Democratic Palestine : 20 (ص 35)
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- Democratic Palestine : 20 (ص 35)
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50 Years Later
The Message That Still Hasn’t Gotten Through
By Heithem Adnan
I know not what to ask myself after
reading the chapter entitled «The Mes-
sage Which Arrived 32 Years Later» in
Ghassan Kanafani’s story, «Um Saad».
Shall I ask myself if history is repeating
itself? Should I say that great men truly
possess the ability to foresee the future?
Shall I ask whether our intellectuals
have been able to bring home this mes-
sage after fifty years? Or maybe I
should ask about the fate of a people
and revolution whose leadership was
incapable of reading this people’s his-
tory and heritage correctly?
I do not know, but when I read the
chapter, I realized that the message has
not gotten through, contrary to what
Ghassan Kanafani wrote, that the
message arrived thirty-two years later.
That day Um Saad went to Ghassan.
She was distraught, and he asked,
«What has happened, Um Saad?»
She pulled out a much folded and
wrinkled piece of paper from _ her
bosom, and thrust it towards him:
«Hassan has read this to me. Ever
since, I have been troubled.»
Naturally the letter had come from
her son, Saad, who represents the real
revolutionaries. The letter spoke of his
comrade, Laith, who had been taken
prisoner by the Zionists. Saad had dis-
covered that Laith’s family might turn
to their cousin, a certain Abdel Moula,
to mediate for their son. Abdel Moula
was known as a collaborator, besides
being one of the richer feudalists.
Ghassan asked Um Saad why such a
thing should distrub her. She replied
that Saad had written to ask her to go
to Laith’s mother to stop her from
turning to collaborators to beg favors
for revolutionaries. Laith had told Saad
that if anything happened to him, and
his family tried to write to Abdel
Moula, then Saad would be left with no
alternative but to shoot them - pure and
simple, to shoot the family of a revolu-
tionary, if they turn to those who do
not participate in the revolution, but
plot to nip the bud of revolutionary
blood before it blooms.
Um Saad was completely confused,
and Ghassan asked if she was sure that
Laith’s family had written to Abdel
Moula. She was not sure and must see.
Here I asked myself whether Laith’s
family, in 1986, would write to
Mubarak or Hassan II or Hanna
Siniora or their ‘martyr’ Zafer Al
Masri, to beg favors for him now, in his
current dilemma. I wondered whether
the likes of Saad should shoot Laith’s
family or not.
My uncertainty increased with that of
Um Saad as I continued to read and
found her saying, «As soon as I heard
Abdel Moula’s name when Hassan was
reading to me, I shook as if evil spirits
had possessed me...»
This, of course, was because Um
Saad was sure that Abdel Moula was
the one who had killed Fadhil, the
revolutionary of 1936, although «he did |
not carry a gun and shoot.» When
Ghassan asked how a person could kill
another without carrying a gun and
shooting, she said: «In the revolution
of 1936, Fadhil went up to the moun-
tains. He was barefoot and carried a
Martin rifle... He was away for a long
time.» Um Saad was still at the begin-
ning of her life then. She used to hear
about things without completely com-
prehending them. She spoke of the six-
month strike and the peasants who
carried arms and went up to the moun-
tains. Now, however, matured by life’s
bitter experiences, she remembers the
events and says: «Then came the letter
from the Arab kings, and the men
returned to their homes.»
Then I wondered, «Did not a similar
letter descend on us from the Arab
kings assembled at Fez in 1982?
Um Saad had this to add to Ghassan:
«The men returned to their homes...
Now, if you ask me how, I wouldn’t
know. However, I do remember one
event clearly.» Naturally, this event was
the revolutionary Fadhil’s heeding the
letter of the Arab kings, whether in
1936, 1982 or thereafter. «Fadhil
returned with those who returned to the
village. He came down from the hills
barefooted as he had ascended. The
road must have been long, for he rea-
ched the square as the last ones reached
the neighboring village. His clothes and
feet were torn. He was completely
exhausted and drained.»
I don’t believe his condition differed
much from that of those ‘Fadhils’ who
reached the squares of Tunis, Algiers,
Khartoum, Damascus or Sanaa after
leaving Beirut.
Um Saad went on to recall... Now
nobody remembers with her or can read
her thoughts: «The square was teeming
with people and Fadhil could not find a
place except on the threshold of a home
at the end of the square. He sat down to
catch his breath and try to take care of
his torn feet that were filled with dirt
and thorns and blood. I was standing
with the women, not far from him. I
wouldn’t have noticed him to begin
with, had I not heard a woman say that
it was Fahdil who works in the oil press,
one of the first to go up in the moun-
tains. The people began to applaud. We
looked up and saw Abdel Moula
ascending a table. He spoke and was
applauded. I do not remember now
what he said, but no doubt he spoke of
the revolution, of victory, and of the
English and the Jews. I do not know
why at that moment I looked at Fadhil.
I saw him stretch out his arms to the
people, saying, «Hey you, it was I
whose feet were torn, and now he is the
one you clap for?»
I do not know why, but when I read
these words, I imagined pictures of
stouthearted fighters sitting exhausted
in the squares of Tunis, Khartoum or
Sanaa. One of the sons of King Hassan
stands, speaking of victory amidst the
applause of the Arab masses. I do not
know why I began to imagine the pic-
tures of heroes of successful guerrilla
operations, pictures of the destruction
wreaked by vengeful Zionist air raids,
and pictures of tremendous demons-
trations in the occupied territories,
carrying pictures of Yaser Arafat.
However, my mental wanderings
were cut short. Ghassan Kanafani
summoned me to continue reading his
story. He wrote that Um Saad «again
spread out the piece of white paper,
frayed by folding, before my eyes.» At
this point, I felt that the words of
Ghassan were like hammer blows on
my head. I felt as if he had returned
from the grave, the parts of his body
reassembled once again in defiance of
the Zionists’ explosives. He rose to
grasp each one of us with what remains
of Palestinian feeling, to shake us and
say: «Go and tell Laith’s family in
Tunis, in Sanaa, in Baghdad and
everywhere, ‘No, do not go to Abdel
Moula or Mubarak or Hassan II or any
one of his family, or else I will raise my
gun and shoot you.’»
Um Saad once again intervenes to
say: «Now, Abdel Moula once again,
after twenty years, can you imagine?...
How can such a thing happen?... I am
not discussing Laith... Fadhil died
afterwards. Some say he died of tuber-
culosis at the oil press. Others say he
was killed in the 1948 war. Still others
say that he left Palestine in 1949,
returning afterwards, only to be killed
on the road. However, this is not our
subject.»
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