Better Days Will Come

I got email from an American woman who lives in California, which said “please Kawther, know that there are many Jewish people in the U.S who feel this way. Salam, Noelle.”. She meant the gloomy sadness in the heart and memory of each Palestinian since the Nakba, and the tragedies since. The woman attached a link to an article entitled “Mourning the Jewish New Year,” written by Marc H. Ellis who is a university professor of Jewish Studies.

The writer said: I am a Jew. And I say: I am a Palestinian. Here’s what I want to say:

I don’t want you to mourn here, not even a funeral to carry my dark memories on my shoulders and walk with a buried head in the mud. We all have heard enough political speeches, we have read many articles about the Nakba, we drank lying promises, we are fed up with the news and commentaries. We all the victim of political greediness, we all have suffered from the repression and displacement. We – the Palestinians- have died a thousand times to be born again.

Yes, I don’t want to mourn, and I don’t want to rend my garments due to the absurdities of history, and due to this farce, which is not over yet.

Mourning will not kill the grief, and rending the garments will not weave us a new dress for the happiness. Maybe little innocent dreams will defeat the bloody memories. Am I stupid?.

Once, a Swedish friend who lives in America, wrote something to me after he got back from a visit to Tel Aviv: ” One day, you will see, you will come over to say hello to me, share an afuch at Cafe Asztor, where I will be enjoying the hot summer stickiness with my fellow Tal Avivi old boys gang, and I will come say hello to you in Gaza, gobble some bakhlava and feed the jellyfish, strolling along the beach. Deal?” After I read his words I felt mixed feelings, sadness and gladness, optimism and pessimism; but mostly delight. Will the day ever come to visit Tel Aviv?. In 21 years I haven’t seen a Palestinian city other than Gaza, never tread on Tel Aviv, Haifa, Jaffa, Acre, Beer-Sheva … I haven’t even seen the capital, Jerusalem. Isn’t that ironic!

My friend can visit Tel Aviv, whatever time he wants, and can visit Jerusalemas well, while I spend most of my life in the one Palestinian city, Gaza!. Would I beg you, Israel?!: Allow me to visit the village where you killed my family there in 1948?, the village where you destroyed our homes and our hearts, which was then turned into a nature reserve. Is it impossible to visit it?

If a war will bring me back to my homeland, will make my dreams true, what is the good in this if you will lose your loved ones?. Would I return to my home without my family? When will that time come that we can take back freedom without needing a war? Rather, when will the world stop wars? .

These days, Jews celebrate their new year. Celebrate, please, dance over our dead bodies every new year, because every year the dead bodies of innocent people will bloom peace, and love. Whether you like it or not.

Now I must to thank that America woman, who made my day, and made me feel good about the hope of the world’s solidarity with the Palestinians’ grief. Thank you, dear Noelle.

Prayer For Palestine!

I am very concerned and confused.Tomorrow, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas will be heading to the United States to declare Palestine as an independent and recognized Nation State. I feel very anxious about it, and very excited for tomorrow, afraid that the Security Council will use the United Nations veto, to ruin the dreams of many Palestinians .

Up to now, 130 countries recognized the State of Palestine, and that number is more than two thirds of UN member states, this is the percentage which perfectly required for getting the membership of the international organization. Now the decision rests with the United States!. I wish Obama will retract his declaration that he will use the USA veto against Palestine.

Recognition for Palestine means that the Palestinians have rights such as ” the right of return” ( the right of Palestinians whom were expelled from their homeland by the Israeli occupation in 1948, to return to their homes) .. This will turn the status of Palestinian prisoners in occupation jails into prisoners of war. It will also change the Palestinian territories from a disputed territories to an occupied territories under international law and will provide space for a Palestinian state to join the international war crimes tribunal to punish Israel for the senseless war in Gaza ( Operation Cast Lead ), and other bloody crimes.

I’ve been waiting for the world to realize that Palestine is a real state, not an illusion, Palestineis a tangible land and is not a fictitious homeland. It is not just a map we draw on paper and say, “Here we live. ” . Palestine consists of cities, villages, sun, sea, streets, forests, mountains and much more that. Palestineisn’t just a word the world erased, and wrote instead, “Israel.”

Dear America, leave us with our dreams.

Please pray for us tomorrow, friends .. Pray for peace in Palestine.

Written by: Kawther AbuHani.
Edited by: Dale Robers, California. Hamish Montgomery, UK.

Love and War

” Monseigneur Love ” by Thomas Cooper Gotch

Can you return with your memory three years back? Come with me… I was 19 years old – a teenager – I had my own beautiful dreams; they were safe and full of peace. Then the Israeli war on Gaza began. I was coming back from the exam at the university. The flames were going off behind me. I entered my house, thinking that an earthquake hit the city, the bombing and rockets in every direction. We ran to the windows to see what was happening. Oh, the whole city was burning, the glass in the windows of our house all fell, and like my heart… had broken.

I do not want to write about war; life does not stop and will not. I have written enough about the war,and I have already left the sadness and tears for the winter nights of war; and yes, my tears that mingled with the blood of the martyrs. I try to forget everything. I have written tens of stories about the war, published in newspapers and magazines. The question in my mind was: Does writing heal the wounds of war?

Later, I thought: Will I rip up memories of 23 days I’ve written, through 23 cold nights under fire and death and destruction? After the war, I’ve written a story, “Love and War” (in Arabic: الحب و الحرب) and published it in one of the well-known Palestinian magazines. I was the youngest writer they have ever known. The magazine sent to me a good number of dollars (by the way, this reminds me of Gabril Garcia Marquez).
I did not know what should I do with the money, so I gave them to my father as a gift! After a few days, the writers wrote to me about that story. I still remember how a journalist described it to me: You are the bomb, Kawther. I laughed and said to him, “Israel is the bomb, my dear.”

In short, the story involved a man who fled from the war to the shelters, where he fell in love with a woman. Because of her love, he felt like a coward who has no value in life. He spent a few days with love, having sex with that woman; all the while they talked about their memories before the war, discussed the catastrophes of war, and eventually the man decided to leave the shelter and go to war to fight the enemies and to defend peace. The man fled his woman, but promised her that he would return and have with her children that do not make war.

I have succeeded in my plastic surgery in my memory and in washing my heart of the tragedy of the war, I turned war into peace, coldness into warmth, hatred into love.. hunger into satiety.. and turned my heart into the big sky..

Now I’m writing this text, and feel love in my heart, I feel that if one day I should die, I will say ” Israel, do not kill us, please. Just get out of Palestine, we love life” ..

At this very moment, I am 21 years old, I want to write to habibi, where he enjoys peace, “love me, love me, love me.. much more.”

Written by: Kawther AbuHani.
Edited by: Dale Robers, California.

The Morning Carrier

.La Revolution” by Valentine Cameron Prinsep”

At the time of revolutions

it has become easy for us to become heroes

to announce a president is dethronement

to recognize women’s rights.

At the time of revolutions

man will be remain a bull

woman will be remain a red mark

in each line

in each house.

When you get back from revolution

to your home

where the revolution is greater than a meteor:

your family is a government

your father is a president

overthrow your family

bring down the failed regime.

At the bottom of the soul

there is a silent drum

beat it now

rise from lethargy

rebel against fear

face your dark traditions

sound the drum

dance

Voltaire did not die.

Written by: Kawther AbuHani.
Edited by: Hamish Montgomery, UK.

Men

Memories of Love” by Natasha Sazonova”

She write :

” Today I’m the sad lover, the bad mind, the little woman.

Bad things happen to my good day.

Cat roll a small stone in the street..

I want to break my mobile, this tool makes me sad and originally I’m sad..

Sun smiles at me and frowns, the city cries, I’m sure.

I want to drench my heart in a big glass of wine.. “

I write:

I’m going to write her a love story, I’ll put it on the balcony ledge, the angels will carry it to you. I know you’ll read it on the kitchen table, read it slowly, please, and then send me a message.

“In 1989 I was born,

In 2010 I loved a European man.

In 2011 I still love him.

In 2012 everything will end.

In 2013 the European man would say: ” You were a great, my girl.”

In 2014 he will tell his friends proudly: “I had loved an Arab woman once.”

In 2015 I will have finished writing my memoirs about an European man believed that I loved him in order to get out of my small city. In the last line I will write: “He was a wonderful man, was a man respects my brain then hits both of my body and my brain .. He was a man afraid of me too much, and very concerned about me, or rather about my love’s purpose (Are there an evil purposes in love?), he was thinking that I am using him, he was a very pure /poor European. I thought that the Arab man is different from the European man, but both are same .. they are human beings and both carry the same ideas.. the SAME DNA .” .

So the girl decided that the future of men will be bleary with a different masks.

Note:

– In 2011 the girl turned into a very large city.

– She still love him.

Written by: Kawther AbuHani.
Edited by: Suzan Algiri, England.

Yalla Eid Sa'id

The special Eid al-Fitr sweets
( Ka’c and Ma’mul )

On this last day of Ramadan, as we prepare ourselves to celebrate Eid al-Fitr, my mom has already made the special Eid al-Fitr sweets. We make this kind of sweets only on this Eid.

Yesterday, I went with my sister to the clothing store to purchase new dresses, shoes and other things. The streets were overcrowded; you could hear the car horns and watch fireworks going off. Many children were dressed in colorful clothes and played in the streets. When we arrived at the clothing store, we were surprised by the amount of people. Can you imagine Gaza these days? This is a wonderful time and how I wish it to be repeated. The beautiful things in life – the days that we love – pass quickly and come to us only as visitors. Does Santa Claus come to you more than once in a year?

On the night before the Eid, lights flow out of Gaza, people don’t sleep for joy and anticipation of the wonderful morning of Eid. In the morning, the mosques start takbi’r (exclaiming “Allahu Akbar -means God is Greatest”). You can hear the happy takbi’r of people: ” ِAllahu Akbar…”

I spend these Eid days with my family in Gaza: we wake up early, eat fried fish as our tradition breakfast each morning, put on new clothes, and go to kiss our father’s forehead and mother as an expression of respect and filial piety – and as the role of our parents, they shall pray for us and give us some money. Relatives visit each other and exchange coins, which called in Arabic ‘Al-Eidiah’.

I like to spend the Eid days watching kids while they are having fun with each other, which brings me back to my childhood. I was a very quiet child but at the same time very noisy. After having the fried fish, I would go to my mother’s garden, water the plants and then pick some flowers to put among my papers in order to spread the smell of perfume between the sheets. Then I start writing my memoirs.

On the third and last day of the Eid, I rip up my memoirs and throw them into the sea. I think that the waves will read my words and love me, or maybe the fish will eat my stories!

Happy Eid, my family and my friends everywhere.

عيد سعيد لعائلتي و لكل أصدقائي أينما كانوا .

Eid Sa’id 🙂

Beautiful Days

From my window

In this small spot in this big world, Gaza lives and roses from the eyes of the dawn.. Sunrise at 6:00 Am and sunset about 18:10.

Nowadays, I used to wake up at 10:00 Am, it is too late, of course!. Often people tend to rise about 7:00 Am; but if I do the same, I might get a long day with a lot of boredom, that’s my routine since I graduated from IUG university.

Here, we love coffee, make it in a small Arab pot with a green cardamom, for me, yeah, I love it!. In the morning, I make mine a cup of coffee and sip it with Fairuz songs (a famous Lebanese singer). The bad thing in my days is that I should comb my hair, and this task makes me grumble because I don’t like to remember that I have curly hair!!.

My daily routine depends on two things: Books and Love, if I lose one of them, my day will be unbalanced: Books give me the power I need, Love stimulates me!. Love is very important to keep you alive, it is the essence of life. Other than this there are my friends, specially: Nida’a, Ala’a and Nadia, we’ve been meeting in Gaza and talking with each other, they have a great stories, sometimes talking to me candidly with concern of writing down/ publishing their “personal stories”. Indeed, I would to do that, at least that will help somehow in knowing the reality of women’s life in Gaza; they are still my best friends anyway, always inspire me..

Friendships are based on cooperation and altruism, your neighbor is like your brother, such one of your family, it is really great when you open your window by chance with your neighbor at the same time and greet him spontaneously with happy mien. In my city, all people are such a lovely beehive, you can not live without a good neighbor, otherwise you would be a stranger!.

Written by: Kawther AbuHani
Edited by: Ghosson Rahhal, Jordan.