The Palestine Working Group hosts a lecture by Atef Abu Saif, Simone Veil Fellow at the Robert Schuman Centre.
The lecture will focus on the damage done to the cultural heritage in the Gaza Strip during the Israeli ongoing war. Museums, archeological and excavation sites, archival centers, libraries, hundred years old buildings, world heritage registered places were bombed and damaged. In addition, the lecture will highlight the destruction of cultural centers, theater houses and cinemas, sculptures, art galleries, exhibition halls and studios.
While the whole city was destroyed, the destruction to the cultural heritage was done in the first months. The war against memory is another war that Israel is launching since the Nakba in which Palestinian history and narrative were targeted to demolish all references to Palestinian presence in the region. What can be named cultural genocide has been implemented in parallel with demolishing the place and its inhabitants.
About the speaker:
Atef Abu Saif is a Simone Veil Fellow at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies. He has previously served as the minister of Culture for the Palestinian Authority. During the initial three months of the current Israeli war on Gaza, Abu Saif wrote a daily account of his life in Gaza in the war in which he lost many of his family members. This account was published under the English title, Don’t look left: a genocide diary .
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