Strangers in the House - Softcover

Shehadeh, Raja

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1846682509 ISBN 13: 9781846682506

Publisher: Profile Books, 2009

Synopsis

Raja Shehadeh was born into a successful Palestinian family with a beautiful house overlooking the Mediterranean. When the state of Israel was formed in 1948 the family were driven out to the provincial town of Ramallah. There Shehadeh grew up in the shadow of his father, a leading civil rights lawyer. He vowed not to become involved in politics or law but inevitably did so and became an important activist himself.In 1985 his father was stabbed to death. The Israeli police failed to investigate the murder properly and Shehadeh, by then a lawyer, set about solving the crime that destroyed his family. In Strangers in the House, Shehadeh recounts his troubled and complex relationship with his father and his experience of exile - of being a stranger in his own land. It is a remarkable memoir that combines the personal and political to devastating effect.

About this title

From the Publisher

A timely and personal perspective on subject matter of current international interest. Raja Shehadeh was born in, and still lives and practices law in, Ramallah on the West Bank. STRANGERS IN THE HOUSE reveals the personal experience of daily life for the Palestinians who have chosen to stay in the occupied territories. It allows a human face to appear in the midst of the barrage of violent reports we hear daily on the radio and read in the newspaper.

From the Author

In terms of the current situation, I approach it from my own experience with no pretence of being a Palestinian spokesman. I had an on-going debate with my father that I write about in the book regarding the value of the human rights struggle. He believed in political action as the only effective action that can lead to any real results. I argued the importance of the human rights struggle. In 1985 I toured the US talking about the violations of human rights in the Occupied Territories and the illegal building of settlements. Now sixteen years later I will be coming back to the US to speak about a much-changed reality. The human rights voices have been muted—mine and others. Now violence speaks. Has the human rights struggle been futile or ineffective, as father had predicted? Is the violence espoused by the young a response to the failure of the human rights struggle—violence as opposed to non-violence? Had the supporters of human rights been more determined in ! their struggle to stop Israeli violations and the building of Israeli settlements would we in the Middle East—would the world—be where it is now? Would the voice of those committing violent actions be as prominent as it is today? I hope that this book will help bring these issues and questions to the forefront of the international dialogue.

Edition details

• Publisher: Profile Books
• Publication date: 2009
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1846682509
• ISBN 13: 9781846682506
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 240