PALESTINIAN LIBRARIES
LITTLE PIECES OF HEAVEN IN HELL
by Ghada Elturk
http://www.libr.org/PL/21_Elturk.html
Issue number 21, Winter 2003
"From Progressive Librarian No. 21, Winter
2003. Published by permission."
July 2002 is
a memorable month for me. It was the month I went back to
my birthplace for the first time since 1983. I went to
see my father, whose health is deteriorating, and to
visit with other family members, including sisters and a
brother I haven't seen in twenty-two years.
Soon enough, on arriving there everything around me
seemed like the ultimate hell. Everything and everywhere
- in Beirut, Lebanon, in Ramallah and in Jenin on the
West Bank in Palestine.
In Beirut, living conditions in
the refugee camps, in the aftermath of so many wars
launched against Palestinian civilians, were
heartbreaking and disorienting. I had worked in those
camps before. Living conditions were bad back then, but
now they seemed unreal, as if in a movie: exaggerated
horror, subhuman and filthy. Lebanese army checkpoints
surround the outskirts of these camps; Palestinian
checkpoints posted on the inside. Poverty, garbage,
crowded streets and markets. Everything - buildings,
streets, people - seemed
dying and beyond help or recovery. Walking through the
camps was easier than driving, but when you walk, you
trip over garbage and skirt open sewage, while your hands
and arms make a path for your body through the throngs of
people rubbing and sliding closely all around - a
sickening dance. The stench of everything combined beyond
words.
The Palestinians in Lebanon are
forbidden from working in some 70 or more professions,
one cause of hardship and poverty. The situation in the
Palestinian camps is not of their own making. The
camps were never like this during the time I lived in
Beirut before 1983. There was poverty but not filth,
destruction, and more filth. These Palestinian refugee
camps are like big jails and strikingly similar to the
camps in the Gaza Strip.
In Ramallah and Jenin, living
conditions were similar, but painted with  occupation, siege, curfews, checkpoints,
arrests and random and planned killing. Poverty,
unemployment, political uncertainty, lack of food, were
obvious. You didn't need a second look to realize
you were living in a war zone, no matter how close you
are to "borders." Curfews are lifted at random,
announced only to the baker, who calls his customers, who
call their friends and neighbors - thus word that a
curfew has been lifted is spread. Curfews are
re-instated without notice. You are stuck wherever you
happen to be when a curfew is imposed, whether at work or
the market. You wait for the curfew to lift to go back
home, but the checkpoints get you first and you might be
stuck for the rest of the day or the night if you're not
allowed to pass. Israeli checkpoints are posted between
villages, in the middle of dying olive tree orchards, in
the middle of dust and heat.
It is my habit, wherever I land,
to visit libraries and bookstores. I am a librarian
after all, and to me such visits are, beyond doubt, the
most satisfying part of the time I spend in
"new" places. Not only because they are my
"natural" environment, but also because I talk
with the people around me and feel the pulse of a newly
encountered place, hitherto unknown to me.
In the refugee camps, I did not
find life. I found what I call "surviving
hells." Family gatherings, unlike the old times,
consist of just sitting around, just being there between
one battle and another, one curfew and another, one
electricity blackout and another. Politics and economics
all contribute to devastating and inhuman conditions
under which civilians try to hold on to some semblance of
normalcy in the midst of a surreal and life-threatening
existence.
But even in this "surviving
hell," bookstores and libraries exist. The
bookstores I visited have very limited and old
publications to offer customers. The stores that have a
larger selection are connected to universities, stocked
primarily with textbooks, journals and specialized
magazines - most of which are out-of-date, incomplete and
limited. In spite of their sparseness, however, the
shelves present an order, a contemplative atmosphere
creating the little heavens of sanity that seem to be all
that's left for the Palestinians.
When you walk to a library or
cultural center in the West Bank, you walk across tracks
left by military tanks that crush street and sidewalk
pavements, smash cars, and eat parts of fences and homes.
When you walk to a library or a youth center in Lebanon,
you walk through garbage, dust, noise and the certain
feeling of so much violence in the air, and mass graves
all around you. As you step into one of these little
heavens, you are surrounded by organized space, colored
painting on the walls, posters. And you appreciate the
quiet, the quiet we amuse ourselves with here when we
associate a librarian with "sssshhhhh."
While in Ramallah, I took
advantage of a curfew that was lifted from 9 a.m. to 3
p.m. to visit four libraries.
The Public Library of Ramallah
Municipality is a public lending library, in a
three-story building with the children's department on
the lower level. Here, the damage left by more than two
Israeli military invasions was not very obvious. The
building, furniture, the collection, everything was very
impressive, considering the situation, clean and well
organized. Staff was working hard before the curfew was
re-instated. I spoke with patrons and staff.
Understandably, not many children were using the
library. Instead parents were checking out books
for their children.
The staff told me they had a
full summer program for children and youth, but they
didn't want to take a chance and go ahead with the
programs because they did not want to risk children's
lives or well-being should anything happen.
The staff shared with me a flyer
produced for the summer program, which had been planned
to run Saturdays through Mondays for children ages 8 to
13. At the library facility, the children would have
watched plays and puppet theatre, film screenings and
music concerts; they would have attended lectures on the
environment, enjoyed storytelling, participated in book
discussions and writing; they would have engaged in art
exhibitions, drawing, art and crafts. They would have
gone on fieldtrips to the Palestinian Legislative
Council and to the Ramallah Municipal Park and Gardens.
Children and youth would have, but for the danger did
not.
Indeed, another great concern
was that some of the performers, storytellers and artists
would have to travel to Ramallah from other cities,
towns, and villages, and due to curfew and unpredictable
Israeli military actions, the library staff also did not
want to risk bringing these people to Ramallah.
At the Khalil Sakakini Cultural
Center Foundation, a non-profit organization, destruction
by Israeli military action was more obvious, and despite
attempts to fix previous damage, newer damage to the
walls, glass, furniture, doors was
apparent. The Sakakini Center is a beautiful, old,
three-story historical site. A music hall is on the
third floor, offices and small exhibit spaces are on the
second floor and an art gallery is on the first. The
Center offers art, poetry, music and film programs for
children, youth, families and adults. The staff said they
had decided to take their chances with curfews and
military actions, but made changes to the programs with
respect to time, materials and audience participation,
due to the military situation.
The Center continued to offer
programs and activities because they wanted, among other
things, to "provide badly needed outlets for
creativity, entertainment and relaxation to the public
attending them." Some of the programs offered
explored arts in various mediums, provided open summer
night concerts that gave voice and space to the talents
of mainly amateur young musicians, poets, dancers and
singers. During Ramadan 2001, the Center held
"solidarity iftars" for those who were alone
during the holiday as a consequence of the violent
events: students who live away from home and low ranking
soldiers who live outside their headquarters. The four
evenings consisted of a break-the-fast meal, a concert
and the distribution of care packages. CNN aired a
positive report of this activity.
The making of four patchwork
quilts was a project arising from the consequences of
current events. One hundred and fifty-six mothers who
have lost their children since September 2000 embroidered
a loving tribute to the lives of their sons and
daughters. The goal of the project is to help the mothers
deal with their grief and teach them a new and
income-generating craft. The quilts are in their final
stages and will be show-cased around the world.
The damage and destruction were
very obvious and alarming in the Al-Quds University
Institute of Modern Media and Al-Quds Educational
Television in Ramallah (Al-Quds means Jerusalem). The
Israeli army occupied the university compound for 17 days
and transformed it into a headquarters and a detention
center. Furniture, computers, equipment, cameras, walls,
windows?everything - every single item - seemed to have
had a blow, a total or disabling blow. Staff continue to
work as do so many others between one curfew and another,
faces stunned yet trying so hard to conduct daily
business as normally as possible.
I also visited the Museum of
History and Archeology. Destruction is obvious there as
well. Some was repaired but more damage had occurred
later. All the collection was in boxes. Staff was
maintaining and cleaning, but, again, just trying to deal
with reality.
Most of the adults I saw in the
libraries and bookstores were students from various
universities who could not attend classes or take exams.
They were meeting with professors, who were conducting
classes in the library. This was a practice that I saw
often wherever I went - in bookstores, cafés, ice cream
parlors, and restaurants. You would see a table with one
or two professors and students either listening to a
lecture or submitting papers, asking questions about
research, bemoaning the lack of resources, and trying to
convince the professors to accept their papers with the
limited resources cited. The students lacked access to
what the professors were asking them to read. Because of
the economic situation, unemployment, and extremely low
incomes, the majority of students cannot afford to buy
required textbooks, let alone additional supporting and
enriching material.
During the time I was in
Ramallah, graduating high school students were not able
to take their final exams - "Tawjeheyah." This
not only affected individual students and the school
system but also the universities, because neither the
universities nor the students knew how many students
would be eligible to attend the upcoming school year.
In Jenin, the educational
achievement of children I met was next to nil. Young
elementary school age children could barely identify
letters and numbers. Many had no attention span
whatsoever, even for the most animated and diverse
storytelling and games I tried to engage with them. When
electricity was available during programs televised for
children, they watched television. I am not sure of the
quality of what they watched. Traditional home
activities for children are lost in the current climate
under occupation, since family gatherings that once
included storytelling and games, among other things,
seldom do so now. Ironically, with the curfews, children
spend much of the time locked in their homes playing
"war." They use blank white paper torn from
their school supplies to make play guns. When curfew is
lifted they run to the store to buy stale candy and
sweets.
Civil and governmental life is
interrupted, due to a major loss of equipment, databases,
and documents. There is so much destruction. Tom Twiss's
compilation of the damage to the libraries and cultural
centers is comprehensive and accurate, as I saw at the
places I was able to visit and meet with staff, or talk
to people who saw the sites I was not able to visit.
Following is a summary of the
needs I gathered from conversations with library staff in
the West Bank, regarding what concerned librarians in the
U.S. can do to help them out:
1. Help pay
for periodical subscriptions so they don't lose them or
have a gap, since mail is unreliable and they might not
have money to pay for subscriptions.
2. Help them
bring some of their art exhibits and programs to tour the
United States of America, since it's the hardest country
for them to get into.
I think we need to keep
assessing the situation. We need to establish contacts
there and use them when opportunities arise to help
rebuild.
Also we might want to consider
"adoption" - establishing brother and sister
libraries. Libraries here in the U.S. can establish
relations with a library, cultural center, a children's
or youth program, and coordinate with each entity
or program to help meet their needs.
In my opinion, I think it is
easier to work through non-governmental organizations
(NGO) rather than through the Palestinian or Israeli
authorities. We might also work through willing Israeli
universities, which could forward our support and
donations to Palestinian libraries and educational
centers.
Our support might help ease the
daily burdens these librarians and affected civilians
deal with, help focus attention on coping with reality,
and come up with programs and services to a population
that is robbed of its cultural life and cultural
facilities.
While in Beirut, I spent more
time in two Palestinian refugee camps, worked with
children and youth, and met with librarians and general
staff. I was amazed at the energy, dedication, and
innovation that all these people demonstrate in the face
of the harsh situation surrounding them. The quantity and
quality of programs and services they offer the children
and youth are amazingly high. The understanding of
library personnel of their profession and role is on the
cutting edge.
I met with children's
librarians, a blind director for special services, art
and dance teachers, environmental coordinators, and
health-care providers who were leading diverse programs
and workshops for children and youth. All were providing
excellent programs and offering a wide range of services
to their students and the refugee population at large.
Some of the needs they expressed
during our conversations were for Braille books and
material for the blind such as talking books,
encyclopedias, dictionaries, and library supplies such as
labels for call numbers. The sighted librarian emphasized
the special-needs requests, since their needs are
particularly poorly met. I was very impressed by her
professionalism and ability to stick to the big picture,
rather than trying to get her own library's needs listed
as priorities.
In libraries in this devastated
region you find a different kind of life, the life that
should be, where everyone is practicing their human and
civil right to learn and improve the educational and
intellectual aspects of their lives. In the libraries you
find a cultural atmosphere, books and reading materials
all around, computers, book discussions, civic and
environmental gatherings, music, dance, songs, children's
involvement, youth taking charge - all in the midst of
chaos, devastation and destruction. I can't think of
anything else that is more humane and in so much demand,
yet has the least support, than the Palestinian
libraries.
The Palestinian people live in isolation. Without our
support based on justice and fairness, they do not stand
a chance for survival.
Copyright Progressive Librarian, 2003
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