Nakba Quote Of The Day: Gideon Levy

"Look at this prickly pear plant. It's covering a mound of stones. This mound of stones was once a house, or a shed, or a sheep pen, or a school, or a stone fence. Once - until 56 years ago, a generation and a half ago - not that long ago. The cactus separated the houses and one lot from another, a living fence that is now also the only monument to the life that once was here.

Take a look at the grove of pines around the prickly pear as well. Beneath it there was once a village. All of its 405 houses were destroyed in one day in 1948 and its 2,350 inhabitants scattered all over. No one ever told us about this. The pines were planted right afterward by the Jewish National Fund, to which we contributed in our childhood, every Friday, in order to cover the ruins, to cover the possibility of return and maybe also a little of the shame and the guilt".

-- Social studies lesson; a visit to the ruins of the depopulated Palestinian villages of northern Israel, by Gideon Levy. Ha'aretz, 31 March 2004.

Photo: The ruins of the Palestinian village of al-Kunayyisa, near al-Ramla, depopulated and destroyed by Israeli troops of possibly the Giv'ati Brigade, 10 July 1948. By Noga Kadman via Palestine Remembered.