In this deeply personal study, Hammad illuminates a deep agenda of place, meaning, and resistance in territorial struggles through the telling of a less-heard story of how women, men, and young people understand their world and their lives in the occupied Palestinian West Bank landscape. Taking a case study of a contested and divided Palestinian village situated in the heart of the Occupied Palestinian Territories and known for its sustained, non-violent protest against the Separation Wall that cuts through its lived spaces, Hammad examines how villagers live, experience, interpret, and attempt to resist infringements on their property and person.
The study considers the spectrum of ways that people resist in this context, examining not only the overt weekly protests but also the everyday acts and subjectivities of resistance of its residents, young and old. It offers valuable theoretical insight into the extent and ways that meanings of place hold the potential to mediate, shape, and sustain resistance struggles through the voices and experiences of people. The backdrop of the protracted Palestinian-Israeli conflict and Palestinians’ struggle over space, place, and history—which continues to play out in the present—makes this book politically relevant and empowering as it brings voices from a secluded contested village to the world.
Suzanne Hassan Hammad is a sociologist and pracademic. She has extensive experience in applied social and policy research in health, education, and social protection in the Middle East and North Africa region, and has led on consultancies within the humanitarian and community development sectors with a focus on inclusion and empowerment of marginalized population groups. She has worked in both research and practice with a range of organizations including UNICEF, UNRWA, the American Friends Service Committee, and regionally-based research centers and NGOs. Suzanne is currently a Doha-based Independent Consultant and Adjunct faculty at Northwestern University Qatar and Georgetown University Qatar. She holds a PhD in Sociology from Queens University, Belfast and a Masters degree in Social Policy from the University of Nottingham. She serves as Advisory Board Member of Development in Practice Journal which aims to engage scholarship from both scholars and practitioners, and is Trustee on the Board of an Oxford-based training, consulting and research organization, INTRAC for Civil Society.
List of Figures, Maps, and Tables Foreword Preface Acknowledgements Prologue. Back to the Present: 2022, the Naqba Continues... Chapter 1. Retelling Stories of Dispossession and Resistance Chapter 2. The Place: A Palestinian West Bank Village Chapter 3. What Bilins Spaces Meant: The Magnitude of What was Lost Chapter 4. Encounters with the Barrier: Senses of Place in Flux Chapter 5. Enter the Friday Protests: The Public Face of Resistance Chapter 6. Holding On: Living and Doing Resistances Everyday Chapter 7. The Taste of Earth: Meanings of Home, Place, and Resistance for Palestinians Conclusion. The Potency of Emplaced Resistances Epilogue. Headlines from Bilin (2010- 2022) Arabic Glossary Bibliography About the Author
At once scholarly and deeply personal, this highly readable book tells a story of how it feels to be at the receiving end of a colonial occupation. It is an intimate account of what people do when their community gets partitioned, lands taken away, and daily life disrupted. This is one of the best books I have read on the everyday of the Israeli colonization of the Palestinian lifeworld and resistance against it. — Asef Bayat, Professor of Sociology and Bastian Professor of Global and Transnational Studies, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
Hammads book gives voice to people of Bilin and will resonate with readers interested in natives defending their land and livelihoods. The text leads to better understanding of how freedom will come despite incredible odds thanks to sumud, active resistance and resilience. — Mazin Qumsiyeh, Professor and Director of Palestine Institute for Biodiversity and Sustainability, Bethlehem University; author of Popular Resistance in Palestine
