During the 1948 Israeli War of Independence - what the Palestinians have termed the “Nakba” (“catastrophe” in Arabic) some 700,000 Arabs left the land that had just become the State of Israel. Some left at the bequest of Arab leaders from neighboring countries - a land free of Arabs would make an easier job for the invading Arab forces. Others fled after hearing rumors of massacres carried out by Israeli forces in Palestinian villages like Deir Yassin. Some in villages like Lydda and Ramle were expelled by the nascent Israel Defense Forces. 

Supporters of Israel would say that the expulsions were necessary - that there was no way to contend with the neighboring Arab armies pouring across the newly formed borders without having dealt with the internal Arab threat first. Palestinian supporters would term it ethnic cleansing. This song and the next  reflect on the Palestinian expulsion from the village of Lydda, now Lod, which today lies just outside Ben-Gurion Airport and that in the 1940’s was a stop on the Jaffa-Jerusalem Palestine Railway. These songs draw on Ari Shavit’s chapter ‘Lydda’ from his masterpiece, "My Promised Land", as well as S. Yizhar’s novel, "Khirbet Khizeh."

Oh, from the river to the sea 
Does the land remember me?
Does my old stone house still open to this key?
Does it still yearn to hold my family?

We were the straw that broke the country’s back 
They said we blocked the precious railroad tracks
Dumped all our flour into cotton sacks

It’s not a right it’s that I will return
If not my body then my memory will burn 
In Friday night candles 
In all of their homes
No sleep no solace I won’t leave them alone

There were tents until the children came
Six sticks and canvas couldn’t stop the rain
So they built houses, concrete simple and plain
Sixty years on and the houses remain 

It’s not a right it’s that I will return
If not my body then my memory will burn 
In Friday night candles 
In all of their homes
No sleep no solace I won’t leave them alone

I can cross that wall most summer nights
Glide right over as my dreams take flight 
I see my father and he holds me tight 
We touch the front door as it fades from sight

Does the Land Remember Me?

Ben Fisher