Masked gunmen with al-Aqsa Brigades prepare for a 21-gun salute at the funeral of Palestinian prisoner Maysara Abu Hamdiyeh in Hebron on Thursday, April 4, 2013. (Photo: Allison Deger/Mondoweiss)
Without broadcasting defeat, Palestinian armed resistance in the West Bank ended as a tactic a decade ago, but as an aesthetic it is in overdrive. It is used by virtually all Palestinian political parties, including Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah that has renounced and outright suppressed stone-throwing against the Israeli authorities. The contradiction between the presentation of force and a policy against it was no clearer than last week at the Hebron funeral of Maysara Abu Hamdiyeh, a Palestinian prisoner who died of esophageal cancer while in Israeli detention. While one reading of the gunshots fired that day suggest a warning to the Israelis, the intended audience was more likely another faction of the same political party.
Abu Hamdiyeh’s funeral procession was stamped closed by a 21-gun salute from al-Aqsa Brigades, Fatah’s armed wing. Even more, a dozen unmasked Palestinian Authority (PA) police (also aligned with Fatah) gave a separate weaponized hail to the late prisoner.
Procession for Maysara Abu Hamdiyeh, Hebron.
Palestinian Authority police transport Maysara Abu Hamdiyeh to Hebron’s Martyr’s Cemetary.
Maysara Abu Hamdiyeh.
Al-Aqsa Brigades during Maysara Abu Hamdiyeh’s funeral procession, Hebron.
Abu Hamdiyeh was rumored to have been a fighter in the second Intifada, a legacy that was fought over by attendees. At the funeral a group of Hamas supporters wearing green baseball caps for the party chanted that the shaheed, or martyr, was one of their own. But shortly after the cheering started others gathered and scolded them in Arabic. The second group said that Abu Hamdiyeh is a “Palestinian martyr, not a Hamas martyr.” The tension over defining Abu Hamdiyeh’s legacy was palpable throughout the day. Perhaps it is because when violent resistance is reduced to a symbol, owning that symbol is a sort of status—like firing a gun into the air and pausing for journalists’ cameras.
Clashes before the funeral of Maysara Abu Hamdiyeh, downtown Hebron.
A short 15-minute walk from the burial site, clashes between Palestinian youth and Israeli soldiers went on for hours. In the end the gunmen never supported the stone-throwing youth. And no one, including the handful of Israeli border police who faced off with the youth, seemed to expect them to join. In fact the clashes appeared to almost be a separate event, reflecting the constant tension in Hebron rather than the community seeking revenge for Abu Hamdiyeh’s death.
Today in the West Bank guns are more often than not ornamentation, and violent resistance has been mildly replaced by popular resistance. The ammunition is merely things that are found on the ground. Still the image of a man with a gun is not forgotten.
Drawing even deeper into the aesthetics of resistance while not engaging in it, in January Fatah celebrated its 48th anniversary in Ramallah by decorating the event stage with images of violent resistance. A slide show of fighters and an armed Yasser Arafat looped in the background as musicians performed national songs. At that time even the acrimonious relationship between Fatah and Hamas eased. That same month the PA allowed a Hamas anniversary celebration to take place in the West Bank and a Fatah anniversary was scheduled for the Gaza Strip.
Clashes following Maysara Abu Hamdiyeh’s funeral, downtown Hebron.
Yet it is unlikely that a call to arms will come from those who most revere arms–at least certainly not from the current political leadership. Months ago Abbas publicly stated that his party will no longer be engaging in violent resistance, only diplomatic measures. And in the past few years Fatah has done just that—lobbying the United Nations for recognition and using force to push back Palestinian stone-throwers from getting close enough to actually have one of those rocks hit a soldier.
So while violent resistance proves to still be the cannon for displaying power, it is more or less a show for rival political parties rather than the Israelis. It is but a mainstream symbol for who is on top, and Abu Hamdiyeh’s funeral conveyed that while the PA’s brand of Fatah may have won over the international community, al-Aqsa Brigades has an arsenal of support.
All photographs are by the author.
I dont really get the point of this article, or what you are trying to convey, would a 21 stone salute be better?
“and violent resistance has been mildly replaced by popular resistance.” do you really think that mild is the right word here, when any resistance is often met with extreme violence by the state, wouldn’t the adverb heroically, be more appropriate? why there is almost a hint of contempt in the way you phrase this which i am sure is unintentional.
I doubt small arms cause much consternation to Israeli’s who have some guns too, i think, which they tend to use in confronting situations of “mild” resistance, as well as other more destructive materiel.
perhaps a 21 suicide vest salute would be the thing.
“In fact the clashes appeared to almost be a separate event, reflecting the constant tension in Hebron rather than the community seeking revenge for Abu Hamdiyeh’s death.”
You really think the purpose of the stone throwing youths could have been to “seek revenge”, even though of course you dont but while we are on the subject “revenge” is worth mentioning, for Hamdiyeh, Hamd is a lovely word, it could have been to honour him or as you say its a bit tense in Al-Khalil these days.
“Drawing even deeper into the aesthetics of resistance while not engaging in it,”
“lobbying the United Nations for recognition” and a few other things so ably recorded by your commenter Hostage, these are not resistance? are you sure you have not been seduced by the romance of the Gun, that now even mild institutional resistance doesn’t register with you? and that you are not here one “who most revere(s) arms”, do people who are regularly shot down “revere” arms?
“in January Fatah celebrated its 48th anniversary in Ramallah by decorating the event stage with images of violent resistance. A slide show of fighters and an armed Yasser Arafat looped in the background as musicians performed national songs.”
Its their history
“So while violent resistance proves to still be the cannon for displaying power”
again its their history and a record of heroic resistance against enormous odds. A display of power? really.
ah but like the simple Amerindians or hubristic savages everywhere its all power, revenge, mutual chest thumping and er “mildness”, i know they are so, well, disappointing
i think we should send in the Gurkhas under a Havildar Major,
should sort this thing out. Wait are those drums i can hear, “Yes Bwana, they say, You should spend less time wondering about stereotypical irrelevancies”
“Right Ahmadu, break out the Enfields”
As a symbolic metaphor of strong protest, wouldn’t it be more effective for the Palestinians to ditch the AK rifles, shave the beards, drop the towels, and stand with slingshots drawn and aimed?
RE: “Without broadcasting defeat, Palestinian armed resistance in the West Bank ended as a tactic a decade ago, but as an aesthetic it is in overdrive.” ~ Allison Deger
MY COMMENT: Flobots’ concept of the “white flag warrior” is a much better aesthetic.
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● Flobots: “White Flag Warrior” featuring Tim McIlrath [VIDEO, 03:41] – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lsgbb23z27w
What a tragic, tragic indictment. The Palestinians renounce the violence of throwing rocks while the ISrealites continue to bomb them, fire at them with tanks, drop depleted uranium and white phosphorus on them. There’s a lot to be said here about peaceful resistance and brutish force. That is, of course, depending on which side is doing what as we are constantly told what a menace and a threat to jewish sovereignty those damn Palestinian kids and their rocks of mass destruction are.
I’m a survivor of israel’s operation ‘Grapes of Wrath’. Until then, I did not believe in violent resistance and ever since then, I most certainly do.