Against Erasure: A Photographic Memory of Palestine Before the Nakba

A unique, stunning collection of images of Palestine in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and a testament to the vibrancy of Palestinian society prior to occupation.

This book tells the story, in both English and Arabic, of a land full of people--people with families, hopes, dreams, and a deep connection to their home--before Israel’s establishment in 1948, known to Palestinians as the Nakba, or ＂catastrophe.＂ Denying Palestinian existence has been a fundamental premise of Zionism, which has sought not only to hide this existence but also to erase its memory. But existence leaves traces, and the imprint of the Palestine that was remains, even in the absence of those expelled from their lands. It appears in the ruins of a village whose name no longer appears in the maps, in the drawing of a lost landscape, in the lyrics of a song, or in the photographs from a family album.

Co-edited by Teresa Aranguren and Sandra Barrilaro and featuring a foreword by Mohammed El-Kurd, the photographs in this book are traces of that existence that have not been erased. They are testament not to nostalgia, but to the power of resistance.

Teresa Aranguren is a journalist based in Spain. In 1982, she covered the Israeli invasion of Lebanon as a correspondent for Mundo Obrero (Workers World), has worked for a number of Spanish publications, covering the Israel-Palestine conflict, and the Gulf Wars, and since 1989 has been the Middle East correspondent for Telemadrid. Aranguren is the author of Palestina: El hilo de la memoria (Palestine: The Thread of Memory) (2004) and Olivo Roto: Escenas de la ocupación (Broken Olive Tree: Scenes from the Occupation) (2006).

Sandra Barrilaro is a Spanish photographer and activist. She has been a speaker at the Palestinian Educational Cultural Forum, and participated in the Women’s Boat to Gaza flotilla in 2016. Barrilaro’s work on Palestine has been exhibited widely under the title ＂Palestine, A Look at Injustice,＂ and she is currently working on several projects about Palestine.

Mohammed El-Kurd is an internationally-touring poet and writer from Jerusalem, Palestine. His work has been featured in The Guardian, The Nation, This Week In Palestine, Al-Jazeera English, and the forthcoming Vacuuming Away Fire anthology, among others. Mohammed graduated from the Savannah College of Art and Design with a B.F.A. in Writing, where he created Radical Blankets, an award-winning multimedia poetry magazine. He is currently pursuing an M.F.A. in Poetry from Brooklyn College. His poetry-oud album, Bellydancing On Wounds, was released in collaboration with Palestinian musical artist Clarissa Bitar. Apart from poetry and writing, el-Kurd is a visual artist, printmaker, and most recently, co-designer of a fashion collection with Serbian designer Tina Gancev. Mohammed has spent his undergraduate weekends performing poetry at campuses and cultural centers across the United States and hopes to continue in the post-COVID-19 era.