Region | Palestinian Territories
'We fled the massacres'
Among the six million Palestinian refugees scattered around the world, there are 1.7 million refugees living in 10 camps in Jordan, according to the UN relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA).
- By Khitam Al Amir, Senior Translator
- Published: 00:41 May 14, 2008
- Jameela Abu Sammour, 78, was only 17 years old and a newlywed in her first pregnancy at the time of the Nakba. She believes that she will not survive to see Palestine again, but is confident that either her sons or grandchildren will see it.
- Image Credit: Supplied Picture
Among the six million Palestinian refugees scattered around the world, there are 1.7 million refugees living in 10 camps in Jordan, according to the UN relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA).
Jordan received the largest number of Palestinians during the two Arab-Israeli wars of 1948 and 1967, and that Palestinian refugees in Jordan represent the largest percentage of the total number of refuges registered with the UNRWA.
Despite 60 years of dispossession, Palestinian refugees in Jordan still depend on the oral history as an instrument for preserving the Palestinian collective memory and national identity.
Jameela Abu Sammour, 78, speaks about the Nakba with tearful eyes as if it just happened. She was only 17 years old and a newlywed in her first pregnancy.
She hoped that she would give birth to her sons and daughters in their homeland to be raised up and grown in the lands of their parents and grandparents.
Her family and husband were living in the village of Fallujah, where an Egyptian brigade led by the late Jamal Abdul Nasser, who was a young army officer that time, fought bravely.
After the shameful defeat of Arab troops in 1948, Jameela recalls her husband asking her to collect some clothes and necessary items in order to leave the village.
"I refused and told him I wanted to die here; I did not want to leave my land, but he forced me to get in a big truck to leave for the West Bank City of Nablus," Jameela said.
Before continuing her story, she sighs and said: "This was the first Nakba, but the 1967 war marked another Nakba, because we fled our temporary destination in Nablus to Jordan.
Jameela had to work as a tailor to feed her children after her husband died. Now her daughters became grandmothers and her sons became fathers.
Today, she spends hours before TV channels in Amman watching the latest news about Palestine, especially the siege in Gaza.
She believes that she will not survive to see Palestine again, but she is confident that either her sons or grandchildren will see it.
Fatima Hassan Abu Warda, 72, is from Beer Sheeba, south of Palestine, where she was living with her family in peace.
"We heard of the massacres against Palestinian villagers, and this prompted my parents and others to flee our homes, fearing for our lives".
After the Nakba, she settled in Jordan, and had to skip education only to be married several years later.
Now, she is a mother of four sons and three daughters, who are living in different parts of the world.
"I devoted my life to bringing up my children and cultivating patriotic feelings in them to preserve the Palestinian national identity.
Fatima praises Palestinian women's role in preserving the national identity and supporting the national movement to keep the Palestine cause alive in younger generations.
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