It was the British who paved the way for the Nakba, the bloody founding of the state of Israel marked by the massacre and mass expulsion of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homeland.
In A National Monument, which opens on Thursday at Dar el-Nimer for Arts and Culture in Beirut, a series of beautiful, hand-drawn maps made during the final years of British Mandate foreshadow the tragic events of 1948 and the decades of conflict to follow.
Visualising Palestine, a non-profit organisation established in 2012 to use data to draw attention to the Palestine-Israel conflict, has collaborated with Lebanese artist Marwan Rechmaoui to exhibit a series of two and three-dimensional maps of historical Palestine.
Inside the exhibition
The highlight of the exhibition is a series of 22 carved plywood sculptures by Rechmaoui, each capturing a Palestinian city or town, sanded to a soft sheen. The detail and texture of these sculptures is a way of reclaiming the physicality of a land that has become almost mythical for many Palestinians in the 70 years since the Nakba. "For most of us my age and younger, Palestine is a story or it's an idea or it's a cause or it's a belief, but it's never an earth you stand on. You're not allowed to stand on it," says the artist, who was born in Lebanon in 1964.
Each sculpture is made up of squares of wood based on the grid overlaying a series of beautiful, hand-drawn maps created by the British between 1946 and 1948. Each sculpture is to scale with the maps, so while the smaller towns fit on a single square, Jerusalem covers four. Their positions in the gallery correspond to their geographic locations, creating a scale map of pre-Nakba Palestine that spans the length and breadth of the gallery.
The wooden sculptures are surrounded by a sea of 1,500 dots, representing smaller Palestinian villages from the period. The exhibition's curator, Ahmad Barclay, an architect, visual communicator, product designer and partner with Visualising Palestine, copied these from an overprint on the original maps created by the Israelis in the 1950s to show new settlements, as well as Palestinian villages marked as "destroyed" in Hebrew.
Visitors can walk between the sculptures, peering down at miniature tableaux of historical Palestine, a country that has taken on a symbolic status for many Palestinians living in exile, unable to return. While the maps are remnants of the colonial appropriation of Palestinian land, the sculptures are a tender ode to lost cities, a means of reclaiming what has been stolen.
The inspiration behind the work
“My father’s family is Palestinian. I was born here and I’m Lebanese, but I hear the Palestinian accent at home. It’s very close to me,” says Rechmaoui. “Growing up in a house where you have visitors sleeping on the couch for a few days and then disappearing and then another visitor sleeping on the couch for a few days and then disappearing. For me that’s the Palestinian issue. It’s transitional, always.”
He is fascinated by the symbolism of the grid, which he says represents the British imposition of modernity over Palestine. “It became a step towards colonising the country, but also introducing this way of thinking, which is alien from the local,” he explains. “When you have the grid, you can make the borders of a piece of land, of real estate. Before that, I still remember how my grandparents divided the inheritance of a piece of land. It was oral. It was like, ‘Your property is from this tree to that wall. And then from that wall to the other tree is your brother’s property.’ But if the speaker dies, nobody will know where the property is. So there was this conflict between the scientific approach of the grid and the poetic approach of the oral.”
What to expect
Barclay approached Rechmaoui to create the sculptures as a way of bringing to life a database of maps compiled by Visualising Palestine. Barclay was able to create computer-generated three-dimension models of the landscape by matching the historical maps to topographic information produced by Nasa. Online, the maps have also been geo-referenced to Google maps, so that visitors can contrast historical and contemporary views of the same city, town or region.
The collection, which includes Ottoman, French and English maps dating from 1870 to just before the Nakba, is available online at palopenmaps.org.
Visitors to the exhibition can explore these maps on digital tablets, comparing the historical maps to contemporary Google maps of the same cities and regions. The online database is designed to facilitate collaborations with organisations such as the Palestinian Oral History Archive, due to launch later this year. Barclay hopes that the maps will eventually be linked to photographs and stories from different areas of Palestine.
The curator has also chosen to exhibit prints of the maps that inspired the sculptures, which are beautiful drawings in shades of green, red and orange. “They’re aesthetically very attractive, almost like pieces of art,” Barclay says, “but also it’s this kind of artefact, evidence, from before the Nakba … There’s an element of these maps being an artefact of a process of colonisation. They’re created with the intent of mapping out the territory for the Zionist movement to purchase land, transfer land, to colonise the territory, initially hand-in-hand with the British.”
Learning about the topography of Palestine
Rechmaoui's work as an artist has long betrayed a fascination with space, geography and mapping, from his 2004 work Beirut Caoutchouc, a large rubber floor-mat based on a map of Beirut according to sectarian divisions, to his 2016 work Blazon, an enormous installation made up of 400 flags and 59 shields, conveying the written and oral histories of Beirut's districts as expressed through names, landmarks and figures.
In A National Monument, he has found a way to use the tools by which the British divided and appropriated Palestine – employing maps and grids to divide it up mathematically, as though it was an abstract concept, rather than a physical land, home to thousands of people – to reclaim Palestine as a tactile reality, both on a personal and a public level.
"I'm learning a lot about the topography of Palestine, but by hand, not by eye. I have to touch it all the time, see where the hard parts are, to sand them and make them softer, so I spend my whole day like a blind person going around the topography of the country," he says. "You start feeling the difference between coastal cities and mountainous cities. It's like Braille. And symbolically it's very much like that, because it's a place that you don't see, but you're touching it."
A National Monument is on show at Dar el-Nimer in Beirut until January 26
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Read more:
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How one Palestinian fashion designer gives new life to old clothes
The Palestinian women refugees using Arabian motifs and poetry to create art
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THE SPECS
Engine: 6.75-litre twin-turbocharged V12 petrol engine
Power: 420kW
Torque: 780Nm
Transmission: 8-speed automatic
Price: From Dh1,350,000
On sale: Available for preorder now
The lowdown
Badla
Rating: 2.5/5
Produced by: Red Chillies, Azure Entertainment
Director: Sujoy Ghosh
Cast: Amitabh Bachchan, Taapsee Pannu, Amrita Singh, Tony Luke
Crime%20Wave
%3Cp%3EHeavyweight%20boxer%20Fury%20revealed%20on%20Sunday%20his%20cousin%20had%20been%20%E2%80%9Cstabbed%20in%20the%20neck%E2%80%9D%20and%20called%20on%20the%20courts%20to%20address%20the%20wave%20of%20more%20sentencing%20of%20offenders.%26nbsp%3B%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3ERico%20Burton%2C%2031%2C%20was%20found%20with%20stab%20wounds%20at%20around%203am%20on%20Sunday%20in%20Goose%20Green%2C%20Altrincham%20and%20subsequently%20died%20of%20his%20injuries.%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%26nbsp%3B%E2%80%9CMy%20cousin%20was%20murdered%20last%20night%2C%20stabbed%20in%20the%20neck%20this%20is%20becoming%20ridiculous%20%E2%80%A6%20idiots%20carry%20knives.%20This%20needs%20to%20stop%2C%E2%80%9D%0D%20Fury%20said.%20%E2%80%9CAsap%2C%20UK%20government%20needs%20to%20bring%20higher%20sentencing%20for%20knife%20crime%2C%20it%E2%80%99s%20a%20pandemic%20%26amp%3B%20you%20don%E2%80%99t%20know%20how%20bad%20it%20is%20until%20%5Bit%E2%80%99s%5D%201%20of%20your%20own!%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
MOUNTAINHEAD REVIEW
Starring: Ramy Youssef, Steve Carell, Jason Schwartzman
Director: Jesse Armstrong
Rating: 3.5/5
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
AT%20A%20GLANCE
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EWindfall%3C%2Fstrong%3E%3Cbr%3EAn%20%E2%80%9Cenergy%20profits%20levy%E2%80%9D%20to%20raise%20about%20%C2%A35%20billion%20in%20a%20year.%20The%20temporary%20one-off%20tax%20will%20hit%20oil%20and%20gas%20firms%20by%2025%20per%20cent%20on%20extraordinary%20profits.%20An%2080%20per%20cent%20investment%20allowance%20should%20calm%20Conservative%20nerves%20that%20the%20move%20will%20dent%20North%20Sea%20firms%E2%80%99%20investment%20to%20save%20them%2091p%20for%20every%20%C2%A31%20they%20spend.%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EA%20universal%20grant%3C%2Fstrong%3E%3Cbr%3EEnergy%20bills%20discount%2C%20which%20was%20effectively%20a%20%C2%A3200%20loan%2C%20has%20doubled%20to%20a%20%C2%A3400%20discount%20on%20bills%20for%20all%20households%20from%20October%20that%20will%20not%20need%20to%20be%20paid%20back.%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ETargeted%20measures%3C%2Fstrong%3E%3Cbr%3EMore%20than%20eight%20million%20of%20the%20lowest%20income%20households%20will%20receive%20a%20%C2%A3650%20one-off%20payment.%20It%20will%20apply%20to%20households%20on%20Universal%20Credit%2C%20Tax%20Credits%2C%20Pension%20Credit%20and%20legacy%20benefits.%3Cbr%3ESeparate%20one-off%20payments%20of%20%C2%A3300%20will%20go%20to%20pensioners%20and%20%C2%A3150%20for%20those%20receiving%20disability%20benefits.%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Founders: Ines Mena, Claudia Ribas, Simona Agolini, Nourhan Hassan and Therese Hundt
Date started: January 2017, app launched November 2017
Based: Dubai, UAE
Sector: Private/Retail/Leisure
Number of Employees: 18 employees, including full-time and flexible workers
Funding stage and size: Seed round completed Q4 2019 - $1m raised
Funders: Oman Technology Fund, 500 Startups, Vision Ventures, Seedstars, Mindshift Capital, Delta Partners Ventures, with support from the OQAL Angel Investor Network and UAE Business Angels
How to apply for a drone permit
- Individuals must register on UAE Drone app or website using their UAE Pass
- Add all their personal details, including name, nationality, passport number, Emiratis ID, email and phone number
- Upload the training certificate from a centre accredited by the GCAA
- Submit their request
What are the regulations?
- Fly it within visual line of sight
- Never over populated areas
- Ensure maximum flying height of 400 feet (122 metres) above ground level is not crossed
- Users must avoid flying over restricted areas listed on the UAE Drone app
- Only fly the drone during the day, and never at night
- Should have a live feed of the drone flight
- Drones must weigh 5 kg or less
HIJRA
Starring: Lamar Faden, Khairiah Nathmy, Nawaf Al-Dhufairy
Director: Shahad Ameen
Rating: 3/5
'The Ice Road'
Director: Jonathan Hensleigh
Stars: Liam Neeson, Amber Midthunder, Laurence Fishburne
2/5
The Penguin
Starring: Colin Farrell, Cristin Milioti, Rhenzy Feliz
Creator: Lauren LeFranc
Rating: 4/5
Labour dispute
The insured employee may still file an ILOE claim even if a labour dispute is ongoing post termination, but the insurer may suspend or reject payment, until the courts resolve the dispute, especially if the reason for termination is contested. The outcome of the labour court proceedings can directly affect eligibility.
- Abdullah Ishnaneh, Partner, BSA Law
The alternatives
• Founded in 2014, Telr is a payment aggregator and gateway with an office in Silicon Oasis. It’s e-commerce entry plan costs Dh349 monthly (plus VAT). QR codes direct customers to an online payment page and merchants can generate payments through messaging apps.
• Business Bay’s Pallapay claims 40,000-plus active merchants who can invoice customers and receive payment by card. Fees range from 1.99 per cent plus Dh1 per transaction depending on payment method and location, such as online or via UAE mobile.
• Tap started in May 2013 in Kuwait, allowing Middle East businesses to bill, accept, receive and make payments online “easier, faster and smoother” via goSell and goCollect. It supports more than 10,000 merchants. Monthly fees range from US$65-100, plus card charges of 2.75-3.75 per cent and Dh1.2 per sale.
• 2checkout’s “all-in-one payment gateway and merchant account” accepts payments in 200-plus markets for 2.4-3.9 per cent, plus a Dh1.2-Dh1.8 currency conversion charge. The US provider processes online shop and mobile transactions and has 17,000-plus active digital commerce users.
• PayPal is probably the best-known online goods payment method - usually used for eBay purchases - but can be used to receive funds, providing everyone’s signed up. Costs from 2.9 per cent plus Dh1.2 per transaction.
GOLF’S RAHMBO
- 5 wins in 22 months as pro
- Three wins in past 10 starts
- 45 pro starts worldwide: 5 wins, 17 top 5s
- Ranked 551th in world on debut, now No 4 (was No 2 earlier this year)
- 5th player in last 30 years to win 3 European Tour and 2 PGA Tour titles before age 24 (Woods, Garcia, McIlroy, Spieth)
The five pillars of Islam
The President's Cake
Director: Hasan Hadi
Starring: Baneen Ahmad Nayyef, Waheed Thabet Khreibat, Sajad Mohamad Qasem
Rating: 4/5
'Ghostbusters: From Beyond'
Director: Jason Reitman
Starring: Paul Rudd, Carrie Coon, Finn Wolfhard, Mckenna Grace
Rating: 2/5
The National's picks
4.35pm: Tilal Al Khalediah
5.10pm: Continous
5.45pm: Raging Torrent
6.20pm: West Acre
7pm: Flood Zone
7.40pm: Straight No Chaser
8.15pm: Romantic Warrior
8.50pm: Calandogan
9.30pm: Forever Young
Dust and sand storms compared
Sand storm
- Particle size: Larger, heavier sand grains
- Visibility: Often dramatic with thick "walls" of sand
- Duration: Short-lived, typically localised
- Travel distance: Limited
- Source: Open desert areas with strong winds
Dust storm
- Particle size: Much finer, lightweight particles
- Visibility: Hazy skies but less intense
- Duration: Can linger for days
- Travel distance: Long-range, up to thousands of kilometres
- Source: Can be carried from distant regions
European arms
Known EU weapons transfers to Ukraine since the war began: Germany 1,000 anti-tank weapons and 500 Stinger surface-to-air missiles. Luxembourg 100 NLAW anti-tank weapons, jeeps and 15 military tents as well as air transport capacity. Belgium 2,000 machine guns, 3,800 tons of fuel. Netherlands 200 Stinger missiles. Poland 100 mortars, 8 drones, Javelin anti-tank weapons, Grot assault rifles, munitions. Slovakia 12,000 pieces of artillery ammunition, 10 million litres of fuel, 2.4 million litres of aviation fuel and 2 Bozena de-mining systems. Estonia Javelin anti-tank weapons. Latvia Stinger surface to air missiles. Czech Republic machine guns, assault rifles, other light weapons and ammunition worth $8.57 million.
LILO & STITCH
Starring: Sydney Elizebeth Agudong, Maia Kealoha, Chris Sanders
Director: Dean Fleischer Camp
Rating: 4.5/5
Ahmed Raza
UAE cricket captain
Age: 31
Born: Sharjah
Role: Left-arm spinner
One-day internationals: 31 matches, 35 wickets, average 31.4, economy rate 3.95
T20 internationals: 41 matches, 29 wickets, average 30.3, economy rate 6.28
VEZEETA PROFILE
Date started: 2012
Founder: Amir Barsoum
Based: Dubai, UAE
Sector: HealthTech / MedTech
Size: 300 employees
Funding: $22.6 million (as of September 2018)
Investors: Technology Development Fund, Silicon Badia, Beco Capital, Vostok New Ventures, Endeavour Catalyst, Crescent Enterprises’ CE-Ventures, Saudi Technology Ventures and IFC
White hydrogen: Naturally occurring hydrogen
Chromite: Hard, metallic mineral containing iron oxide and chromium oxide
Ultramafic rocks: Dark-coloured rocks rich in magnesium or iron with very low silica content
Ophiolite: A section of the earth’s crust, which is oceanic in nature that has since been uplifted and exposed on land
Olivine: A commonly occurring magnesium iron silicate mineral that derives its name for its olive-green yellow-green colour
Griselda
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