and she was considered one of the pioneers in social and women’s action in the West Bank.

In 1965, Khalil came to the public eye when she founded the al-Inaash al-Usra society in her garage – it would grow to become one of the largest and most effectivePalestinian welfare organization.

The organization empowers women through vocational skills trainings.  The center also offers residential child care and, through its sale of embroidery and crafts, helps preserve Palestinian heritage and culture during the years of occupation. From modest beginnings, Ina’ash El-Usra has grown to have a $6 million annual budget, giving Palestinians the opportunity to maintain their dignity and hope as they struggle to maintain their presence in their historic home.

In 1970, she became a member in the leadership of the “National Front in the West Bank”.

In 1978, she was chosen to be a member in the “The National Committee of Guidance,” the supreme leading bureau of the Palestinian people inside Palestine. She was the only woman in that committee.

She established, and later became president of, the “Society of Reviving the Family” for thirty consecutive years. This society was one of the most prominent national societies to stand up against the occupation of the West Bank after 5 June 1967.

During the 1980s, Khalil was tied to the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine and detained six times by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) ; she saw two of her children deported from Israel and the other three (who had been out of the country at the time) forbidden from re-entering. She was eventually placed under town-arrest in al-Bireh.

In 1996 she ran for president of the Palestinian Authority, losing to Yasser Arafat, while garnering 11.5% of the vote.

A grandmother of 13, Khalil remained an active member in the political scene, serving on the Palestinian National Council up until her death in 1999.

She was a member of the Young Christian Women, of the administrative bureau of the Union of Charities in Jerusalem, the chairman of the Union of Volunteer Women Societies, which includes fifty-five societies in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, member of the administrative committee of the branches of the Charities Union in Jerusalem, Al-Khalil, and Nablus, the treasurer of the Illiteracy and Senior Teaching Committee, of Al-Maqasid Charity, an honorary member of the Arab Lawyers Union

She wrote a poetry book entitled Uprising to Statehood.

Medals and Prizes:

• Medal of Jerusalem for culture and literature-1991
• Medal from the Public Union of the Students of Palestine-1992
• Medal from the Cultural Sports Center, Baka Al-Gharbiya
• Medal from the Arab American Society, Ramallah-1993
• Medal from the American Union, Ramallah-1993
• Medal from the Palestinian Society of Mathematical Sciences-1993
• Medal from the Palestinian Ministry of Culture-1995
• Medal of “For you, Jerusalem” Conference-1995
• Medal from Al-Bira municipality, Palestine-1995

Sources:

– www.jadaliyya.com

– www.passia.org

Further reading:

– When life hands you lemons

http://www.cipe.org/blog/2010/03/11/making-lemonade-from-lemons/#.VH2JFZUtDtQ

–Women Beyond Borders

http://www.arabfilm.com/item/384/

Widad Kawar is an internationally renowned collector of Palestinian and Jordanian ethnic and cultural arts. She was born in Tulkarem but grew up in Bethelem. Widad received her education in the Ramallah Quaker School. She studied at the American University of Beirut.

Ramallah and Bethlehem, both considered significant cultural heritage centers in Palestine, had a tremendous impact on Widad as a young girl.

During some vacations at her mother´s town Widad began to appreciate the nature of Palestinian village life in the 1940s. She started to learn about costumes and embroidery and she felt in love with that art. In the time she spent in Aboud, every day after lunch many women got together and embroider.

With the time she got married and settled in Jordan where she volunteered in Hussein and Wihdat refugee camps. Widad was a member of the YMCA as well as the Women’s Auxiliary of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, a special body created after the Palestinian exodus in 1948.

The war of 1967 was an extraordinary human drama and Widad and all the Palestinians saw Palestine occupied. She began to collect geneuine pieces before they were lost or influenced by the new life in the refugee camps.

She collected marriage dresses, cushion covers, home decorations, weaving, pottery, handicrafts, belts, head covers jewelry and straw work.

After the war she began to meet women in different villages and cities in Palestine and she understood the way their roles had changed with the occupation and their position in the family, their attachment to their heritage and their endurance to keep a family together under that situation.

The women whose heritage Widad has collected remain her inspiration. They have honored her by sharing their sad and happy memories of the past with her. They inspired her to pass on their rich cultural heritage to future generations.

Actually, Kawar is known as Umm l’ibas al-falastini—the mother of Palestinian dress.

She has amassed an extensive collection of dresses, costumes, textiles, and jewelry over the past 50 years, seeking to preserve part of the heritage of Palestine. Kawar´s collection is the largest to date of Palestinian traditional dress and accessories comprising more than 3,000 items.

She has made her collection available for public viewing and has mounted exhibits of Palestinian dress around the world.

For her each item fo her collection calls to mind an individual: a wife, a mother, a daughter, a family. Each item reminds her of a place: a village, a town, a house, a market. Each item was worn on special occasions by a special person.

She has written many books on Palestinian embroidery. Recently, she collaborated with Margaret Skinner on A Treasury of Stitches: Palestinian Embroidery Motifs, 1850–1950(Rimal/Melisende). Widad is currently a member of the Board of Trustees of the American Center for Oriental Research.

Her latest and most important book is Threads Of Identity a history of Palestinian women told through aspects of popular heritage, focusing on traditional dresses but also including textiles and rug weaving, rural and urban customs, jewellery, cuisine, and festivities. The interviews with women who lived through the traumas and changes of the 20^th century are a contribution to oral history, augmenting standard historical accounts. While most writing about the Middle East concentrates on politics, her book focuses on the dignity of ordinary people, and women in particular, bridging the gap between the major events of history and everyday life. With this book Widad Kamel Kawar pays homage to Palestinian women.

After years of collection, she recently established Tiraz, a home for the largest collection of Arab dress, containing over 3,000 costumes and weavings from the 19th and 20th centuries. Her dream now is to develop the center and keep the traditions of embroidery alive.

Each piece belongs to a particular time, a particular tribe or village, with an individual story to tell.

Tiraz is a place to exhibit and combine these stories for the public in Jordan and the Middle East, as well as for cultural centres and institutions around the world. To be celebrated and understood, and collection must be seen and experienced.

Words alone cannot capture the spirit and immediacy of the embroidered patterns; the sensitivity, diversity and the richness of their forms.

Tiraz will curate, describe and explore these forms, expressed in the seams of each garment, in a way which historians and visitors from all over the world will come to appreciate, and remember.

Awards

• Directorate of Heritage Award of the Government of Sharjah, 2014
• Prince Klaus International Award for culture and development, 2012
• Jordan Tourism Medal for her role in organizing the Seville World Expo, 1992
• King Hussein Medal, 1993
• Medal for Jarash Festival, 1986

List of Publications

The list below includes authored publications as well as contribution towards publications, especially exhibit catalogues.

• Threads of Identity: Preserving Palestinian Culture and Heritage – Amman, Jordan [2011]
• Contribution to BERG Encyclopedia of World Dress and Fashion Volume Four on Central and South West Asia [2010]
• Bethlehem: From Golden Threads to Cement Blocks – Amman, Jordan [2005]
• Cultural Treasures of Jordan [2001]
• Palestinian Embroidery, Traditional Fallahi Stitch. With Tania Nasir. National Ethnic Museum -Munich, Germany [1992]
• Costumes Speak. With Sally de Vries. Jordan Magazine – Washington, United States
• National Costumes of Jordan. The Art of Jordan. Museum of Mersyside – Liverpool, England
• 2000 Years of color. Kawar Collection and Mosaics of Jordan. Moesgard Museum – Aarhus, Denmark [1991]
• Memoire de Soie. Institute du Monde Arabe – Paris, France [1988]
• Pracht Und Geheimnis. Rautenstrauch-Joest Museum – Munich, Germany [1987]
• Costumes and Wedding Customs in Bayt Dajan. With Shelagh Weir. [1984]
• Weaving in Jordan – Amman, Jordan [1981]
• Costumes Dyed by the Sun – Tokyo, Japan [1982]

 Exhibitions

Some of the items of her big collection

Hebron

 Jaffa

 Gaza

Head Cover Jerusalem                                                       Head Cover Galilee

Bracelets                                                                                                    Necklaces

Cross Stitch

Pottery

 Weavings

Sources:

– http://www.arabheritage.org

– http://tirazcentre.org

Further readings:

-Presentation of 2012 Prince Claus Award to Widad Kawar

http://www.princeclausfund.org/es/news/presentation-of-2012-prince-claus-award-to-widad-kawar.html

– Widad Kawar – Every Dress Tells A Story

http://beamman.com/historic-and-cultural/1085-widad-kawar-tiraz