the word al-nakba

Submitted by dhimmi no more (United States), May 22, 2010 at 16:39

Hi Suzanne

As student of the Arabic language I'm always looking for what words do mean more so in the context of politics and the term al-nakba al-falastiniyya or simply al-nakba is a very interesting subject

>To start discussing the "nakba" with the Israeli War of Independence or even to associate the word, beginning in the 1920s, with Arab hatred of the Jews is simply wrong, as, at that time, it had nothing whatsoever to do with Jews.

Well I wish is it is this simple. The word nakba (root NKB) really means calamity, disaster or catastrophe and it pertains in the context of the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians and it describes in one word what has been called al-hjira al-falastiniyya or the exodus of the palestinians and there is no doubt in my mind that the person who coined such word in such context is Qustantin Zureiq in 1947-1948 and was used in his book "ma3na al-nakba" or the meaning of the nakba

Now the word nakba has been used in other contexts for example Egyptians back in the 1950's used the term nakbet harb seta wa khamseen or the nakba of the war of 1956 and they also used the term nakbet sab3a wa seteen or the nakba of the war of 1967 which I understand was changed from nakba to naksa and the word naska (nakset sab3a wa seteen) means the relapse so no one would take away the word nakba from the Palestinians

>As George Antonius, supposedly the first "official historian of Palestinian nationalism." wrote in his official advocacy/history of Arab nationalism "The Arab Awakening" (a highly biased book, published in 1938 and for years afterward, the official text used at British universities) :

Did you really read "Arab awekening"? I doubt it very much. And could you give me the page number where I would find the word nakba?

>"The original Nakba had nothing to do with Jews, and nothing to do with demands by Palestinian Arabs for self-determination, independence and statehood. To the contrary, it had everything to do with the fact that the Palestinian Arabs saw themselves as Syrians. They rioted at this nakba - at this catastrophe - because they found deeply offensive the very idea that they should be independent from Syria and Syrians. In the 1920s, the very suggestion that Palestinian Arabs constituted a separate ethnic nationality was enough to send those same Arabs out into the streets to murder and plunder violently in outrage."

Could you give me the page number as this does not make sense as the book was written in the late 1930's

>See http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/7964 for this information and more.

I really would like to see the original Arabic

Thanks

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