Kelsey Sheridan

Loras College

12/15/2011

2011Writing on the Walls: Resistance Art in Palestine

Writings on the Walls: Resistance Art in Palestine 1

“A country is not only what it does, it is also what it tolerates.” – Kurt

Tucholsky. This quote is spray painted across the Israel/Palestine Separation

barrier, or as it is commonly referred to in this paper, the Wall. While this

quote is interesting and thought-provoking in its own right, it is its placement

of the quote that is most intriguing of all. Not only is this Tucholsky quote

found on the Wall, it is found first and foremost in the Yad Vashem Holocaust

Memorial in Jerusalem, Israel. The irony of this quote being in both places is

that it is used to highlight the injustice done to people; in the case of Israel it

is used to highlight the injustice done to the Jewish people by Germany

during the Holocaust, and in the Palestinian case it is used to highlight the

injustice done by Israel in the Israel/Palestine conflict. However it is out of 1 Israeli Separation Barrier, Palestine. Personal photograph by John Eby. Nov. 2011.

the Israel/Palestine conflict and because of the oppression of the Palestinian

people by the state of Israel that a style of creative and non-violent

expression came to flourish – resistance art. Through the various styles of

resistance art, graffiti and murals, the Palestinians found a peaceful and

artistic way to discuss and represent their struggle.

Palestinian resistance art comes in a variety of forms, the ones that will

be discussed specifically in this paper are the artworks on the Wall, graffiti

works and mural works throughout Palestine. The resistance art of Palestine

is exhibited in a variety of venues, such as buildings, houses, businesses and

the Separation barrier, and the choice made by the artists for the location of

the venue for their work is essential to the content of the message being

portrayed. Several themes appear as particularly important to visual

representations of dissent and resistance in Palestinian territories. Peace,

Right of Return, Equality, and Resistance are essential messages that

characterize the public art of Palestine. These messages vary, however,

depending upon the venue of public art. While images on the Wall reflect

messages of equality and resistance, other public venues emphasize the

importance of the Right of Return and the promulgation of injustice upon

Palestinians. The character of Palestinian public art reflects the social

consensus on the approach to resistance, which is to opt for non-violent

means. This is shown especially in contrast to the public art of Northern

Ireland at the height of the Troubles, where themes of armed resistance

were prominent.

Only recently has resistance art, especially the resistance art in

Palestine, become a topic of discussion amongst cultural anthropologists,

historians and scholars. While there have been various discussions about

Palestinian art, mostly about art following the fall of the Ottoman Empire,

resistance art such as graffiti and murals have been relatively untouched by

scholarly debate. Now while Palestinian art has been a topic that has been

researched, as of 1987 it was a relatively unique discussion. Gannit Ankori,

an Associate Professor of Art History who teaches at the Hebrew University

of Jerusalem, whose book Palestinian Art discusses the idea of Palestinian

identity represented through art, discusses this issue of a lack of research on

Palestinian art. She writes about the struggle in the preface of her book,

talking about how she was invited to take part in a conference in 1986 whose

theme was ‘Jerusalem in Art’ and how she decided to look at images of

Jerusalem painted by Palestinian artists. She writes that

I had approximately one year to prepare my lecture. Naively, I was certain that I would find numerous books on Palestinian art from which I could choose images of Jerusalem that I would be able to study and analyze. Little did I know that this could not be done for the simple reason that there was then virtually no research literature on Palestinian art.2

Much like Gannit Ankori there were issues finding reliable and relevant

sources discussing the historiography of resistance art in Palestine, thus for

this paper the majority of historiography came from sources discussing the

general background of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. The general

historiography of the conflict obviously does not pay much attention to art,

2 Gannit Ankori, Palestinian Art. (Reaktion Books, 2006) 3.

instead it focuses on primary documents and the discussion of memory.

Memory as a topic of discussion, mostly regarding memories as a primary

source of information, mostly focuses on the research of 3 people; Benny

Morris, Lila Abu Lugod and Ilan Pappe.

Benny Morris is known as the founder of the New Historian approach.

This approach finds faults with the Israeli military and their practices during

the 1948 war and subsequent years. Instead of the Old Historian approach

which viewed the tactics of the army as justified the New Historians looked

at the Israeli military documents once they were declassified, and criticized

the decisions that were made and the treatment of the Palestinians during

their expulsion from Israel. Unlike most New Historians, however, Benny

Morris does not believe that memory is a valid source for information. He

thinks that memory is tainted by personal experience and trauma, detracting

from the relevance of the information that memory can provide.

On the other end of the memory-debate spectrum is Lila Abu Lugod.

Abu Lugod wrote a book called Nakba: Palestine, 1948 and the Claims of

Memory. In the book she writes about what the Palestinians refer to as the

“Nakba;” the expulsion of Palestinians from their land by the Israeli military.

The importance of memory is emphasized in this book, and Abu Lugod relies

heavily on the testimony of Palestinian people to create her argument. She

writes that memory is, “the product of fragmentary and personal collective

experiences”3 and that to remember is “to reconstruct, reinterpret and

represent events for specific audiences and in specific contexts.”4

When Ronald Reagan asked Mikhail Gorbachev to tear down a wall it

became one of the most widely quoted speeches in history. In a speech in

West Berlin in 1987 these words symbolized the desire for democracy to

penetrate behind the cement wall that had kept East Germany isolated and

controlled by the USSR for almost 30 years. When the wall finally came down

it was one of the most memorable and momentous events in American

history. Today it seems crazy that something like the Berlin Wall could have

existed and been allowed to exist for so long; what sense of justice is there

in building walls around people.

That is exactly the question that Palestinians ask themselves daily as

they are forced to live behind Israeli-built cement walls. Since 2002 Israel

has been constructing a concrete wall around the occupied Palestinian

territory, effectively sealing the West Bank and Palestinians off from the rest

of the world. The Wall, as said by street artist Banksy, “stands three times

the height of the Berlin Wall and will eventually run for over 700km – the

distance from London to Zurich. Palestine is now the world’s largest open-air

prison and the ultimate activity holiday destination for graffiti artists”.5 Israel

views the Wall as a security measure that is vital to their nation’s safety and

the safety of their people. Palestinian resistance groups have adopted violent 3. Lila Abu-Lugod, Nakba: Palestine, 1948, and the Claims of Memory. (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007) 208. 4 Abu-Logod, Nakba, 208. 5 Bansky, Wall and Piece (London: Random House UK, 2007), 136.

measures such as suicide bombings as a way to fight for their freedom and

their land. By building the Wall and installing check points where the Israeli

army monitor the people entering and exiting Palestine into Israel they are

limiting the ability of suicide bombers or people with weapons to inflict

violence on other citizens. Since the Wall has gone up the number of suicide

bombings have decreased, but whether that is because of the Wall itself or

because Palestinians have decided to resist in a different way cannot be said

for sure. Either way Israel says that the Wall is a necessary measure in

providing a safe environment for their people. On the other side of the

conflict the Palestinians view the Wall as a strategic attempt by Israel to

continuously encroach upon their land and systematically destroy the morale

and spirits of the Palestinian people. They see the Wall as a jail cell and as a

way for Israel to keep oppressing them. The Wall separates the Palestinian

people from their farm land and their livelihood, limiting their ability to do

their jobs and provide for their families. However by constructing the Wall

the Israeli government has unwittingly given the people of the West Bank a

giant canvas upon which to exhibit their feelings; feelings about Israel, about

the Wall, their situation, their resistance, and essentially about whom they

are as a people. The walls of the barrier are covered with Palestinian images

of identity and resistance.

It has been said that people are a product of their environment.

However in the West Bank you can say that the environment is the product

of the people. Since the beginning of construction on the Wall almost a

decade ago the Palestinian people have created a visual exhibition of their

oppression. All along the length of the Wall there are murals, paintings, and

graffiti. However these are more than just pretty pictures or the graffiti of

angsty teenagers looking for a way to rebel, they are pictures of a homeland

lost, dreams of the future, images of despair and words of peace, hope,

anger and loss. They are symbols of Palestine. In his book, Against the Wall,

William Parry writes that, “the Wall has become an enormous visual petition,

an ephemeral forum, a pictorial rant and reprimand, calling for resistance,

justice, freedom and solidarity, and a plea for understanding and humanity”.6

When the people or artists of Palestine create the images that decorate the

Wall they are in essence putting pieces of themselves on the wall, they are

manifesting their identity through art.

While there are hundreds of various images and graffiti messages

covering the walls of the West Bank separation barrier, the one that

embodies the identity of the Palestinian the most is a simple slogan, “to exist

is to resist.” To the Palestinian people a major part of who they are as a

people and a nation is their continued existence in defiance of the Israeli

people and the Israeli state.

6 William Parry, Against the Wall: The Art of Resistance in Palestine (Lawrence: Lawrence Hill Books, 2011) 10.

7

This theme of “to exist is to resist” is a central part of Palestinian identity

and life. Because of the Israeli governments continued efforts to relocate the

people of Palestine from their land and to create a purely Israeli state the

continued resistance of Palestinians against these efforts is essential to their

survival as a people. The Palestinians know that in order to keep the land

they have now and to regain the land that has been lost to encroaching

settlements they must resist the Israeli government, army, and sometimes

even people. Every day the Palestinian people fight to keep their way of life,

and it is because of this fact that the “to exist is to resist” mentality has

been adopted as a part of Palestinian life and identity. This image is

reminding the people of Palestine that just by living their life and continuing

7 Against the Wall: The Art of Resistance in Palestine, by William Parry. (Lawrence: Lawrence Hill Books, 2011) 133.

to inhabit the land they are fighting back against the oppression of the state

of Israel, because for years the Israeli government and army have been

chasing the Palestinian people out of their homes, limiting where they live,

restricting where they are allowed to go and confining them behind

enormous concrete walls, trying to remove them and create a purely Israeli

state.

Despite all of this the Palestinian people continue to occupy the land

that they have been living on for thousands of years. When asked how they

endure what Israel puts them through a Palestinian man named Mohamad

Issa responds, “it’s the Palestinian spirit. They can build walls around us,

they can subject us to this every day, but they can’t break our spirit”.8 For

the people of Palestine “to exist is to resist” is more than just a catchy

saying sprayed onto the walls surrounding them, it is a sentiment that lives

within each and every Palestinian and it is the embodiment of their way of

life. Not only is existence part of resistance for these people, but resistance

in turn is part of their existence. Muhammed Jayyousi, a Palestinian youth

coordinator in the village of Jayyous, puts it perfectly when he says, “to resist

is to exist or we will lose more of our land. We need to come back for as long

as it takes to show Israel that we won’t accept the Wall, we won’t live in a

ghetto, we won’t be refugees in our own land. It’s our only choice.”9 When

Palestinian people write this on the Wall they are reminding the Israelis, the

world, and themselves that they are not going anywhere, that they will 8 Parry, Against the Wall, 91. 9 Parry, Against the Wall, 188.

continue to live on that land and fight for their freedom for as long as it

takes. Different aspects of Palestinian identity can be seen in the recurrence

of symbols and/or themes in the artwork and graffiti along the Wall. Parry

writes that from the artwork on the Wall people can see that there are,

“symbols central to Palestinian identity, denoting resistance, liberation,

affinity to the land, Palestinian refugees’ ‘right to return’ and national unity”. 10 These symbols are all featured in artwork and graffiti along the Wall, the

Palestinian artists are heavily influenced by these ideas and themes and

incorporate them in the images and phrases they create. Resistance is a

theme that is heavily showcased by Palestinian artists in their artwork,

whether the work is advocating violent or non-violent resistance, the

defiance of Israel is the main idea that artists are trying to exhibit in their

work. One example of resistance in graffiti is a phrase written in English

saying “the only peace Israel wants is a piece of my land.”

11

10 Parry, Against the Wall, 10. 11 Against the Wall: The Art of Resistance in Palestine, by William Parry. (Lawrence: Lawrence Hill Books, 2011) 126.

This image does not scream resistance or a desire to continue to struggle. It

is written in English, it is not a large piece of work, it is subdued and quiet

against some of the other images that are featured on the Wall. However, it

continues to advocate the continued fight of the Palestinian people against

their Israeli oppressors. By stating that Israel is not interested in peace, but

only in land, the creator is saying that Israel constantly claims that it wants

peace; however the actions of Israel directly contradict these hopes of

reaching peace with Palestine. Through actions such as settlement of

occupied areas, the construction of the Wall and trying to block Palestine’s

entry into the United Nations Israel continues to act in a way that does not

promote peace between itself and Palestine in the perspective of the

Palestinians. It is important to think about the way the artist presents their

work to the intended audience. It is also important to consider why the artist

would want to present their work in such a subdued manner. The subtleness

of the image and its message leads us to infer that the artist wants the

Palestinian people to resist peacefully, to not resort to acts of violence or

totally succumb to their feelings of rage and anger towards Israel. Like the

phrase “to exist is to resist” the artist is advocating that just by living their

lives and standing up for their rights peacefully that they will eventually

overcome the oppression.

While violence does seem to be the obvious choice for resistance or

defiance of Israel, this is not a major theme that can be seen in the

artwork of the Wall. Most artwork advocating for the Palestinian people to

resist Israel promote messages of non-violence. This can be seen in an image

of a piece of artwork taken from the wall in which a raised fist is holding a

human heart with the words ‘your heart is a weapon the size of your fist,

keep fighting, keep loving,’ written on the wrist of the arm.

12

12 Against the Wall: The Art of Resistance in Palestine, by William Parry. (Lawrence: Lawrence Hill Books, 2011) 73.

There are two ways for the audience to view this image, and it all depends

on perspective. At first the image seems to promote love as a solution,

showing that the artist believes that violence will in no way help the situation

between the two states, and that in order to solve the problems that have

erupted between Israel and Palestine that peace must be a priority as well as

a method to achieve an agreement. It seems as though the artist is not

advocating the supremacy and control of the Israeli state over Palestine, but

that their message is one of peaceful resistance, not of violence and

retaliation. However, the more one looks at the image another meaning can

be seen presenting itself. Instead of the peaceful resistance that is first

imagined, the image could be advocating a more defiant resistance to Israeli

occupation. The fist can be seen as a symbol of power and determination, of

a continued fight while the heart can be seen as a symbol of courage.

Looking at these images together from the second examination of the

artwork the message seems to be that of the artist telling the people of

Palestine to be brave be strong and to continue fighting. While the image is

not overtly demanding a violent resistance against the Israeli’s it does

advocate a continued defiance of Israeli oppression; that the love they have

for their land and their commitment to resistance will one day free Palestine.

On a part of the Wall there is an image of a cactus, wearing the

traditional keffiyeh of the Palestinian men. To a non-Palestinian this picture

would seem strange, but to a Palestinian it is a symbol of resistance. The

sabra, or prickly pear cactus (sabr means patience), has come to symbolize

Palestinian steadfastness and resistance. In his book Parry writes about the

symbolism of the sabra, saying…

The cactus is able to survive the harshest conditions and it regrows if cut. In the Palestinian villages that the Israelis depopulated and destroyed in 1948, often the sabra cacti are all that remain – the cacti were used to protect against trespassers and to demarcate borders around homes. Jewish militias demolished many of the buildings but the sabra remain, revealing the boundaries of the homes dispossessed.13

14

13 Parry, Against the Wall, 186. 14 Against the Wall: The Art of Resistance in Palestine, by William Parry. (Lawrence: Lawrence Hill Books, 2011) 186.

This image is a constant reminder to the people of Palestine of what they

have lost, but also of how they persevere. Like the sabra cactus they survive

in the most difficult of conditions, continuing to thrive even though they have

been driven out of their land, kicked out of their homes, and enclosed behind

a wall. The picture reminds them to continue to resist, waiting patiently for

their time of freedom to come. This image embodies both messages of the

Palestinian right to return and resistance.

These images of resistance inspire the people of Palestine to not give

up hope for freedom. They remind the people that resistance is a part of

their identity, and just by living they are fighting against Israel. It can clearly

be seen that resistance is a major part of the Palestinian identity through the

artwork and graffiti of the Wall.

The artwork on the Wall is not the only form of artistic expression that

the Palestinians use to resist Israel and to offer messages of hope,

remembrance and defiance. Starting with the First Intifada in 1987 graffiti

became a way for Palestinian people to connect with their communities. Not

only were the walls of the occupied territories covered with graffiti art but

also with news about the Intifada. The Palestinians took control of their

environment and worked it to their advantage, decorating the walls of

Palestine with news and messages for people. In The Writing on the Walls:

The Graffiti of the Intifada the author discusses the Palestinian use of graffiti

as a news source. He writes that,

Popularly dubbed a ‘war of stones,’ stone-throwing images dominated the Intifada’s public presentation. Indeed it was a war of stones, but stones were more than weapons of defense: they were print weapons as well. With its preponderance of stones and stone walls, the landscape provided readymade, easily accessible weapons of communication, assault and defense.15

This idea of Palestinians using the walls and graffiti as a way to inform the

people about what was happening is echoed in a book about the graffiti of

the Gaza Strip by Mia Gröndahl. Gröndahl writes that during the Intifada the

Israeli’s censored the Palestinian newspapers, and because there was no

Palestinian TV or radio with which to communicate the events of the Intifada

people were not aware of what was going on. She says that,

The walls became the self-evident communication channel – a place to create newspapers that could reach everyone in Gaza. In graffiti, the Intifada’s activists had found a way to inform Gaza residents about what was happening: the walls told them who had fallen in battle,

15 Julie Peteet. “Writing on the Walls: The Graffiti of the Intifada.” Cultural Anthropology 11 (1996): 139.

summoned them to take part in new protests, and encouraged them to continue resisting.16

Not only was graffiti a way to inform people about what was going on but it

soon became a way for the Palestinians to upset the balance of power

between themselves and the Israelis. In her article Peteet says that, “for

Palestinians, graffiti was an intervention in a relationship of power,”17 and

that “both the act of writing and the reading of its content disrupted

dominant-subordinate relations in various ways.”18 By creating this graffiti

the Palestinians were able to upset the traditional domination of Israel over

the Palestinians; Israel was trying to keep the people uninformed, to limit

their knowledge about what was going on, but the Palestinians disrupted

their attempts by writing on the walls and telling the people about what was

going on. Just like today, during the First Intifada graffiti was a symbol of

resistance. Even the use of landscape became an act of resistance when it

came to writing graffiti. The Israeli soldiers made sure to try and limit the use

of graffiti, making people immediately wash their walls when it showed up.

While sometimes the message of the graffiti was that of resistance, the

action of writing graffiti itself was more the act of defiance or resistance

against Israel. Peteet writes,

Graffiti suggested and beckoned for people to resist, to take action. Private property in the form of walls – which demarcated residences or businesses – was mobilized. Aside from declaring the popular communal nature of the uprising, taking over privately owned walls for inscription was also an act of internal politicization and mobilization,

16 Mia Gröndahl. Gaza Graffiti: Messages of Love and Politics (Cairo: The American University in Cairo Press, 2009) 10. 17 Peteet, Writing on the Walls, 139. 18 Peteet, Writing on the Walls, 143.

since owners of walls of print would be confronted by soldiers demanding erasure and payment of fines of roughly 700 Israeli shekels (about $350).19

Gröndahl also mentions the Israeli policy of removing graffiti immediately.

She says that the Israeli military would often invade a Palestinian refugee

camp and order the people living there out of their houses and force them to

wash the walls of their homes clean of graffiti. However, “as soon as the

soldiers had disappeared in their jeeps, the graffiti activists returned with

their battery of paint can and sprayed new slogans in the fight for a free

Palestine.”20 Graffiti became an integral part of the resistance movement in

Palestine, and continues to play a major role in the struggle against Israel.

What is interesting about the graffiti of Palestine today is that it has

not only been adopted by the people as an act of resistance, but also by the

political parties. Hamas and Fatah have really embraced this idea of using

the walls to broadcast messages of defiance and hope to the Palestinians.

Graffiti has become such a part of the Palestinian identity that Hamas and

Fatah train their graffiti artists in design, painting and calligraphy so that

they can spray paint messages for those parties around the city. Each

political organization has its own staff of calligraphers in Palestine, because it

is not enough to just spray paint on a wall, the ability and the art of writing

beautifully is essential.21 It is important for the artists to be skilled in

calligraphy; otherwise the message could be lost among all the other graffiti

that covers the walls of Palestine. For quite some time there was 19 Peteet, Writing on the Walls, 143. 20 Gröndahl, Gaza Graffiti, 10. 21 Gröndahl, Gaza Graffiti, 28.

competitiveness between the two parties, each trying to outdo each other

creatively, while still respecting each other’s territory; they refrained from

painting on walls belonging to the opposite party. However that changed

after Hamas won the election in 2006 and came to power in Gaza. Hamas

was “aware of graffiti’s power, [and] the political party toke sole control of

what was painted on the walls.”22 From then on the only political messages

permitted were those of Hamas, and Fatah was limited to writing harmless

messages just trying to inform people of their continued existence.

The act of creating graffiti may be an important part of Palestinian identity

and resistance, but the context behind the phrases and slogans of the graffiti

cannot be over looked. Much like the artwork on the Wall graffiti continues to

have the main themes of resistance, Palestinian identity and right of return.

On a wall in Palestine there is an image of a city surrounded by walls with an

open door way. Scrawled across the wall is the phrase “we are returning”

with an image of a key dangling from the letter “n.” The graffiti is written in

the Ruq’a script, one of the 6 different types of scripts used in graffiti. Unlike

other scripts used specifically for literature or quotes from the Qur’an Ruq’a

is an easily readable script that is used for all kinds of messages.

23

22 Gröndahl, Gaza Graffiti, 14. 23 Gaza Graffiti: Messages of Love and Politics, Mia Gröndahl (Cairo: The American University in Cairo Press, 2009) 147.

The graffiti clearly states the message of the artwork, we are returning.

Because the artist used the Ruq’a script, which is able to be read by all

Palestinians the message is meant for all the people of Palestine. The use of

the image of a key is important. The key is called the ‘key of homecoming’

and it is a visual symbol of the right of return. The right to return is an

essential part of Palestinian identity. It is the driving force behind the entire

Palestinian resistance; the land is what they’re fighting for; the land that has

their homes, their farms, their culture. If the right to return was not such a

major aspect of the identity of the Palestinian people Israel would have taken

over all of Palestine long ago. This image is reminding the people of Palestine

what they are fighting for, what they’ve lost and what they one day will have

back.

Another image that also incorporates this theme of right to return in

graffiti is taken from a piece commissioned by the PFLP, a left-wing

organization within the PLO. Written on the wall in red and yellow paint and

outlined in black the text reads “we return to resist” on the top row in Naskh,

which is a popular style for graffiti, and “no compromises” on the bottom row

in free-style script.

24

24 Gaza Graffiti: Messages of Love and Politics, Mia Gröndahl (Cairo: The American University in Cairo Press, 2009) 75.

Interestingly the themes of resistance and right of return are incorporated

into one statement in this piece. Instead of being two separate ideas of

Palestinians returning home to their land and resistance against Israel this

slogan of “we return to resist” creates a new aspect of Palestinian resistance.

The message that the PFLP is sending is that not only should Palestinians

have the right to return to their land, which could be seen as a peaceful

return, but that they are going to return to the land that was taken from

them and they are going to resist the nation of Israel anyway they can. The

statement “no compromises” builds on this theme of resistance against

Israel because it is saying that one way or the other Palestine is going to

take their land back, no matter what. Palestine has tried to compromise with

Israel in the past and each time Israel has not honored their agreements, and

Palestine has gotten tired of it. Not only does this statement point to Israel

not honoring agreements, but it also points to the perceived weakness of

Fatah in negotiations with the Israelis. Fatah was the party that took part in

the negotiations during the Oslo Accords, and they compromised a lot in

order to reach an agreement with Israel; in the view of a lot of Palestinians

they compromised too much. This image is also a criticism of Oslo. The PFLP

is saying that Palestine will no longer compromise with Israel, that the time

for compromise is over and that it is time to get their land back.

Along a wall there is the word “Palestine” scrawled in beautiful graffiti

in red paint with yellow, black and green outlining it. Just one word, but that

word is powerful. This example of resistance graffiti25 doesn’t seem very

defiant about the struggle against Israel, but it doesn’t have to be. The word

itself is a symbol of resistance; it inspires the love and devotion of a whole

nation of displaced people and reminds them that the treatment they endure

is for something. It reminds them of who they are, where they come from

and what is important. It symbolizes what they have been missing and

hoping for these last 60 years. The word “Palestine” is especially powerful

and meaningful to the people who identify as Palestinians because many

Israeli’s do not even acknowledge the reality of a “Palestine.” Instead of

accepting the reality of Palestine those aforementioned Israeli’s refer to the

north of the West Bank as Samaria and the south as Judea, using the names

that they would have been called in biblical times, when the Jewish people

occupied the area.

26

25 Gröndahl, Gaza Graffiti, 151. 26 Gaza Graffiti: Messages of Love and Politics, Mia Gröndahl (Cairo: The American University in Cairo Press, 2009) 151.

Graffiti has become a part of Palestinian identity and resistance. The writings

on the wall “encouraged resistance, cajoled, demanded, critiqued and

provided running political commentary.”27 The graffiti that Palestinians

create are more than just words sprayed upon a wall; for the Palestinians it is

a way “to express your feelings and thoughts.”28 One young graffiti artist

named Maysa said that the reason she does graffiti is because, “I want to tell

the whole world that even though Israel is trying to destroy our lives and kill

us, we will never give up and forget Palestine.”29 This sentiment is echoed in

every Palestinian heart and all along the walls of Palestine, and the colorful

messages remind them of that.

Covering the surfaces of walls, houses and businesses of Palestine are

murals. Much like the artwork of the Wall these are large, colorful images

whose purpose is to send a message. However there is a difference between

27 Peteet, Writing on the Walls, 143. 28 Gröndahl, Gaza Graffiti, 132. 29 Gröndahl, Gaza Graffiti, 132.

the murals on the Wall and the murals on the buildings of Palestine. As we

have seen landscape plays an important part in Palestinian resistance, the

landscape is the canvas on which the artists create their work and share

their messages. The Wall is a major part of the Palestinian landscape, but it

is also a symbol, not just a symbol of oppression for Palestine but a symbol

of injustice all over the world. Because of this artists and tourists who come

to visit Palestine like to leave their own individual artwork or message on the

wall; messages and images calling for peace, messages calling for freedom

and messages of solidarity with the Palestinians, making the Wall an

international canvas. The artwork of the Wall is not entirely Palestinian,

which creates a distinction between murals there and murals around

Palestine itself. It is with this distinction in mind that we can focus on the

murals of Palestine.

Outside of a school in Hebron, where the tensions between the

Palestinians and Israelis are at the highest, a mural is painted on a wall. On a

background of blue there is a rising sun, and in the middle of that sun is an

image of a city surrounded by olives. Flanking the sun are two white doves

each carrying a branch, of what can be assumed to be an olive tree, in their

beaks. Underneath the birds the words “free Palestine” are written, with

something written in Arabic next to the sun.

30

The messages of peace and freedom are blatantly obvious in this mural.

However a more subtle message is really the focus of this piece. The city

inside the rising sun represents Palestine. The olive, one of the staples of

Palestinian life for food and farming, frame the image of the city, making the

connection that the city is Palestine. It is important to see that Palestine is

inside the rising sun, because the message that is being portrayed here is

30 Palestinian Wall, Palestine. Personal photograph by John Eby. Nov. 2011.

that Palestine will one day rise again. For over 60 years Palestine and it’s

people have been oppressed and mistreated by the nation of Israel. Their

land has been taken from them, their families torn apart, and their way of life

altered by the encroachment of the Wall. The days of once glorious Palestine

with its vibrant culture and people have been diminished severely since the

creation of the Israel. However, the artist of this mural is saying that those

days will one day return, and that Palestine will take its place among the

nations of the world. But the artist isn’t saying that the coming-age of

Palestine should be achieved through violence, it can only be done through

peace. The use of the doves carrying the (olive) branches solidifies this

message.

At least 40 clouds float in the sky on a mural painted at one of the

Palestinian refugee camps. Inside each of these clouds is the name of a

village that has been lost to Israel and Israeli settlements. Underneath the

clouds an image of a typical Palestinian village is painted. A mosque, families

playing, homes and animals can all be seen in the mural. It paints quiet the

pretty picture of life before Israel started to remove the Palestinians from

their land.

31

31 Palestinian Refugee Camp, Palestine. Personal photograph by John Eby. Nov. 2011.

Where better to paint a picture representing the loss of land than at a

refugee camp? Its placement among the homeless citizens of Palestine is

poetically fitting. How many of the refugees living in the camp can find the

name of their village or of a village they knew in this mural; most likely a

vast majority of them can. The loss of land is a common theme in Palestinian

art, both mural and graffiti, and it is also a part of Palestinian identity. This

mural serves the dual purpose of reminding the refugees of the homes and

villages they once lived in, of a better time and a better place where they

could live on the land that their ancestors had lived on for generations. But it

also reminds them of what they are fighting for, what they can gain back as

long as they resist Israel’s attempt to acquire all their land.

In the same refugee camp there is a mural that symbolizes another

aspect of Palestinian identity, the right to return. The image shows an outline

of what used to be Palestinian territory. Painted in stripes of black, white and

green a hand emerges from the outline of Palestine, holding up a peace sign.

Next to the representation of Palestine there is a key, and twining around

this whole image is barbed wire.

32

32 Palestinian Refugee Camp, Palestine. Personal photograph by John Eby. Nov. 2011.

The message that can be seen here is that of a peaceful return of Palestine

to the land they once called theirs. The image of the key can be seen in

works of art all throughout Palestine, and it represents the right to return of

the Palestinian people. However the hand holding out the peace sign reflects

a desire for a peaceful return of Palestinians. The barbed wire symbolizes the

captivity of the people of Palestine behind the Separation Wall and in the

refugee camps. But this message of oppression is not overtly blatant; at first

glance the barbed wire is hardly seen, meaning that the message of this

peace is not the oppression Palestinians suffer, but their desire for peace and

to return to their homes.

The genre of resistance art is not unique to the country of Palestine.

Graffiti and mural art is an art form that occurs all over the world, from the

neighborhoods of Chicago to the walls of buildings in South Africa. However

half a world away from Palestine we find a country with a similar history;

politically, socially and artistically. Much like Palestine the country of

Northern Ireland has embraced this tradition of resistance art and made it an

integral part of their culture.

We can see this connection between the two countries not only in this

shared artistic tradition, but also in their support of each other through their

resistance art. Both Palestine and Northern Ireland advocate for the end of

each other’s oppression on the walls of their lands, however before this

aspect of their relationship can be discussed, evidence of their connection

must first be examined, and how environment plays a role in the portrayal of

the message. But perhaps the most interesting aspect of this relationship

between the two countries is the way that violence and/or non-violence can

be advocated in these murals.

33

Along a stretch of the Wall surrounding the occupied territories of Palestine a

simple message is spray painted in green, “our revenge will be the laughter

of our children.” This quote was uttered by Irish hunger striker and member

of the Provisional Irish Republican Army, Bobby Sands. As a prisoner of the

British government in 1981 Sands decided to conduct a hunger strike over

the removal of Special Category Status from prisoners of The Troubles, which

lead to his eventual death after 66 days of striking. As a proponent of non-

violent resistance this quote from Sands fits right in among the other images

33 Against the Wall: The Art of Resistance in Palestine, by William Parry. (Lawrence: Lawrence Hill Books, 2011) 117.

and messages of non-violence that adorn the Wall. In this context, amongst

messages of peace and hope this image and quote also becomes a message

of hope and peace with its focus on the future of the children of Palestine.

One could say that it even evokes a sense of happiness, the future happiness

of the children of Palestine once they break free of the oppression of Israel.

34

Here we have the same quote from Bobby Sands, but this time it is in a

much different context. This image is painted on a wall in Northern Ireland,

its location and connotation completely altered by its change in

environment. On the Wall in Palestine this quote stood for a bright future of

freedom from Israeli oppression, here in Northern Ireland this quote stands

for all that Northern Ireland has lost and suffered at the hands of the British

and Protestant enemies. Because of the situation between the Protestants

34 Dr. Jonathan McCormick, CAIN Mural Directory. Aug. 2001. <http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/mccormick/photos/no1083.htm#photo>

and the Catholics the emphasis seems to be on the word revenge, with

allusion to retaliation. Incorporating the image of Bobby Sands only solidifies

the feeling of loss and suffering; this image does more than just evoke those

feelings, there is an actual reminder of one who has perished because of the

conflict between the varying factions in Northern Ireland. That is one of the

issues with this Northern Irish mural art, the message behind the image is

not one of hope or the right to return, it is a constant everyday reminder of

who has died, only continuing and fueling the feelings of animosity and

hatred between the Protestants and the Catholics.

Through the analysis and interpretation of the previous 2 images a

difference can be seen between the messages of the artwork in Palestine

and Northern Ireland. Unlike Palestine who uses the resistance art to

advocate a message of non-violent resistance the walls of Northern Ireland

suggest themes of accusation, death, violence, anger and hatred which

vastly differs from the Palestinian themes of loss, despair, hope or the right

to return.

35

35 Dr. Jonathan McCormick, CAIN Mural Directory. Sep. 2006. < http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/mccormick/photos/no2750.htm#photo>

The idea of violence is clearly obvious in this image representing the Battle

of the Bogside in Northern Ireland. In the mural there is a young man

wearing a gas mask and holding a Molotov cocktail, which is more or less a

bomb, a weapon of violence. Behind the man there are what appear to be

police officers, which based on history would most likely be Unionists, ready

with their helmets and shields, typical riot gear. The police officers are

standing in front of burning houses, smoke billowing into the air behind the

young man. This image is so drastically different than any images from

Palestine analyzed in this paper; this image is screaming violence and

retaliation for the events that happened during the Battle of the Bogside.

Here there is no symbol of peace of hopeful inference of the people returning

to their land, which can be seen in the resistance art of Palestine. Instead all

that can be inferred from the image is destructiveness and disorder,

completely different than the murals of Palestine.

Violence and attack are constant and pervasive themes in the

resistance art of Northern Ireland. These themes can be seen in an image of

a poster hung on a lamppost in one of the 6 counties of Northern Ireland. The

poster is of a member of the Irish Republican Army, the IRA as they are most

commonly referred to as, who fight for the freedom of Northern Ireland from

Britain and the United Kingdom.

36

36 Dr. Jonathan McCormick, CAIN Mural Directory. Dec. 2000. < http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/mccormick/photos/no749.htm#photo>

The message of violence is even more abundantly clear in this image than

the previous one. Here there is a picture of an IRA soldier, specifically a

sniper, pointing a gun directly at the viewer, with the obvious intention of

shooting down Unionist enemies. In Palestine the majority of images dealing

with soldiers are ones whose messages are highlighting the unfair treatment

of citizens from the Israeli soldiers or who are mocking them. Extremely and

blatantly different from Palestine, Northern Ireland’s images of soldiers are

those involving weapons and threats, emphasizing the themes of violence,

retaliation and aggression.

While the emphasis of violence in Northern Irish resistance art is

opposite of the non-violent Palestinian emphasis, the connection and sense

of community that Palestine and Northern Ireland have for each other and

showcase in their work is something quite fascinating. In an article by Jack

Santino he acknowledges this identification that these two peoples have for

each other. He writes, “among northern Irish Catholics a considerable

identification with… Palestinian people”37 and that “today the Palestinian flag

flies over working-class nationalist estates in Belfast.”38

In the Northern Irish capital of Belfast there is a series of murals on a

wall highlighting the injustices done around to people around the globe. One

panel of the wall has a mural dedicated to the Israeli oppression of Palestine.

The image states “Free Palestine from 60 years of Nakba!”, “end this

barbarian Israeli agresson!” and “this is a war crime!” Accompanying these

phrases is an image of a young boy staring at the Separation Barrier with a

city burning behind it.

39

37 Jack Santino. “Public Protest and Popular Style: Resistance from the Right in Northern Ireland and South Boston.” American Anthropologist 101 (1999): 10. 38 Santino, Popular Protest, 10. 39 Belfast Wall, Northern Ireland. Personal photograph by author. Jan. 2010.

This image represents the sense of community that the Northern Irish and

Palestinians have for each other perfectly. The words on the mural such as

“barbarian Israeli aggression” show the Northern Irish Catholics view of the

Wall in Israel/Palestine. As a country that also has a wall dividing the

communities to try and dissuade aggression between parties they are

strongly against it. They see the wall as a human rights violation, specifically

calling it a war crime. They also use the word “slaughtered” to talk about the

number of Palestinians who have died since the start of the Israel’s capture

of Palestinian land, labeling the deaths as inhumane, and since the

insinuation is that the Israeli’s are to blame for this, also labeling the Israeli’s

as inhumane.

The resistance art movement in Palestine started off during the First

Intifada with the use of graffiti to convey news and information to the people

of Israel, today it has transformed itself into a cultural phenomenon, and has

become part of Palestinian life and identity. The images and messages that

are decorating the walls, houses, buildings and the Wall in Palestine are an

artistic manifestation of the Palestinian peoples’ hopes and dreams. They

convey messages of loss, resistance, longing and desire. The resistance art

of Palestine has become an outlet for the people to express their emotions,

to discuss their feelings against Israel, to remind the world that they are still

here. Through the various styles of resistance art discussed in this paper,

specifically the art of the Israel/Palestine Separation Barrier, graffiti and

murals, the Palestinian people have discovered and embraced a peaceful

and artistic way to discuss and represent their struggle. The resistance art

that Palestinians create are more than just beautiful images or ornately

designed graffiti messages, they represent the identity and dreams of a

nation of people that are lost.

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