Israeli forces raided multiple neighborhoods across the occupied West Bank overnight Saturday, detaining at least three Palestinians, launching tear gas canisters and stun grenades, and setting fire to olive trees, as Palestinians around the world commemorated the 68th anniversary of the Nakba. In the northern district of Qalqiliya, dozens of Palestinians suffered from tear gas inhalation, and several trees caught fire when clashes erupted between local youths and Israeli forces in the village of Kafr Qaddum. Coordinator for a popular resistance committee in the village Murad Shtewi said the Israeli army "turned Kafr Qaddum's sky into a cloud of poisonous gas" after firing tear gas heavily and randomly. Dozens of olive trees in the area caught fire from Israeli forces-fired tear gas and stun grenades. Shtewi added that civil defense vehicles were prevented from reaching the fire because Israeli forces had closed the roads with dirt berms, forcing firefighters to walk u...

Three Palestinians were injured by live fire during a Nakba Day demonstration in the Gaza Strip on Friday, witnesses said. Locals told Ma'an that Israeli soldiers opened fire on peaceful demonstrators east of Gaza City, hitting three men in the legs. Dozens of Palestinians were taking part in the march to commemorate the 67th anniversary of the mass displacment of Palestinians during Israel's creation. more

From The Electronic Intifada On my notebooks from school On my desk and the trees On the sand on the snow I write your name On every page read On all the white sheets Stone blood paper or ash I write your name … Liberty – Paul Eluard Edward Said wrote extensively about the necessity of writing the Palestinian narrative. But he also argued, very eloquently, that we were never allowed to do so. Now, we in Gaza have decided to write our narratives, sometimes with blood. Because they leave a mark on our individual and collective consciousness, we call them martyrs. Those who took up arms or pens — Che Guevara, Ghassan Kanafani, Naji al-Ali, Dalal Mughrabi, Shadia Abu Ghazaleh, Steve Biko, Salavador Allende, Rosa Luxemburg, Patrice Lumumba, to mention but a few — have booked their places there. But there are others, much younger, unknown to many, who have played a major role in the formation of our consciousness. They visit me every night; I see them in my dreams. I talk t...

RAMALLAH (Ma'an) -- Thousands of Palestinians turned out on Friday to bury two youths killed by Israeli soldiers a day earlier during protests to commemorate the 66th anniversary of the Nakba, or "catastrophe," of the expulsion of 750,000 Palestinians in 1948. The bodies of Nadim Siyam Nuwara, 15, and Muhammad Audah Abu al-Thahir, 17, were brought to their final resting place in the villages of Abu Shukheidim and al-Mazraa al-Qibliya in the hills north of Ramallah. The two youths were shot directly in the chest while protesting near Israel's Ofer prison, located in the central West Bank near Ramallah. The funeral ceremony for the pair was held in the Petrol neighborhood between the two villages, where thousands prayed beside their bodies. more

RAMALLAH (Ma'an) -- Israeli forces shot and killed a young Palestinian man and a teenage boy Thursday during a protest rally marking the 66th anniversary of the Nakba west of Ramallah in the central West Bank. Witnesses and medical sources identified the victims as 22-year-old Muhammad Audah Abu al-Thahir from the Ramallah-area village of Abu Shukheidim and 17-year-old Nadim Siyam Nuwarah from al-Mazraa al-Qibliyya village in Ramallah district. The victims, according to medical sources, were shot by live ammunition in the chest. Their bodies were evacuated to Ramallah Medical Complex. Medics said three teenagers were also injured by live bullets. One was struck in the chest, one in the foot, and one in the leg. Doctors say they are in stable condition. An Israeli military spokeswoman did not immediately return calls. more

JERUSALEM (AFP) -- An Israeli NGO is on Monday launching a smartphone app that allows users to find the remains of Palestinian villages that now lie inside modern-day Israel. The launch is timed to coincide with Israel's 66th independence day, which begins at sundown, when the Palestinians remember the "Nakba" or "catastrophe" that befell them when Israel came into existence in 1948, and 760,000 of them fled or were forced into exile. "iNakba" features an interactive map and photos of buildings and houses that Palestinians fled or were driven out of during the conflict surrounding Israel's creation in 1948. "Many Palestinians have difficulty locating their home towns and villages (in Israel and the West Bank), because cities or Jewish settlements have been built on top of them," said Raneen Jeries of Zochrot, the NGO that developed the app. "There's a file on each of hundreds of Palestinian villages or cities, and you can fi...

In a run-down office in the busy centre of Tel Aviv, a group of Israelis are finalising preparations for this year's independence day holiday. But their conversation – switching between Arabic and Hebrew – centres not on celebrating the historic realisation of the Zionist dream in May 1948, but on the other side of the coin: the flight, expulsion and dispossession that Palestinians call their catastrophe – the Nakba. Maps, leaflets and posters explain the work of Zochrot – Hebrew for "Remembering". The organisation's mission is to educate Israeli Jews about a history that has been obscured by enmity, propaganda and denial for much of the last 66 years. Next week, Zochrot, whose activists include Jews and Palestinians, will connect the bitterly contested past with the hi-tech present. Its I-Nakba phone app will allow users to locate any Arab village that was abandoned during the 1948 war on an interactive map, learn about its history (including, in many cases, the J...

Tucked into a quiet basement suite in the main building of the immaculate Islamic University of Gaza campus, the Oral History Center could at first be mistaken for a bursar or registrar’s office. But its stacks of metal filing cabinets may contain more memories per square meter than any other place in the occupied Gaza Strip. Researcher Nermin Habid said that the center conducted interviews with those who had witnessed the Nakba (Arabic for catastrophe), the ethnic cleansing ahead of Israel’s foundation in 1948, as well as the Naksa (setback), Israel’s occupation of the West Bank, Gaza, Golan Heights and Sinai in 1967. “We have already conducted 1,500 oral interviews and archived audio files from them,” Habid added. “A meeting can last anywhere from half an hour, to two or three hours. We can also have follow-up meetings. “We have also published 120 [interviews] in written form. In the future, we plan video interviews. We hope to use them to produce a documentary film about the...

Today, 15 May, Nakba Day, Palestinians everywhere mark the 65th anniversary of their continuing expulsion and exile from their homeland. A new short film, released to mark this date, features Palestinians talking about their experiences of ongoing forced removal from their lands and homes by Israel. The film “documents a journey between the two villages and two communities, whose very existence on their land is under threat today” according to Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, which produced it. “It also demonstrates how, in the face of a single Israeli policy to forcibly displace Palestinians on both sides of the Green Line, the people are drawing on deep reserves of courage and steadfastness to remain on their land.” The 15-minute documentary, in Arabic with English subtitles, includes the voices of Bedouins in the Naqab (Negev) village al-Araqib – which has been demolished 48 times just since July 2010, and Palestinians from Susiya, a village in ...

HEBRON (Ma'an) -- Clashes broke out across the West Bank on Wednesday as Palestinians marked the 65th year since the Nakba in 1948, witnesses and Israel's army said. In Hebron, protestors threw a Molotov cocktail at an Israeli military jeep, causing it to flip over and set alight. Four soldiers were wounded in the incident and taken to hospital, a military spokeswoman said. In Qalandiya, Israeli forces fired tear gas at protesters demonstrating to mark Nakba Day, locals said. An Israeli army spokeswoman said over 50 Palestinians hurled rocks at Israeli soldiers, who responded with "riot dispersal means." Over 150 people gathered in Beitunia to mark Nakba Day, locals said. Israel's army said it used riot dispersal means against protesters hurling rocks. more

BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) -- Thousands of people in the West Bank and Gaza Strip on Wednesday marked the 65th anniversary of the Nakba, an event which saw hundreds of thousands of Palestinians displaced from their homes in what is now Israel. Sirens were sounded for 65 seconds in the West Bank to mark the start of celebrations, with thousands of people gathering in Ramallah, Nablus, Qalqiliya and other West Bank cities. "The right to return does not become invalid or ineffective as time passes, because this right is the core of the Palestinian plight," PLO official Wasil Abu Yousif said while addressing crowds at Yasser Arafat's tomb. In Nablus, a minute's silence was held before demonstrators marched in the city waving black flags and Palestinian flags side by side. "After all these years of the Nakba, the Palestinian people have not achieved their goals, but they have managed to accumulate major victories, such as establishing the PLO in order to tell the Pal...

BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) – Several Palestinians were injured by tear gas on Tuesday during a rally marking Nakba Day, which kicked off from Bethlehem's Duheisha refugee camp. A Ma'an reporter said about 300 Palestinians marched on the main road in Duheisha camp headed towards displaced Palestinian villages south of Bethlehem. As the rally arrived in the old town of al-Khader and headed to the bypass Israeli road, Rt. 60, Israeli soldiers attacked the rally with tear-gas canisters and rubber-coated bullets. Israeli troops also detained the coordinator of a popular committee against settlements Mazin al-Azza. more

Israeli right-wing protesters burn a Palestinian flag in front of Tel Aviv University during the Nakba day commemoration event last year Palestinian and Jewish activists will join together to commemorate the ethnic cleansing that led to Israel’s establishment at an event in Tel Aviv University early next week. This will be the second year that students will mark the Nakba — Arabic for “catastrophe,” the name given to the violence by Zionist forces in 1948 — in this way. Students will read poetry, including works by the Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish, and a refugee from Tantura, a Palestinian village destroyed by a Zionist militia in May 1948, will recount his story to the audience. more

In a landmark new project, the Institute for Palestine Studies (IPS) has made available online Palestinian scholar Walid Khalidi’s immensely important work Before Their Diaspora: A photographic history of the Palestinians, 1876-1948 in its entirety for free. Not only that, but the IPS has gone to the trouble of fashioning an innovative new interactive website around the work. You can watch Khalidi talk about his book and the new website in this video. The book is great collection of photographs and historical documents of the Palestinian people from the late Ottoman period, up to the eve of the Nakba, the 1948 wave of ethnic cleansing that Israel used to establish itself. Everything is laid out in chronological order, with well researched captions, and contextual writings on the historical context of each period. The book is both an essential reference work and a useful introduction to the history. The new interactive website has features useful even for those who own a physica...

From Mondoweiss The opening event at an international literature festival in Ireland this month was on the subject of Israeli theft of Palestinian land, history and identity. The inaugural speaker, British journalist John McCarthy, is famous for being held hostage by Lebanese Shi'a militia between 1986 and 1991, and his new book, You Can't Hide the Sun: A Journey Through Israel and Palestine, tells the story of the Palestinian citizens of Israel, from the Nakba to the present day. The publication - and book tour - is significant for two reasons: first, BBC broadcaster McCarthy is a 'national treasure' of sorts in the UK and Ireland - held alongside Irish hostage Brian Keenan for much of his 5 years in captivity, he is a dignified, modest hero known for his commitment to human rights causes, and writes of his captors, 'They, too, were underdogs'; second, he is not a public figure of whom it can be said, 'Well, he would say that wouldn't he' (in the wo...

AMALLAH (Ma'an) -- Over 80 Palestinians were injured in clashes with Israeli forces near Ramallah on Tuesday, medics said, as protesters commemorated the Nakba, or catastrophe, of their exile in 1948. After a mass rally in Ramallah's Clock Square, protesters headed to Israel's Ofer detention center and the Qalandiya checkpoint between Ramallah and Jerusalem to commemorate the expulsion of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians during the founding of the state of Israel. Medics said 63 Palestinians were injured outside Ofer prison and 21 were hurt at Qalandiya as Israeli forces fired tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters. An Israeli military spokeswoman said forces used riot dispersal means at protesters hurling rocks. Earlier, thousands marched from the late President Yasser Arafat's tomb toward Clock Square carrying Palestinian and black flags and banners demanding the right of return and national unity. more

by Saud Abu Ramadan GAZA, May 15 (Xinhua) -- A yellow van drove through Gaza City's densely populated streets on Tuesday, with a loudspeaker calling on residents to mark the 64th anniversary of Nakba Day, or "the day of catastrophe" in Arabic. Hundreds of young men and women waving small flags of Palestine marched through the city's main street Omer al-Mukhtar, led by eight young men carrying a huge map of historic Palestine with names of towns and villages on it. A Palestinian flag of the similar size was also held by eight youths, who were chanted slogans that marked Nakba Day and called for giving Palestinians the legitimate rights they have been demanding and struggling for since 1948. Every May 15, Palestinians mark this special day that reminds them of their homeland, which has been occupied by Israel since the Jewish state's establishment 64 years ago. "I came here to join this rally to say to the world that Palestine is our right. I wasn't born in...

From Mondoweiss "I wish I had died before what happened in Deir Yassin," said Zeinab Akel, a survivor of the village whose oral history is filmed by Zochrot, an Israeli group that teaches the Nakba to schoolchildren. Akel was just 20 years old when Zionist forces threw her from her home, on April 9, 1948. The building is now an Israeli hospital and part of larger mental health clinic. Akel's history narrates the film "Deir Yassin: Remembered," which describes the Zionist para-military massacre of over 100 Palestinians, mostly women and children. The attack began in the early morning with the more extremist sects of the Zionist militias, the Irgun and Stern Gang, and by the afternoon, the Palmach and Haganah, had joined. more

The Israeli group Zochrot has posted a video testimony from Amnon Neumann, a man who fought with the Palmach during the Nakba of 1948. According to their web site, “Zochrot (‘Remembering’) seeks to raise public awareness of the Palestinian Nakba, especially among Jews in Israel, who bear a special responsibility to remember and amend the legacy of 1948.” more

From the Irish Times There is a feeling the Palestinians and Arab states are trying to undermine Israel’s legitimacy, writes MARK WEISS in Jerusalem A SPECTRE is haunting Israel: the spectre of Palestinian mass civil unrest. Twice in recent weeks troops have opened fire with live rounds in an effort to stop unarmed Palestinian civilians crossing into Israel. The first time coincided with Nakba (Catastrophe) day, the day Palestinians mark the anniversary of Israel’s establishment in 1948. Although Israel had mobilised its forces in the West Bank and along the Gaza border, the focus of the protests was along the country’s northern borders with Lebanon and Syria. About 100 Palestinian refugees living in Syria succeeded in breaching the border and crossed into the Golan Heights. One infiltrator even managed to reach Tel Aviv. Ten protesters were killed on the border. The events sent shock waves throughout the Israeli establishment. Suddenly the Palestinian refugee problem was thrust into t...