Between memory and resistance, an identity shaped by space

The case of the Naqab Arab Bedouins

Abstract

Based on interviews of Arab-Bedouin informants from the Naqab, including Arab-Bedouin men of the 1948 generation and their children, from recognized and unrecognized villages, the paper examines the effect of space on identity construction. It considers how forcible spatial change since the events of 1948 has structured the Arab-Bedouin identity, and how attachment to their original lands serves as the basis of construction of their displaced identity, building feelings of conscious and physical alienation from the new space, which becomes an arena of resistance and protest. Whether relocated to recognized or unrecognized settlements, the Naqab Arab Bedouins have attempted to build an exile identity among family members by constructing a collective communal memory about their "magnificent" past, as well as internalizing a lack of belonging and feelings of uprootedness from the place they live in today. Their aim is to protest and oppose their present situation and express their continuous aspiration to return to their previous way of life, on their original lands. The reality of their transitory and unstable existence helps them to construct these feelings and reinforces their demand for the longed-for return. As such, their exile from their former space has not remained a mere memory for the generation of 1948, but instead has been transformed into an exile identity among the second and third generation. It now seems that the fourth generation is also characterized by this transient mentality, which cries out from the misery of their current living conditions. All this shapes the Arab-Bedouin struggle for their lands, for their future and for the future of their children.