The land and everything on it can be taken away, but no one can take away your knowledge or the degrees you earn
Susan AbulhawaToughness found fertile soil in the hearts of Palestinians, and the grains of resistance embedded themselves in their skin. Endurance evolved as a hallmark of refugee society. But the price they paid was the subduing of tender vulnerability. They learned to celebrate martyrdom. Only martyrdom offered freedom. Only in death were they at last invulnerable to Israel. Martyrdom became the ultimate defiance of Israeli occupation.
Susan AbulhawaFor if life had taught her anything, it was that healing and peace can begin only with acknowledgment of wrongs committed.
Susan AbulhawaI know she is crying. Her tears fall on the wrong side, into the bottomless well inside her.
Susan AbulhawaDo you know, Mother, that Haj Salem was buried alive in his home? Does he tell you stories in heaven now? I wish I had had a chance to meet him. To see his toothless grin and touch his leathery skin. To beg him, as you did in your youth, for a story from our Palestine. He was over one hundred years old, Mother. To have lived so long, only to be crushed to death by a bulldozer. Is this what it means to be Palestinian?
Susan Abulhawa