Rashid Ismail Khalidi (1948) is a Palestinian- American historian born in New York. He is the son of Ismail Khalidi and nephew of Husayin al Khalidi. Rashid attended the United Nations International School.

In 1970, Khalidi received a B.A. from Yale University, where he was a member of the Wolf’s Head Society. He then received a D. Phil. from Oxford University in 1974. Between 1976 and 1983, Khalidi “was teaching full time as an Assistant Professor in the Political Studies and Public Administration Dept. at the American University of Beirut, published two books and several articles, and also was a research fellow at the independent Institute for Palestine Studies”. He has also taught at the Lebanese University.

In his books and articles he covers primarily the history of the modern Middle East. He focuses on the countries of the southern eastern Mediterranean. Rashid also researches the impact of the press on forming new senses of community, the role of education in the construction of political identity, and in the way narratives have developed over the past centuries in the region.

Much of Khalidi’s scholarly work in the 1990s focused on the historical construction of nationalism in the Arab world. He argues that the nations have legitimacy and rights. In his book most influential and most widely cited book “Palestinian Identity: The Construction of Modern National Consciousness” (1997) he talks about the illegal establishment of Israel in 1948 and how Palestinians have spread out across the region in Egypt, Lebanon, Syria and Jordan. He explores in this work the evolution of a Palestinian national identity that developed in spite of, and in some cases because of, the obstacles it faced. It illuminates the sources of collective Palestinian identity from the late Ottoman Empire onward: religious beliefs; ethnic backgrounds; local loyalties; education; and external forces such as Zionism.

In Resurrecting Empire: Western Footprints and America’s Perilous Path in the Middle East(2004), Khalidi takes readers on a historical tour of Western involvement in the Middle East, and argues that these interactions continue to have a colonialist nature that is both morally unacceptable and likely to backfire.

Books

-British Policy towards Syria and Palestine 1906-1914: The Antecedents of the Hussein-McMahon Correspondence, the Sykes-Picot Agreements and the Balfour Declaration (1980)

-Palestine and the Gulf: Proceedings of an International Seminar (co-editor, 1982)

-The Origins of Arab Nationalism (1991)

-Resurrecting Empire: Western footprints and America´s perilous path in the Middle East (2004)

-The iron cage: the story of the Palestinian struggle for statehood (2006)

-Sowing crisis: American hegemony and the Cold War in the Middle East (2009)

-Palestinian identity: the construction of modern national consciousness (1977). Reissued with new preface (2010)

-Brokers of deceit: how the U.S. has undermined peace in the Middle East (2013)

-Under siege: PLP decision-making during the 1982 War (1985). Reissued with new preface (2014)

Affiliations

• Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences
• Member, Conseil Scientifique, Ramses2, Maison Méditerranéenne des Sciences de l’Homme, Aix-en-Provence
• Member, Conseil Scientifique, Institut Méditérranean d’Études et Recherches Avancés, Marseille
• Member, Council on Foreign Relations
• Member, Board of Trustees, al-Quds University, Jerusalem
• Member, Advisory Board, Bruno Kreisky Forum, Vienna
• Member, Advisory Board, Encyclopedia of the Modern Middle East
• Member, Editorial Board, Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa & the Middle East

Awards

• Lionel Trilling Book Award for Brokers of Deceit, 2014
• MEMO Palestine Book Awards, 2013: Academic Winner
• Arab American National Museum Book Award for The Iron Cage, 2007
• Lenfest Teaching Award, 2007
• Middle East Studies Association Albert Hourani Book Award, for Resurrecting Empire, 2004
• Middle East Studies Association Albert Hourani Book Award for Palestinian Identity, 1997

Video

Rashid Khalidi on Israelis, Palestinians and Any Hope for Mideast Peace

Further reading:

– Brokers of Deceit; Pathways to Peace

– A Call to Correct History’s Mistakes [interview with Rashid Khalidi]

Sources:

http://www.all4palestine.com/

http://history.columbia.edu/

http://www.goodreads.com/

Edward Said (1935 –2003) was a Palestinian literacy theorist and a well-known public intellectual. He was born in Jerusalem. He spent his childhood between Jerusalem and Cairo and it was in Cairo where he attended both British and American schools. Later on, he left to the United States where he obtained a bachelor’s degree from Princeton and a doctorate in English literature from Harvard. In 1963 he joined the faculty of Columbia University and in 1991 he became professor of English and comparative literature at the same university until 2003.

Said wrote dozens of books, lectures, and essays. Anthologies of his essays have been published, and several of his interviews and conversations have also been edited into book form.

Said helped found the critical-theory¹ field of postcolonialism^2. . Joseph Conrad is the subject of Said´s first book, Joseph Conrad and the Fiction of Autobiography^3.

In 1975 he wrote Beginnings: Intention and Method and 1978 he created his master piece Orientalism –In this highly acclaimed seminal work, Edward Said surveys the history and nature of Western attitudes towards the East, considering Orientalism as a powerful European ideological creation – a way for writers, philosophers and colonial administrators to deal with the ‘otherness’ of Eastern culture, customs and beliefs. He traces this view through the writings of Homer, Nerval and Flaubert, Disraeli and Kipling, whose imaginative depictions have greatly contributed to the West’s romantic and exotic picture of the Orient. In his new preface, Said examines the effect of continuing Western imperialism after recent events in Palestine, Afghanistan and Iraq.

In 1979 The Question of Palestine, Covering Islam: How the Media and the Experts Determine How We See the Rest of the World (1981), The World, the Text, and the Critic (1983), After the Last Sky: Palestinian Lives (1986), Nationalism, Colonialism, and Literature: Yeats and Decolonization (1988), Nationalism, Colonialism, and Literature (1990), Musical Elaborations (1991), Culture and Imperialism and Edward Said: A Critical Reader (1993), The Politics of Dispossession: The Struggle for Palestinian Self-Determination, 1969-1994, Representations of the Intellectual: The 1993 Reith lectures, Peace and Its Discontents: Essays on Palestine in the Middle East Peace Process (1995), Out of Place: A Memoir(1999), The End of the Peace Process: Oslo and After and Reflections on Exile and Other Essays (2000), Parallels and Paradoxes: Explorations in Music and Society (2002), Freud and the Non-European and From Oslo to Iraq and the Road Map (2003), Humanism and Democratic Criticism⁴(2004), Paradoxical Citizenship: Edward Said edited by Silvia Nagy-Zekmi and On Late Style: Music and Literature Against the Grain foreword by Mariam C. Said, introduction by Michael Wood (2006).

Said was an accomplished pianist. He worked as the music critic for The Nation magazine, and wrote four books about music: Musical Elaborations (1991), Parallels and Paradoxes: Explorations in Music and Society (2002, with Daniel Barenboim), On Late Style: Music and Literature Against the Grain (2006), and Music at the Limits (2007). In the latter book he spoke of finding musical reflections of his literary and historical ideas in bold compositions and strong performances.

In 1999, Said and Daniel Barenboim founded the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, which is composed of young Israeli, Palestinian, and Arab musicians. They also established The Barenboim–Said Foundation in Seville, to develop education-through-music projects.

 Awards

Besides honors, memberships, and postings to prestigious organizations world-wide, Edward Said was awarded some twenty honorary university degrees in the course of his professional life as an academic, critic, and Man of Letters. Among the honors bestowed to him was the Bowdoin Prize by Harvard University. He twice received the Lionel Trilling Book Award; the first occasion was the inaugural bestowing of said literary award in 1976, for Beginnings: Intention and Method (1974). He also received the Wellek Prize of the American Comparative Literature Association, and was awarded the inaugural Spinoza Lens Prize. In 2001, Said was awarded the Lannan Literary Award for Lifetime Achievement. In 2002, he received the Prince of Asturias Award for Concord, and was the first U.S. citizen to receive the Sultan Owais Prize. The autobiography Out of Place (1999) was bestowed three awards, the 1999 New Yorker Book Award for Non-Fiction; the 2000 Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for Non-Fiction; and the Morton Dauwen Zabel Award in Literature

 Video

Edward Said The Last Interview 2004

Further reading:

– Edward Said 

– Remembering Edward Said: In the name of Humanism

Reference:

1- Critical theory is a type of social theory oriented toward critiquing and changing society as a whole, in contrast to traditional theory oriented only to understanding or explaining it.

2- Postcolonialism or postcolonial studies is an academic discipline featuring methods of intellectual discourse that analyze, explain, and respond to the cultural legacies of colonialism and imperialism, to the human consequences of controlling a country and establishing settlers for the economic exploitation of the native people and their land.

3- Edward W. Said locates Joseph Conrad’s fear of personal disintegration in his constant re-narration of the past. Using the author’s personal letters as a guide to understanding his fiction, Said draws an important parallel between Conrad’s view of his own life and the manner and form of his stories. The critic also argues that the author, who set his fiction in exotic locations like East Asia and Africa, projects political dimensions in his work that mirror a colonialist preoccupation with “civilizing” native peoples. Said then suggests that this dimension should be considered when reading all of Western literature. First published in 1966, Said’s critique of the Western self’s struggle with modernity signaled the beginnings of his groundbreaking work, Orientalism, and remains a cornerstone of postcolonial studies today.

4- Humanism and Democratic Criticism – In the radically changed and highly charged political atmosphere that has overtaken the United States–and to varying degrees the rest of the world–since September 11, 2001, the notion that cultures can harmoniously and productively coexist has come to seem like little more than a quaint fiction. In this time of heightened animosity and aggression, have humanistic values and democratic principles become irrelevant? Are they merely utopian fantasies? Or are they now more urgent and necessary than ever before? Ever since the ascendancy of critical theory and multicultural studies in the 1960s and 1970s, traditional humanistic education has been under assault. Often condemned as the intolerant voice of the masculine establishment and regularly associated with Eurocentrism and even imperialism, the once-sacred literary canon is now more likely to be ridiculed than revered. While this seismic shift–brought on by advances in technological communication, intellectual specialization, and cultural sensitivity–has eroded the former primacy of the humanities, Edward Said argues that a more democratic form of humanism–one that aims to incorporate, emancipate, and enlighten–is still possible. A lifelong humanist, Said believed that self-knowledge is the highest form of human achievement and the true goal of humanistic education. But he also believed that self-knowledge is unattainable without an equal degree of self-criticism, or the awareness that comes from studying and experiencing other peoples, traditions, and ideas. Proposing a return to philology and a more expansive literary canon as strategies for revitalizing the humanities, Said contends that words are not merely passive figures but vital agents in historical and political change. Intellectuals must reclaim an active role in public life, but at the same time, insularity and parochialism, as well as the academic trend toward needless jargon and obscurantism, must be combated. The “humanities crisis,” according to Said, is based on the misperception that there is an inexorable conflict between established traditions and our increasingly complex and diversified world. Yet this position fails to recognize that the canonized thinkers of today were the revolutionaries of yesterday and that the nature of human progress is to question, upset, and reform. By considering the emerging social responsibilities of writers and intellectuals in an ever more interdependent world and exploring the enduring influence of Eric Auerbach’s critical masterpiece, “Mimesis,” Said not only makes a persuasive case for humanistic education but provides his own captivating and deeply personal perspective on our shared intellectual heritage.

Sources:

http://www.biography.com/

http://www.goodreads.com/

http://sociology.about.com/

http://www.egs.edu/library/

http://www.encyclopedia.com/

Salman Abu Sitta (1938) is a Palestinian researcher and writer. He was born in Beersheba (Bir al-Saba’), British Mandate of Palestine. Abu Sitta and his family were between the first wave of Palestinian refugees to leave their home land and settled down in Egypt. He went to al- Saidiya secondary school in Cairo where he graduated with “excellence”, ranking first in Egypt.

After graduating from Cairo University’s Faculty of Engineering in 1958, he went to the United Kingdom to continue his post-graduate studies, receiving his PhD in Civil Engineering from the University of London.

Former member of Palestine National Council (20 years). Researcher on refugee affairs and author of over 200 papers on the subject. Director of international development and construction projects.

Founder and President of the Palestine Land Society (PLS). General coordinator of al-Awda the Palestinian Right of Return Coalition.

Abu-Sitta has spent many years searching on any information related to Palestine before, during and after the illegal creation of Israel. He tries his best to ensure the memory and identity of the occupied homeland are never lost.

He started to collect information when he was 30 years old by the period when Palestine was under Ottoman rule. The document dated back to the early years of the last century. “It sort of started from there, and it has never stopped,” Abu-Sitta says. “I kept collecting all and any material on every inch of my homeland.”

Published works: – The Return Journey (2007) Palestine Land Society, – Atlas of Palestine, 1948 Palestine Land Society (January 2004), – The Palestinian Nakba 1948: The register of depopulated localities in Palestine (Occasional Return Centre studies) (1998 reprinted 2000) Palestinian Return Center.

He is the founder and President of the Palestine Land Society (PLS). General coordinator of al-Awda the Palestinian Right of Return Coalition

This is the introduction on Abu Sitta´s book “The Palestinian Nakba 1948: the register of depopulated localities in Palestine:

The Palestinian Nakba is unsurpassed in history. For a country to be occupied by a foreign minority, emptied almost entirely of its people, its physical and cultural landmarks obliterated, its destruction hailed as a miraculous act of God and a victory for freedom and civilized values, all done according to a premeditated plan, meticulously executed, financially and politically supported from abroad, and still maintained today, is no doubt unique.

Today, there are more than five million refugees whose families were expelled from their homes and not allowed to return. For half a century, they endured a life of suffering and destitution, some forced to be refugees again and again, most have been active in trying to remove this colossal injustice, all have a relentless desire to return home.

If there is a single lesson to be learnt from the last 50 years of war and strife, it is that the Palestinians will not just disappear and that they are the only people who have no where to live, nor wish to live, except in Palestine.

At the fiftieth anniversary of their Palestinian Holocaust, this Register, first published in 1998, is an attempt to put in print what is already engraved in the minds and hearts of millions of refugees. This second revised edition of the Register is part of an ongoing project to document the collective memory of the ‘unchosen’ but determined people. This and similar projects attempt to draft the blue print for the Return Plan.

Video

Right of Return Conference Day 1: Salman Abu Sitta Keynote

Further reading:

– Atlas of Palestine 1948: Reconstructing Palestine

–Salman Abu Sitta: Mapping the Historical Geography of Palestine

Sources:

http://www.all4palestine.com/

http://www.plands.org/new/

Hisham Zreiq is a Palestinian filmmaker, poet and visual artist; he was born in Nazareth (1968) to a Christian Palestinian family. He is considered one of the pioneers of computer fine art, starting doing computer art in 1994, and he showed his work in many galleries across the world. In 2001 Hisham Zreiq went to live in Germany. In 2006 He started filming his first documentary the sons of Eilaboun, a documentary about the massacre, expulsión and return of the residents of a small Palestinian village in the Galilee.

In 2008 he created the short film Just Another Day dealing with the Arabs living in western world after September 11 terror attacks, followed in 2001 by Before You is the Sea.

Zreiq’s art is his perspective on life, pains, disappointments, happiness, and his philosophical look at life. He uses extensive symbolism and metaphors in both his visual art and films. One example is the cross that symbolizes punishment and sacrifice, as Jesus was punished and sacrificed his life. His art is somehow surrealist, and looks like it was extracted from a dream-like world. The intensity of emotions cannot be ignored, and captures the eyes of viewers, encouraging their minds to wander. His pieces are powered by strong composition and powerful representation of colour.

In 2004 Zreiq was one of the winners of the award “Kunst- und Förderpreis Sparkasse Bayreuth”, and his work was exhibited Kunst & Museum Hollfeld.

His films were screened in several festivals and events, such as:

• Sixth Annual International Al-Awda Convention 2008, California USA
• Boston Palestine Film Festival 2008, USA
• International İzmir Short Film Festival 2008, Izmir, Turkey
• Amal The International Euro-Arab film Festival 2008, Spain
• Carthage Film Festival 2008 (Palestine: To remember section), Carthage, Tunisia
• Regards Palestiniens, Montreal, Canada
• Chicago Palestine Film Festival, 2009
• 13th Annual Arab Film Festival, 2009
• Sixth Twin Cities Arab Film Festival, Minnesota, USA
• Salento International Filem Festival, 2010, Italy
• Palestine Film Festival in Madrid, 2010, Spain
• 18th Damascus International Film Festival, 2010, Syria
• Al Ard Doc Film Festival, 2011, Cagliari, Italy
• Toronto Palestine Film Festival, 2012, Toronto, Canada

Sons of Eilaboun – Trailer

Hisham Zreiq´s Work

Sources:

– Uprooted Palestinian

– http://hishamzreiq.com/

Further readings:

http://sonsofeilaboun.com/

– http://hishamzreiq.com/justanotherday.html

Jumana El Husseini was born in 1932 in Jerusalem. Her parents, Jamal El Husseini, and Nimati El Alami; both from prominent Palestinian families. As a child, Jumana was a student at the Ramallah Friends Girls School near Jerusalem. Forced to leave Palestine in 1947, the family settled in Lebanon. Since her early age, El Husseini was art oriented. During the 1950’s she studied painting, ceramics, and sculpture while majoring in political science at the Beirut College for Women and then at the American University of Beirut. She also studied fine arts in Paris and had her first exhibition there in 1965. El-Husseini has since had a number of solo exhibitions in most Arab countries, especially in Jordan, as well as in Japan and Italy, in addition to her native city Jerusalem.

Noted for figurative paintings of Palestinian women and geometric houses in Jerusalem and Jericho, her style evolved from realistic to geometric and, since 1987 to abstract, with wavelike overpainted drawing evoking Arabic calligraphy. Since that year, her work has undergone a major shift: from being figurative and light, to abstract and dark. Her fanciful, stylized scenes of people and cities are now replaced by the reflective images of a search for rebirth. The paintings are constructed of diffused geometrical shapes floating in well-defined spaces. Articulating those shapes are calligraphic areas that shed both physical and spiritual light on this darkness. They are reminiscent of Middle Eastern cities at night. With their shimmering translucency, they become symbols of hope.

The paintings are sober in color. Texture is used to highlight a strong contrast or to subdue a powerful form. The change of Jumana’s art is the transformation from the joy of remembrance to the realization and assessment of a current situation.

Jumana learned the art of sculpture during the 1950´s when she was at the Beirut College for Women. She started on blocks of stone, then on hard rose wood. All her sculptures are created by carving (Hammer and chisel). The stone artwork is often associated with small hand cut mirrors, and the wood with gold leaf layers. Recently, Jumana has worked on small to medium size rocks from the Dead Sea. Using mixed media she transforms each object to a piece of art.

Early on, Jumana took part in exhibitions at the Museum of Sursok in Beirut (1960, 64, 67),the “Open Air Exhibition” of the American University of Beirut (1963), The Bien­Niali events of Alexandria (1969), Kuwait (1973), Baghdad (1974) and Venice (1979), The tourng Exhibition of the Smithsonian Institute of Washington (1971 to 73), and many collective events: in London (1965), Tokyo (1978), Geneva(1979), The Museum of Eastern Art in Moscow (1980), The National Museum in Madrid (1980), The Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw (1980), London (1985) and Geneva (1986), The Messe Exhibition Center in Vienna, The Museum of Modern Art in Tokyo (1988), The Barbican Centre in London (1989) and many others.

In 1991, she studied stained glass art at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris France (School of Fine Arts).

Jumana´s work

Individual Exhibitions

1965 Woodstock Gallery, London – U. K.

1968 German Cultural Center, Beirut – Lebanon German Cultural Center, Tripoli – Lebanon

1970 American University, Beirut – Lebanon

1971 Bonn University, Stuttgart University, Staeaedtische Gallery, Imlanbachhaus, Munchen, Germany

1973 Delta Gallery, Rome – Italy Gallery des Antiquaires, Beirut – Lebanon

1979 Dome of Jeddah, Jeddah – Saudi Arabia

1981 Redec Gallery, Jeddah – Saudi Arabia

1984 Arab Heritage Gallery, Dhahran – Saudi Arabia

1987 Tour Exhibition in the United States

Arab Cultural Center, San Francisco – USA

Santa Theresa Library, San Jose – USA

Association of Arab Diplomats, American University, Washington DC – USA

Dag Hammershold Gallery, N.Y. – USA

Bedford Gallery, Walnut Creek – USA

Tour Exhibition in Canada

Victoria College University, Toronto – Canada

Algonquin College, Ottawa – Canada

1989 Soviet Friendship Center, Moscow – Russia

Addison Ripley Gallery, Washington DC – USA

Georgetown University, Washington DC – USA

1990 Gallery Etienne Dinet, Paris – France

1991 Argile Gallery, London, U. K.

Shouman Institute, Amman – Jordan

1993 Anadil Gallery, Jerusalem

2002 Darat Al Funun, Amman – Jordan

Al Maamal Gallery, Jerusalem – Palestine

Kattan Center, Ramallah – Palestine

2004 Galerie Joëlle Mortier Valat, Paris – France

Further readings:

– http://iamfrompalestine.com/

– http://jumanaelhusseini.com

Sources:

-http://jumanaelhusseini.com/

-http://www.palestine-family.net

May Khoury is a Palestinian collector of antiques and designer. She was born in 1940 in Ramallah, Palestine. She studied at the Friends Girls School and went to Bir Zeit University. She has been living in Amman, Jordan since 1974until now. She is considered a cultural conservationist- for over 16 years, her creations have earned a deserve status as a Traditional Handicraft Designer. She believes she has a mission to help preserve the traditional facets of Arabian crafting skills, from fading away.

May became a worldwide promoter of Arabian heritage, transforming its aged beauty with new furniture and clothing designs to adorn the modern-day home.

Her fresh approach to redesigning folkloric pieces has gained popularity with younger and older generations alike. The recycling process of breathing new life into older pieces has become her trademark in producing desirable, artistic, and functional creations.

Her creations were introduced to Arab and European countries, as part of the Mediterranean handicraft promotion. With her work she expresses her own vision on heritage preservation, through the holding of several fashion shows abroad and in Jordan where she lives.

She is a member of the International Women Forum, Jordan Branch, of the Jordanian Forum for Business & Professional Women, networking to enhance, develop and empower business women in Jordan, of the world Crafts Council, and member of Alhoush Network which is the premier cultural networking and e-commerce portal to contemporary art and design from the Arab world.

She is the Founder & Designer: Badr Adduja Arts & Crafts. Badr Adduja Brand is the signature of novel crafts, handmade with traditional authenticity and the personal creativity of its founding designer, May Khoury. Inaugurated in 1999 by HRH Princess Muna Al Hussein, Badr Addujafast grew to become a symbol of designing and producing the ultimate in beauty as the name suggests; in Arabic, Badr Adduja means the full moon at night.

Badr Adduja has played an essential role in giving back to the community, where it has employed and cultivated the talents of over 30 artisans, granting them a stable income while sustaining their traditional craftsmanship skills. Together with May Khoury, the growing family of Badr Adduja continues to preserve Arabian folklore and bring its heritage to life.

From eccentric furniture pieces and accessories, to rich textiles and even one-off clothing items, some of Badr Adduja’s creations have made it to the homes of prominent people and private VIP lounges, as well as renowned museums and hotels around the world.

Awards

-Winner of both Gold & Silver A Design Awards 2013-2014 in the category of Arts & Crafts.

-Winner of the Silver A Design Award 2012-2013 in the category Arts & Crafts -Nominated for Prime Designer of the year 2013 by a member of the International Designers Association.

-Won the 2^nd Laureate of the UNESCO crafts prize for the Arab states, held in Algeria in 2002, for the design of a unique wooden chair, carved and decorated with Traditional Palestinian intricate embroidery and motifs.

Private Exhibition

-9th – 31st July 2000 at Badr Ad-duja arts& crafts Under the patronage of Her Majesty Queen Rania AL-Abdullah (Wooden Rhymes)

-Exhibition 14th March 2002at Badr Ad-duja arts & crafts Under the patronage of H.R.H. Princess Muna AL- Hussein (Authentic Textile In Style)

-Exhibition December9th 2007at Badr Adduja gallery An exhibition of Jordanian home furnishings & Accessories (Creations defining a nation )

-November 24th 2008 At Badr Adduja, under the Patronage of her Excellency Minister of Culture Nancy Bakir (Creative Melodies of Oriental Legacies) Exhibition

Mixed Exhibitions

– Dubai: March 12-17, 2014 Beirut Art Fair 19-22nd Sept. 2013 Amman Art Week 5-16 September 2013 30th April

– 2nd May 2001 Abu Dhabi – UAE in The Jordan Festival Under the patronage of H.H. Sheikh Nahyan Bin Zayed Al Nahyan & H.R.H. Prince Feisal Bin Al – Hussien 5th

– 14th Nov. 2002 Paris – France First Salon of Euro med Craftswomen organized by “Women from Two Shores” at salon des pont neuf Paris, France. 25th Feb.

– 11th Mar. 2004 – France Exposition itinérante “ Empreintes et couleurs de Méditerranée” Organized by Project PRODECOM Chambre des Beaux Arts de Méditerrané At Unesco headquarters Paris, France .4th

– 11th Dec 2004 Amman Exhibition for designers of handicrafts from the Mediterranean at city hall, Amman municipality. 22nd Apr

– 1st May 2005 Florence/Italy An exhibition in the International Florence Fair in coordination with unesco.

– 28th June – 24th Sep. 2005 Paris Exhibition for Heritage Artisana & Design at gallery Viaduc des arts. Paris, France

Videos

This is Palestine – May Khoury

Sources:

www.alhoush.com

http://www.badr-adduja.com.jo

http://competition.adesignaward.com

Further reading:

– Interview with May Khoury

http://competition.adesignaward.com/designer-interview.php?profile=122615

Hanan Munayyer is a Palestinian –American collector and researcher of Palestinian clothing.

She felt in love with the Palestinian embroidery in 1987, when she saw a collection of dresses and accessories brought to New York by the late Rolla Foley, an American Quaker who was in Palestine in 1938. Foley was working as a teacher at the Friends School in Ramallah. Foley´s collection included a large number of quality items of Palestinian and Syrian costumes, some of them date back to 1850.

Hanan and her husband bought the Foley´s collection because they thought that embroidery is one of the strongest expressions of Palestinian culture and they were interested in promoting the Palestinian cultural image in a positive way.

Munayyer, a molecular biologist, put her research skills to use to dig into the history of their new possessions — through books (only a handful were available then), textile experts and trips back to the Middle East.

Her collection has items of proto-Palestinian attire in artifacts from the Canaanite period (1500 BCE) such as Egyptian paintings depicting Canaanites in A-shaped garments. Munayyer says that from 1200 BC to 1940 AD, all Palestinian dresses were cut from natural fabrics in a similar A-line shape with triangular sleeves. This shape is known to archaeologists as the “Syrian tunic” and appears in artifacts such as an ivory engraving from Megiddo dating to 1200 BC.

She has the largest collection in America, the Munayyer collection includes costumes from most Palestinian regions well known for distinctive costumes. The collection has been displayed in several American museums.

Hanan is the co-founder and president of the Palestinian Heritage Foundation. She has researched and lectured on Palestinian textile arts for over twenty years.

Her book Traditional Palestinian Costume Origins and Evolution was published by Interlink Books in May 2011, is the culmination of Hanan´s research for the past twenty three years. It reflects the historical and cultural richness of Palestine and the Arab world through costumes and embroidery.

Hanan’s study commenced with scholarly exploration into art history, archaeology, the interpretation of ancient patterns, and the history of costumes and craft in the Middle East over the last 4,000 years. It includes extensive field research and the culling of museum resources and publications from around the world.

The book presents the most exhaustive and up-to-date study of the origins of Palestinian embroidery and costume—from antiquity through medieval Arab textile arts to the present. It documents the evolution of costume and the textile arts in Palestine in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries region by region.

Hanan knows that these textiles have long played an important role in Palestinian culture and identity and are manifested in every aspect of Palestinian life. She believes that the costumes are sources of historical data.

Hanan received the ATFP Award for Excellence in Arts Scholarship at ATFP’s Sixth Annual Gala on October 19, 2011 in recognition of her book on traditional costumes.

 Some items from her collection

Sources:

– http://www.palestineheritage.org

– http://www.all4palestine.com

Videos

-Hanan Karaman Munayyer awarded for Excellence in Arts Scholarship, ATFP 6th Annual Gala

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjy-Px-9k2w

–Traditional Palestinian Costume: Lecture and Book Signing

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HFPSY9rwGIs

Further readings:

– “Traditional Palestinian Costume: Lecture and Book Signing”

http://www.thejerusalemfund.org/ht/display/ContentDetails/i/32204/pid/v

– Traditional Palestinian Costume: Origins and Evolution

http://www.wrmea.org/2012-october/books-traditional-palestinian-costume-origins-and-evolution.html

The Palestine Children’s Relief Fund is a registered non-political, non-profit organization that was established in 1991 by concerned people in the U.S. to address the medical and humanitarian crisis facing Palestinian youths in the Middle East. It has since expanded to help suffering children from the region, based only on their medical needs. They don´t not discriminate based on religion, gender, nationality or sect.

The primary objective of the PCRF is to identify and treat every child in the Middle East in need of specialized surgery not available to them locally. They locate, sponsor and run volunteer medical missions to the Middle East in pediatric cardiac surgery, pediatric cardiology, plastic and reconstructive surgery, maxillofacial surgery, pediatric urology, ophthalmology, vascular surgery, pediatric orthopedic surgery, Pediatric urology and pediatric surgery as well as many other specialties.

They also locate abroad free medical care for children who cannot be adequately treated in the Middle East. The PCRF is the main organization regularly sending injured and sick Arab children to North and South America, the Middle East and Europe for free care that is not available to them there. Since 1991 over 1,000 children have been abroad for millions of dollars of donated care through the PCRF. The PCRF also helps to improve the quality of medical care in the Middle East by sending medical equipment and supplies to the West Bank and Gaza Strip, as well as training local Palestinian medical personnel to improve the quality of care and services within the public sector.

To know more about this organization click here

PSC is an independent, non-governmental and non-party political organisation with members from many communities across Britain, and increasingly throughout the world. It was founded in 1982 during the build-up to Israel’s invasion of Lebanon, and was incorporated in the UK in 2004 as Palestine Solidarity Campaign Ltd.

PSC represents people in Britain from all faiths and political parties, who have come together to work for justice for the Palestinian people. PSC was established to campaign for Palestinian rights, including the right to self-determination and the right of return, and to oppose Israel’s occupation and violations of international law.

PSC is opposed to all forms of racism, including anti-Jewish prejudice and Islamophobia.

The PSC has an executive committee consisting of 20 members (plus two members representing the PSC’s Trade Union Advisory Committee), who are elected at the Annual General Meeting by PSC members. Its headquarters are in London. There are four staff members. The organisation relies on volunteers to perform many tasks, such as running campaigns and managing branch offices.

One of the PSC’s founders, Tony Greenstein, is also a founder of Jews for Boycotting Israeli Goods and the author of a number of articles about Palestine and related subjects, many of which are freely available online.

Most of PSC’s directors have not been of Palestinian or Middle Eastern descent. Its current Chair is Hugh Lanning and its current Director is Sarah Colborne.

The PSC has about 40 branches in England, Scotland and Wales, a list of which is kept on its website. The organisation’s activity in Scotland is co-ordinated by the Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign.

The Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign is a separate organization that was set up in late 2001 by a group of established Irish human rights and community activists.

PSC works with students, faith groups, trade unions and many other campaigning, cultural and political organisations in Britain, Europe and worldwide.

PSC is established to campaign:

• for the right of self-determination for the Palestinian people
• for the right of return of the Palestinian people
• for the immediate withdrawal of the Israeli state from the occupied territories
• against the oppression and dispossession suffered by the Palestinian people
• in support of the rights of the Palestinian people and their struggle to achieve these rights
• to promote Palestinian civil society in the interests of democratic rights and social justice
• to oppose Israel’s occupation and its aggression against neighbouring states
• in opposition to racism, including anti-Jewish prejudice and Islamophobia, and the apartheid and Zionist nature of the Israeli state

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