Palestine Diary

After the British occupation of Jerusalem in December 1917, the newly appointed governor Ronald Storrs met with the Spanish consul Conde de Ballobar. Over a glass of wine, the two men discussed politics and the future of Palestine. Storrs later reported in his extremely popular memoir, that Ballobar wrote a diary which according to him was not going to be published in his lifetime. It took several decades before the diary was in fact published in 1996 in Spanish. In this book, Roberto Mazza introduces the reader to the diary of Ballobar, available in English here for the first time, and provides a comprehensive historical background for readers in search of a fresh perspective on late Ottoman Jerusalem. In the autumn of 1914, Antonio de la Cierva y Lewita, better known as Conde de Ballobar, was sent to Jerusalem to take charge of the Spanish consulate in the city. He found himself at the centre of the socio-political life in Jerusalem and began to record events, experiences and opinions in a diary that has become an invaluable resource. The diary provides unique insight into late Ottoman Jerusalem - and the upheavals of wartime life in the city - and includes a detailed account of the battle amongst the local churches over control of the city's holy places. Also touching upon the development of Zionism and the establishment of British rule, Ballobar writes as a privileged observer of an exceptionally complex historical period. Jerusalem in World War I offers a precious record of events and insights on episodes and people often neglected due to a lack of original source material. Ballobar presents a vivid picture of a lively and dynamic city, making it unavoidable to draw parallels with the contemporary conflict and divisions. This book will be essential reading for students and scholars of the late-Ottoman Empire and World War I in the Middle East.

Writing in his late teens and early twenties, S\am\i cAmr gave his diary an apt subtitle: The Battle of Life, encapsulating both the political climate of Palestine in the waning years of the British Mandate as well as the contrasting joys and troubles of family life. Now translated from the Arabic, S\am\i’s diary represents a rare artifact of turbulent change in the Middle East. Written over four years, these ruminations of a young man from Hebron brim with revelations about daily life against a backdrop of tremendous transition. Describing the public and the private, the modern and the traditional, S\am\i muses on relationships, his station in life, and other universal experiences while sharing numerous details about a pivotal moment in Palestine’s modern history. Making these never-before-published reflections available in translation, Kimberly Katz also provides illuminating context for S\am\i’s words, laying out biographical details of S\am\i, who kept his diary private for close to sixty years. One of a limited number of Palestinian diaries available to English-language readers, the diary of S\am\i cAmr bridges significant chasms in our understanding of Middle Eastern, and particularly Palestinian, history.

Making these never-before-seen reflections available to all readers, the diary of Sami Amr bridges significant chasms in our understanding of Middle East history."--BOOK JACKET.

The first part of this book provides an insight into a privileged life in Kresy (Eastern Borderlands of pre-war Poland) and the fate of its deported inhabitants, including Irena (the author's mother) at the time of the Second World War. This is an attempt to show how historical events shape, distort and sometimes destroy individual human lives. The second and main part of the book contains Irena's diaries from Palestine, written over a period of four years. In her frequent diary entries she tries to make sense of life events, of growing up in the exotic but alien environment of a military boarding school for girls in Nazareth, separated from her parents, who were involved in the war effort against Nazi Germany. These diaries offer a remarkable insight into a bygone era of life inside and outside a unique military school, in a country where different nations, Arabs, Jews, English and Polish, coexisted peacefully under the hot Palestinian sun.