|
Relatives of the late Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish along with Palestinian Authority officials mourn over his coffin during his state funeral in the West Bank city of |
Last Wednesday’s state funeral in Ramallah for the revered Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish revealed how far the Palestinian people are from realizing the justice imagined in Darwish’s writing, and was a sad reminder of how the Palestinian Authority (PA) helps undermine his people’s struggle.
On the day that Darwish’s body was laid to rest, amid tens of thousands of Palestinians mourning in the streets and many more in their homes, his criticisms of and hopes for the Palestinian and Israeli governments and societies remained unheeded and unrealized. However, Darwish’s official funeral at the PA headquarters, with all of its military pomp, demonstrated that the PA had its own interests in mind over that of respecting, never mind fulfilling, Darwish’s message and legacy.
Darwish joined the Palestine Liberation Organization in 1973 but broke 20 years later in disagreement with their signing with
It is hard to imagine that Darwish would have been pleased with his PA-sponsored state funeral. Indeed, with the Oslo Accords he opposed came the establishment of the PA and the illusion of a Palestinian government in parity with
Furthermore, Darwish was overtly critical of political factionalism between Fatah and Hamas,
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas eulogized at Darwish’s funeral: "You remain with us, Mahmoud, because you represent everything that unites us." Abbas spoke of Palestinian unity but in actuality, the PA has complied with
If the PA wanted to truly honor Darwish’s message, they should have first avoided the state procession at the Muqata’a, which serves as the PA headquarters and presidential compound, and has come to symbolize the powerlessness of the PA since its besiegement and partial destruction by
Instead, the ceremony and burial at the
In a 2002 interview, Darwish stated: "I thought poetry could change everything, could change history and could humanize, and I think that the illusion is very necessary to push poets to be involved and to believe. But now I think that poetry changes only the poet."
Perhaps Darwish’s poems cannot singularly, or even with any great consequence, end the occupation of
Sumia Ibrahim is an Iraqi-Palestinian American residing in Birzeit, Palestine this summer. A recent graduate of Rutgers University in New Jersey, an activist of several years against the US war on Iraq, and a media advocate against racial profiling since her profiling experience at JFK airport in New York City in fall 2006, Sumia is the recipient of the Rachel Corrie Scholarship from the Palestinian American Women’s Association to study at Birzeit University this summer.
ZNetwork is funded solely through the generosity of its readers.
Donate