Wednesday, September 03, 2025
Elder of ZiyonThe phrase was popularized in the 2010s, I only rarely find it before then, and hardly ever in Palestinian context (I see it in a memoir of a Holocaust survivor, for example.)
But it has taken on a life of its own, and its trajectory is interesting.
A recent article in the journal Ethnic and Racial Studies is a perfect example of how the concept is bizarre to begin with. Titled "Homemaking as everyday resistance: the settler colonial context of Palestinians in Israel," it claims that Arab Israelis engage in resistance by doing things like moving into mixed Jewish-Arab towns, maintaining Arab architecture in their homes and cooking traditional dishes.
This article examines homemaking as an important, yet understudied, response to settler colonialism. While there is growing interest in settler colonialism, defined by the colonial settlers’ drive to replace the Indigenous population, existing literature does not adequately address the response of its victims. This article highlights the resistance patterns of an Indigenous society facing a unique form of differential settler colonialism. Settler colonial projects adapt to their contexts, employing various means to facilitate the replacement of the Indigenous society. Exploring how Indigenous peoples engage in homemaking provides valuable insights into their resistance strategies. We outline three dimensions of homemaking as resistance: Return versus Displacement, Preservation versus Erasure, and Authentication versus Appropriation of Indigeneity. These dimensions do not encompass all strategies of resistance to all forms of settler colonialism. However, they contribute to a deeper understanding of its dynamics and promote a new theoretical model of homemaking as a resistance strategy.
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This is all absurd. It assumes at the outset that Israel is a settler colonial state and that it is hellbent on erasing all Arab culture. The premise is wrong to begin with - the very existence of the Museum of Islamic Art, the significant amount of Arab and Islamic exhibits at the Israel Museum and Israel's preservation of Islamic buildings even at Judaism's holiest places show that Israel acts to preserve all cultures, not replace them.
The article says things like:
Purchasing homes in mixed cities or cities established for the Jewish settler society is a key homemaking practice that reflects the Palestinian return process. It is important to distinguish that while some of the Palestinian presence in cities now defined as mixed, such as Haifa, Acre, Lydda, Ramle, and Jaffa, is a historical presence that predates the establishment of Israel in 1948, there is a growing trend of Palestinian families relocating from villages to these cities. This phenomenon, referred to in research as “internal migration”, reflects a form of return.Does anyone really think Arabs want to move to mixed cities as a form of "return"? It is where the jobs and better schools are! If Israeli society was as racist as the authors presume, then moving to these cities would be prevented by the Jews.
Most Arab Israelis, like anyone else, just want to live in peace. They choose where they live based on where they can best work or raise their kids, they decorate their houses in the way that fits their personalities and they cook the food they want to eat.
But something happens when outsiders start to proclaim that Arabs living their lives are really heroic, steadfast resisters.
They start to believe it.
Who doesn't prefer to hear that the decisions they make are not pragmatic, but heroic? Who can resist the idea of being idolized for the decisions they would make anyway?
So we get a feedback loop: after years of being told that they make mundane decisions for ideological reasons and that their steadfastness in staying in their homes is admired worldwide, the people are happy to tell any reporters or researchers, yes, we really did all this to show our resistance to Jewish hegemony. The benefits of pretending to be heroes far outweighs the boring answer of admitting that they simply want the best for their families.
So now these academic researchers can find plenty of Arabs willing to say exactly what the false premise pretends to be the truth - and it becomes the new truth, proven by the words of the newly minted heroes.
And when that happens, peace becomes less likely, because when people define themselves as resisters, they never want to compromise.
This is how propaganda can itself change reality.
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"He's an Anti-Zionist Too!" cartoon book (December 2024) PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism (February 2022) |
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