History is a reasoned, evidence-based reconstruction of the past, and is read and shared by everyone. Memory, on the other hand, is experiential and deeply personal. This is certainly true for most historical traumas, and for the Nakba generation, the abrupt loss of Palestine was so disorientating and intense that it lost much of its historical context. Memory became history and, as such, the Nakba became everyone’s personal story. To my grandfather, the political and historical complexities of the Nakba were secondary to the deep sense of betrayal he felt. First by the British, who “handed Pa…

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