The Tunis Years 1982–1994

Two literary groups shaped Palestinian literary history during the Tunis period. One group includes Palestinian literary figures who moved from Beirut to Tunis before the PLO’s relocation, for example the writer Tawfīq Fayyāḍ and the literary scholar Rītā ʿAwaḍ. The second group includes those who moved to Tunis with the PLO: Maḥmūd Darwīsh, Liyānah Badr, Aḥmad Daḥbūr, Muʿīn Bsīsū, Rashād Abū Shāwar, and Yaḥyā Yakhluf. A sub-group of those who moved to Tunis were non-Palestinians affiliated to the PLO, such as the Syrian poet and writer Hādī Dānyāl.¹¹ The interactive timeline in Figure 1 illustrates the residence events of literary figures during the Tunis period.

View Full Size

Screenshot of an interactive timeline showing Palestinian and affiliated non-Palestinian literary figures who were based in Tunis in the 1980s and 1990s. Access link: https://palread.geschkult.fu-berlin.de/view/79

Citation: Journal of Arabic Literature 55, 4 (2024) ; 10.1163/1570064x-12341519

Source: The PalREAD Project

• Download Figure
• Download figure as PowerPoint slide

The three literary figures that stand out in the new Tunisian context are those who made Tunis their home and stayed beyond the PLO’s departure in 1994, namely Rītā ʿAwaḍ, Tawfīq Fayyāḍ and Hādī Dānyāl. ʿAwaḍ is a literary figure who actively shaped the Palestinian cultural sphere in Tunis through institutional initiatives. A literary scholar of Palestinian origin, she relocated to Tunis from Beirut in 1979. She developed close contacts with Palestinian literary figures in Tunis, including Darwīsh and Fayyāḍ. As the director of the cultural division at the Tunis headquarters of the Arab League Educational, Cultural and Scientific Organization (ALECSO), she initiated and edited several volumes relating to Palestinian cultural heritage,¹² and actively promoted the nomination of Jerusalem as the 2009 Arab Capital of Culture. Her activities also spanned other Maghrebi countries, including collaborations with the Moroccan poet, Muḥammad Bennīs, in organizing literary events such as the Writers’ Conference in Casablanca in 1985.¹³ Tawfīq Fayyāḍ moved to Tunis in 1980, prior to the PLO’s relocation. Upon his arrival in Tunis, he developed close relationships with Tunisian writers, including Tunisia’s most renowned resistance poet, Muḥammad al-Saghīr Awlād Aḥmad. While Fayyāḍ already knew many of the literary figures who eventually relocated from Beirut to Tunis, he was particularly close to Darwīsh given their shared youth in Haifa.¹⁴

As a non-Palestinian, Dānyāl’s move to Tunis with the PLO is a tale that encapsulates a moment in history when the Palestinian Revolution attracted poets, writers and intellectuals from all parts of the globe. At a young age, Dānyāl fled Damascus to Beirut to join the PLO and the Palestinian Revolution. He eventually became the director of the Palestinian radio station (Idhāʿat Filasṭīn), which continued to operate during the siege of Beirut in 1982. Fleeing Beirut with the PLO cadres, Dānyāl ended up in Tunis where he went on to serve as the general secretary of the General Union for Palestinian Writers and Journalists while Darwīsh was its president. Between 1982–1987, Dānyāl was the Tunisia correspondent for the Beirut-based PLO magazine Filasṭīn al-thawrah. In 1988, he went into exile in Algeria, but was able to return to Tunis that same year.¹⁵ Later, he went into publishing, directing the Tunis-based publishing house Nuqūsh ʿArabiyyah, also known as Arabesques, before founding his own publishing house, Dār Diyār, where he publishes both Tunisian authors such as Muṣṭafā al-Kīlānī and Palestinian poets such as Dārīn Ṭāṭūr.¹⁶ Like Fayyāḍ, Dānyāl maintained a regular presence in Tunis and remains engaged in the Tunisian literary sphere until today.¹⁷

The cases of ʿAwaḍ, Fayyāḍ, and Dānyāl show that due to their extended stays in Tunis, they were able to forge deeper links with the Tunisian literary sphere, a sphere that was, for various political reasons, rather inaccessible for the majority of Palestinian literary figures. These figures would interact with both sides, engage in literary events and collaborate on publications that furthered the links between the Palestinian and Tunisian literary spheres. Besides official PLO meetings, such as the writers and journalists union (some of which were held in Tunis), many of the literary figures living in Tunis regularly met in cafés such as Maqhā al-Kawn and Maqhā al-Zunūj, as well as in bookshops such as Le Gai Savoir, and hotels such as the Hotel International.¹⁸ In Hotel Salwa, for example, a poetry wall was created featuring the works of Palestinian poets upon their arrival in Tunis.¹⁹ In addition to events and initiatives organized by ʿAwaḍ through ALECSO, this period also saw Tunisian initiatives to organize events around Palestine. In 1989, a Tunisian cultural symposium on the intifāḍah took place in Tunis, bringing together both ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ Palestinian literary figures such as Samīḥ al-Qāsim, who traveled from Haifa, and Yaḥyā Yakhluf who was already in Tunis.²⁰ Another example is the 1991 Tunisian film titled “Waqāʾiʿ al-layālī al-mushammasah,” dedicated to exploring Fayyāḍ’s life and his relationship to the intifāḍah.²¹

Tunisian Literary Periodicals

Despite the presence of important literary figures, a survey of Tunisian literary periodicals reveals only a small increase in interest and engagement with Palestinian literature during the Tunis period. It becomes clear that Palestinian presence in Tunis did not translate into an immediate but rather a delayed impact on the Tunisian literary sphere, featuring more contributions on Palestinian literature after the PLO’s departure from Tunis in 1994. In accordance with conditions imposed by their Tunisian hosts, the PLO adopted a strict policy to prevent Palestinian involvement in the local Tunisian context. This included the active limiting of opportunities for Palestinian-Tunisian literary exchanges, preventing Palestinian literary figures from participating in local Tunisian literary activities, festivals, and events.²² These restrictive policies were a direct result of the tragic events of the Lebanese civil war where the PLO was accused of meddling with local Lebanese politics. Additionally, the cultural and political devastation suffered in Beirut meant that only a diminished version of the PLO was able to relocate to Tunis, lacking the cultural infrastructure and personnel to re-build a new and dynamic literary sphere. PLO and Tunisian policies clearly took a toll on both Palestinian and Tunisian literary figures and led to Palestinians in Tunis being isolated.

An in-depth content analysis of the issues of two renowned Tunisian literary periodicals whose lifespans fall directly within the Tunis period, Al-Ḥayāt al-thaqāfiyyah and Al-Masār, was carried out. Al-Ḥayāt al-thaqāfiyyah was founded in 1975 by the then Tunisian Minister of Cultural Affairs, Maḥmūd al-Masʿadī, and continues to be published monthly by the ministry until today. Al-Masār, on the other hand, was published by the Tunisian Writers Union between 1988 and 2011. Although Al-Ḥayāt al-thaqāfiyyah’s mandate, as defined in its very first editorial, is to represent Tunisian literary and cultural expression and its evolution since the Tunisian independence,²³ several of the literary figures who relocated to Tunis contributed to it during this period. Up until 2014, Al-Ḥayāt al-thaqāfiyyah published twenty-three contributions on Palestinian literary topics, the majority of which were published after 2001, well after the PLO’s departure from Tunis.²⁴ During the Tunis period, only two articles were published that touch on Palestinian literary topics, including a 1985 interview with the Damascus-based Palestinian writer and artist ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Muzayyin,²⁵ and a literary study published in 1986 comparing Imīl Ḥabībī’s novel The Pessoptimist to Voltaire’s Candide.²⁶

Although outside the scope of the Tunis period, two years in particular saw increased contributions on Palestinian literary topics in Al-Ḥayāt al-thaqāfiyyah. The year 2008, which marked the death of Maḥmūd Darwīsh, and 2009, which coincided with the declaration of Jerusalem as the Arab Capital of Culture.²⁷ In addition, literary figures who remained in Tunis, namely Tawfīq Fayyāḍ and Hādī Dānyāl, eventually managed to publish original literary works in Al-Ḥayāt al-thaqāfiyyah,²⁸ while other Palestinian literary figures were featured mainly as the subjects of literary studies. Although Darwīsh was not a contributor to Al-Ḥayāt al-thaqāfiyyah, during the post-Tunis period his works received more attention than any other Palestinian literary figure, with numerous articles discussing and analyzing his poetry.²⁹

Meanwhile, Al-Masār, given its mandate to support literary and cultural progress in Tunisia and thereby taking a less conservative approach in comparison with Al-Ḥayāt al-thaqāfiyyah,³⁰ was more open to including Palestinian literature during the Tunis period. Of a total of nineteen articles published in Al-Masār on Palestinian literary topics, seven were published during the Tunis period, a relatively higher number than the two articles published by Al-Ḥayāt al-thaqāfiyyah in the same period. These included original poetry contributions by Hādī Dānyāl and Samīḥ al-Qāsim, a 1992 interview with al-Qāsim, and a literary study comparing two of Darwīsh’s poetry collections.³¹ In the post-Tunis period we noticed a wider engagement with Palestinian literature, including a posthumously published interview with Maḥmūd Darwīsh;³² a farewell to Imīl Ḥabībī;³³ a literary study of Rashād Abū Shāwar’s Beirut memoirs;³⁴ a study of the Palestinian novel,³⁵ and a literary analysis of Darwīsh’s poetry collection Limādhā tarakt al-ḥiṣān wahīdan (Why Did You Leave the Horse Alone) (1995).³⁶

A unique feature traced in Al-Masār are the contributions of Arab writers on Palestinian literature, such as an elegy by the Tunisian poet Sāmiyah ʿAmmār Buʿattūr dedicated to the Palestinian poet Fadwā Tūqān,³⁷ and a study of resistance literature by the Egyptian writer ʿAbdallah Abū Hayf.³⁸ Al-Masār also saw Palestinian contributions on North African literature, such as the comparative literary study by the Palestinian writer from Syria, Niʿmah Khālid, on the works of Tunisian, Algerian, and Syrian women authors.³⁹ Ultimately, both Al-Masār and Al-Ḥayāt al-thaqāfiyyah demonstrate a continuous engagement and interest in Palestinian literature with peaks at crucial moments in Palestinian (literary) history that span the Tunis period and beyond.

Other Tunis periodicals that precede, fall partially within, or slightly after the Tunis period were also surveyed for their engagement with Palestinian literature. In Al-Fikr, for example, published between 1955 and 1986 co-founded by al-Bashīr Bin Slāmah and Muḥammad Mzallī (both of whom later pursued political careers as ministers),⁴⁰ five contributions relating to Palestinian literature were identified, two of which were published during the Tunis period. In 1984, the Palestinian poet and literary scholar Salmā al-Khaḍrāʾ al-Jayyūsī contributed an article on the Tunisian national resistance poet Abū Qāsim al-Shābbī.⁴¹ This was in fact al-Jayyūsī’s second article on al-Shābbī in Al-Fikr, the first appearing in 1975.⁴² The second article, published in 1985, is a contribution by Tunisian writer Musṭafā al-Fārisī honoring the passing of the Tunis-based Palestinian poet Muʿīn Bsīsū.⁴³ Earlier articles appearing in Al-Fikr feature two Palestinian contributions on different aspects of modern Arabic literature, including a 1961 study by Jabrā Ibrahīm Jabrā, the well-known Palestinian writer based in Baghdad, and a 1977 literary analysis by al-Jayyūsī.⁴⁴ In the pre-Tunis period context, it is likely that al-Jayyūsī had already developed close links in the North African literary sphere while living in Algeria, where she taught at the University of Algiers between 1973 and 1975.

A second journal, Qaṣaṣ, is also illustrative of Tunisian engagement with Palestinian literature. Founded in 1966 by the Tunisian writer Muḥammad al-ʿArūsi al-Maṭwī, who later became the editor-in-chief of Al-Masār, it can be considered a precursor to Al-Masār. Qaṣaṣ was published until 2009 with a focus on Tunisian literary themes and topics,⁴⁵ but also published three contributions relating to Palestinian literature during the Tunis period. The first article, published in 1988, is a literary study of Ghassān Kanafānī’s novella Rijāl fī al-shams (Men in the Sun) (1963).⁴⁶ In 1993, Qaṣaṣ published a short story by an Egyptian writer featuring a Palestinian female protagonist.⁴⁷ And finally, in 1994, Qaṣaṣ featured a book review contributed by Syria-based Palestinian writer Niʿmah Khālid, who later became a contributor to Al-Masār.⁴⁸

While the distance from the local Tunis literary context is evident in the surveys presented above, the interest in Palestinian literature seeps through the pages of Tunisian periodicals despite restrictive and isolationist policies. In particular, a sustained interest in the figure and works of Maḥmūd Darwīsh is evident throughout and after the Tunis period. Although he did not contribute any of his own poetry or prose to the Tunisian periodicals surveyed in this article, Darwīsh is positioned as a transnational Arab poet whose works garnered increased interest and held widespread appeal across the board. Further buttressing Darwīsh’s transnational persona, in 2007 he was invited back to Tunis as part of the annual Carthage Theatre Festival to receive the prestigious Tunisian literary prize, the November 7 Creativity Award, which was presented to him by the Tunisian president.⁴⁹ Overall, Palestinian literature as a topic and Palestinian writers as contributors received a voice in the Tunisian periodicals analyzed. However, the most perceptible impact of the Palestinian presence in Tunis reveals itself after the end of the Tunis period through the sustained and growing engagement with Palestinian literature in Tunisian periodicals. The Tunisian periodicals surveyed reflect the reality of a restricted and isolated Palestinian literacy presence in Tunis, compounded by the diminished cultural capacities of the PLO. Quite telling is the fact that many of these periodicals revealed a delayed impact, showing an increased engagement with Palestinian literature after the departure of the PLO from Tunis in 1994. Literary figures who remained in Tunis had a more perceptible impact on the Tunisian literary scene, contributing original literary works to Tunisian periodicals, publishing studies on Tunisian literature, organizing cultural events related to Palestinian literature, and establishing publishing houses that publish the works of Tunisian, Palestinian and other Arab writers.

PLO Periodicals in Tunis

Tunisian periodicals provide only a partial view of the Palestinian literary sphere during this period. Although on a much smaller scale than during the preceding Beirut period, the PLO published and issued a limited number of periodicals during the Tunis period. Whereas sparse, short-lived, and relatively isolated, PLO periodicals published in Tunis reached outwards to mobilize solidarity with the Palestinian cause, and inwards to bridge the literary gaps between Palestinian literature ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ in exile.

Different from the Tunisian periodicals surveyed which show a clear focus on societal and cultural issues, the PLO’s Tunis periodicals combined the political with the literary and cultural. The two Arabic-language periodicals edited directly by the PLO that we were able to access, Al-Ṣadāqah and Bayādir, will be mentioned briefly, before looking at the trilingual and transnationally edited Lotus magazine in more detail. Al-Ṣadāqah, a cultural quarterly, was founded in Tunis by Maḥmūd Abbās and Muḥammad Ismāʿīl in 1986. Its subtitle refers to the Union of Palestinian Friendship with Other Peoples (“Majallah faṣliyyah yaṣduruhā ittiḥād jamʿiyyāt al-ṣadāqati al-falasṭīniyyah maʿa al-shuʿūb”) as its publisher, thus underlining the thematic connection to international solidarity with Palestine. Al-Ṣadāqah published limited literary content. The few literary articles were contributed mainly by Tunis-based literary figures such as Yaḥyā Yakhluf, with a focus on exploring literary and political themes, particularly the impact of the occupation and the intifāḍah on Palestinian literature.⁵⁰

Bayādir, on the other hand, was founded in 1990 as a quarterly magazine published by the PLO’s cultural division in Tunis.⁵¹ Bayādir’s editor, ʿAbdallah al-Ḥūrānī, was formerly the director of the PLO media department in Beirut, later founding the PLO’s cultural department in Tunis in 1984. The editorial team included other Tunis-based literary figures: Aḥmad Daḥbūr, Ghassān Zaqtān, and Jamāl al-Afghānī. Despite its removed Tunis location, the stated mission of the periodical was to reconnect Palestinian writers in exile with those ‘inside’.⁵² Hence, the editor notes, the first issue is dedicated to Palestinian writers, including those ‘inside’ such as Samīḥ al-Qāsim, Ismāīʾl Shammūṭ and Fadwā Tūqān, as well as exiled writers in Tunis or elsewhere such as Aḥmad Daḥbūr.⁵³ In its first editorial, Bayādir engages with the role of the (Palestinian) intellectual and writer, particularly during and after the intifāḍah.⁵⁴ Articles in later issues include a sprinkling of literary contributions by the editors, Zaqtān and al-Afghānī and poetry by Darwīsh and Rashād Abū Shāwar.⁵⁵ In Bayādir we notice the names of two key Moroccan literary figures, Muḥammad Bennīs and Muḥammad Barrādah, who become regular contributors to the transnational Palestinian literary sphere.⁵⁶

Content analysis of the two Tunis-founded PLO periodicals reveals different missions. Al-Ṣadāqah looked outwards, holding a more leftist internationalist view that sought to buttress support for the Palestinian people across solidarity networks. Bayādir, on the other hand, looked inwards, in an attempt to heal the fractures of the scattered and fragmented Palestinian literary sphere by bridging the gaps between ‘inside’ and ‘outside’.

Lotus, the trilingual periodical published by the Afro-Asian Writers Association (AAWA), also bridged these gaps, providing rare opportunities for Palestinian-Tunisian collaboration through its open contribution policies and editorial makeup. In comparison with Al-Ṣadāqah and Bayādir, Lotus covered a much more expansive literary geography in its reach, content, editorial makeup, and contributors, positioning itself beyond the boundaries of any single nation-state. Lotus, published under the auspices of the PLO in Tunis between 1983 and 1991, was the only literary periodical to move with the PLO from Beirut to Tunis. Its previous two locations, Cairo (1968–1978) and Beirut (1978–1982), saw the periodical at its prime production years and remain the cities that Lotus is most strongly associated with.⁵⁷ Nonetheless, Lotus’ Tunis years are crucial in the context of this article, providing unique insights into the transnational Palestinian literary sphere during this period. In this sense, Lotus was an exception in its tricontinental reach, wide ranging audience, leftist internationalist outlook, and dedication to publishing Palestinian literature.

Following the assassination of Lotus’ Egyptian editor, Yūsif al-Sibāʿī, in 1978, the periodical moved to Beirut where the PLO oversaw it, offering the editing team refuge and being involved in contributing and editing it through individual key Palestinian writers.⁵⁸ In Beirut, Pakistani poet Faiz Ahmed Faiz took over as the editor-in-chief, bringing Maḥmūd Darwīsh on board as the editor of the Arabic edition.⁵⁹ Faiz continued in this role during the transition to Tunis, this time bringing to his side another Palestinian poet, Muʿīn Bsīsū as deputy editor-in-chief. According to reports and meeting minutes published in Lotus, Bsīsū was also part of the decision-making process that led to the relocation of the periodical to Tunis.⁶⁰ Lotus became one of the few avenues for Palestinian-Tunisian literary collaborations. This is apparent in Lotus’s editorial makeup. During Bsīsū’s and ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ’s editorships, the Tunisian writer and founder of the Tunisian Writers’ Association, Musṭafā al-Fārisī, became deputy editor-in-chief of Lotus.⁶¹ Furthermore, the international network of contributors to Lotus, including Palestinian, Maghrebi, and other leftist Arab literary figures, is unrivaled when compared to local national periodicals. In this sense, Lotus transcended isolated discussions of national literatures.

Given the Palestinian involvement as hosts and editors of Lotus, combined with the periodical’s clearly stated leftist political position of anti-colonial and anti-imperialist struggle, it is no surprise that Lotus saw Palestine as a cornerstone of its editorial mission. This plays out most concretely in the three special issues dedicated to Palestinian literature that Lotus published in the 1980s. The first special issue appeared in 1983. In the opening pages, Faiz and Bsīsū dedicate the issue to “the cause of Palestine and the tragedy of Lebanon.”⁶² They assert that the consequences of the Lebanese civil war are of universal importance: “These dire happenings are a matter of intense concern not only for the Palestinians and the Lebanese, not even for the Arab peoples alone, but for the whole of mankind and the entire present day world.”⁶³ To give the world a glimpse of the “horrific carnage in Beirut and South Lebanon,”⁶⁴ the editors include “some representative writings of Palestinian resistance literature produced during and before the blockade”⁶⁵ along with the reactions of prominent writers from around the world. The editors end their introduction to the issue by highlighting the homelessness of Lotus at that moment before it fully re-located to Tunis: “Lotus magazine has been deprived of its editorial offices in Beirut. Efforts are afoot to decide on a new venue for our editorial establishment.”⁶⁶ During this transitional period, Faiz goes as far as to provide his home address in Lahore and the Headquarters of the Soviet Writers Union in Moscow as forwarding addresses for those interested in contributing to Lotus.⁶⁷

Bsīsū followed the opening statement with an editorial entitled “Afro-Asian Writers on Palestinian Barricades.” In the editorial, Bsīsū explains that it was “on the national barricades of Beirut that arose the concept of creating this Palestinian special issue of Lotus.”⁶⁸ He describes the contributors to the Palestine special issue as a “noble choir formed by the voices of men of letters of different Afro-Asian countries”, and how these “voices of solidarity”⁶⁹ have come together like never before to join Palestine’s national resistance. Ultimately, what Bsīsū seeks to illustrate through the special issue is how the “Palestinian motif has developed into one of the dominant themes inspiring progressive national writers and poets.”⁷⁰ The 1983 special issue featured contributions by several Palestinian and Tunisian literary figures, among them Samīḥ al-Qāsim, Darwīsh, Bsīsū and Tunisian writer Musṭafā al-Fārisī who had contributed the previously mentioned obituary for Bsīsū to Al-Fikr in 1985. It also includes personal memoirs of the Sabra and Shatila massacres written by Alys Faiz, and an opinion piece by the Moroccan writer Muḥammad Barrādah.

Bsīsū’s leading role in Lotus would not last long. He passed away in 1984, and it is to his memory that Lotus dedicated its second Palestine-related special issue.⁷¹ In his piece “In Memory of a Great Palestinian Poet and Fighter,”⁷² Muṣṭafā Haykal, the Egyptian-German historian and writer who edited the 1982 German translation of Bsīsū’s collected works,⁷³ calls him the “poetic messenger of the Palestinian people’s struggle and resistance.”⁷⁴ Darwīsh’s piece, “Mouin Beseisso is not Sitting in an Empty Chair”,⁷⁵ includes extracts republished from the original elegy that appeared in the Beirut-based PLO magazine Filasṭīn al-thawrah. The translated extracts highlight Bsīsū as an enigmatic Gazan, a “citizen without a country, a singer without a song … He knew: this exile will lead him to a new one, another one.”⁷⁶ Yaḥyā Yakhluf in his farewell piece, visualizes the nature of Bsīsū’s poetry as the “debate between poetry and the Kalashnikov” that flares up when “Umm Ali dances in a Sabra tent and your voice raises the spirit, the symphony of life resounding in your words …”⁷⁷ In this Lotus special issue, Bsīsū is held up as the quintessential revolutionary poet.

Between the two special issues, and less than a year after Bsīsū’s death, Faiz passes away leaving an editorial vacuum at Lotus. In the 1985 issue, Ziyād ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ, a Palestinian writer and journalist who moved with the PLO from Beirut to Tunis, is acknowledged as the deputy editor-in-chief. One year later, in 1986, ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ officially becomes the editor-in-chief of Lotus.⁷⁸ According to reports, both Bashīr Bin Slāmah and PLO Chairman Yāsir ʿArafāt were involved in his appointment.⁷⁹

Lotus’ Palestinian focus strengthened and complicated its transnational aims. In 1988, Lotus publishes its third special issue with a focus on “Arab Palestinian Literature,”⁸⁰ with an opening editorial written by ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ dedicating the special issue to the First Palestinian Intifāḍah. ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ confesses that the Palestinian “shatāt” (diaspora) did not make the mission of this special issue easy.⁸¹ He explains that the difficulties locating, reaching, and communicating with other Palestinians, both inside and outside, as well as securing and accessing the literary material proved to be a tremendous task. He also asks the reader to agree with him that it will be impossible for one issue to encompass all aspects of Palestinian literary production, even if the aim of the special issue was to draw a map of Palestinian creativity. Finally, ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ stresses that contributions are meant to be examples rather than representatives of each genre.⁸² In many ways, the challenges that ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ faced back in 1988 persist today, resonating deeply with the struggles in gathering the fragments of Palestinian literature as part of the research undertaken in the PalREAD project.

Despite ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ’s editorial disclaimers, the 1988 special issue proves to be a remarkable achievement. The table of contents reads like a who’s who of Palestinian literature during that period. All the important literary figures are represented, including some names that are unfamiliar to us today, such as Maḥmūd al-Rimāwī, Ghassān ʿAbd al-Khāliq, Rasmī Abu ʿAlī, ʿAbd al-Laṭīf ʿAql, and Yūsif ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz, among others. The issue also features contributions by important Palestinian literary critics such as Fakhrī Ṣāliḥ, Walīd Abū Bakr, and Fayṣal Darrāj.

Lotus was also a reflection of the moment when the issue of Palestine was at the vanguard of revolutionary and liberation movements across the world. Given its unique nature, Lotus has received increasing attention in recent years, especially as part of academic projects focused on studying leftist solidarity, anticolonial, decolonial, and south-south transnational movements.⁸³ Although recent interest in the Lotus periodical has generated new research on its Afro-Asian nexus, internationalist trajectories and solidarities across the Global South, and its alternative history of postcolonial critique, the Tunis years and its relationship to Palestinian literature warrant further research and in-depth analysis.⁸⁴

Ultimately, the surveys of Tunisian and PLO periodicals reveal that Tunis did not, or more accurately could not, become the main literary hub for Palestinian literature. While an interest in Palestinian literature is perceptible in Tunisian periodicals, increasing after the PLO’s departure in 1994, there is a clear preoccupation with the Palestinian literary sphere in the periodicals published by the PLO in Tunis, especially in their attempts to heal the wounds of division and tension between the ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ of Palestinian literature. Lotus, on the other hand, was an entirely different type of periodical in that it allowed writers to express the transnational reality of their lives, creating multi- lingual and cross-continental affiliations, relationships, and solidarities, both literary and political.

Parallel Literary Geographies

The literary and political infrastructure-in-exile that had been briefly consolidated and centralized in Beirut, was no longer possible in Tunis. Nonetheless, what the Tunis period brings into sharp focus is the reality of fragmentation and the resulting transnational modes of production and circulation that account for most of Palestinian literary history after 1948. More broadly, the Tunis years were part of a larger transnational setting that saw Palestinian literary production and debate scattered across regional and international locales, from the Arab world to Cyprus and Europe. As such, our research question for this period transformed from one based on an assumption of the impact of physical presence on a literary sphere to a process of identifying parallel geographies and exploring transnational literary constellations. What the transnational literary networks show are continued interactions between Palestinian writers and their Tunisian and Maghrebi counterparts across these different spaces, be it in Tunis or Paris, as we will see. This observation is central to the description of Palestinian literature regarding its growing fragmentation, because despite the displacement and presence in different parts of the world, Palestinian writers connected with other Arab writers, and especially Maghrebi ones whom they had met in Beirut, Tunis, and Paris (see Figure 2 above).

View Full Size

Screenshot of an interactive network visualization of contributors on Palestinian literature to periodicals published in Tunis, Paris, and Nicosia. Access link: https://palread.geschkult.fu-berlin.de/view/83

Citation: Journal of Arabic Literature 55, 4 (2024) ; 10.1163/1570064x-12341519

Source: The PalREAD Project

• Download Figure
• Download figure as PowerPoint slide

These literary geographies witnessed a hub of Palestinian literary activity in parallel and connected to Tunis: Paris, with it the community of Palestinian, Maghrebi, and Arab writers who wrote and contributed from there, and Palestine itself. A few literary figures moved and lived in several literary spheres at once. While Paris, a literary sphere more open than in Tunis, served as a space where literary figures collaborated, debated, and published their works, Palestine as a literary space revealed a different version of restricted and continuously stunted literary activity. In this way, Paris was a parallel literary site where Palestinian literature circulated, and where Mashriq/Maghreb networks and collaborations formed organically, parallel to the Tunis context which suffered from the tense political relations with the Tunisian government and the restrictive policies of a diminished PLO.⁸⁵ As for the Palestinian sphere, cities such as Jerusalem and Haifa stand out as islands of literary activity during this period.

The transnational geography of Palestinian literature during the Tunis period can be captured by tracing the literary itineraries and activities of figures such as Maḥmūd Darwīsh. Although Darwīsh maintained regular presence in Tunis during this period, he also lived in Paris, while simultaneously publishing his literary periodical, al-Karmel, from Nicosia. The city of Paris provided a more organic and dynamic space for Palestinian-Maghrebi and Palestinian-Arab collaboration. Paris did not only become the Palestinian portal to Europe, but also to North Africa, the Arab world at large, and, ironically, also the Palestinian ‘inside’. Palestinian Paris-based periodicals reveal increased collaborations, interconnected networks of contributors, and interlinked content delivered through cultural news and re-published pieces from periodicals across the parallel literary geographies that constituted this period. In this way, Paris became a bridge to Tunis, Nicosia, Jerusalem, and Haifa. Darwīsh’s collaboration with the Moroccan poet Muḥammad Bennīs is a testament to the networks developed through, but which also had a reach beyond, Paris. Given that Darwīsh’s literary activities and initiatives spanned most of the literary geographies of this period, it is no surprise that his journal Al-Karmel established itself not only as an important address for Palestinian literature but also as a central interlocutor in the most significant Arabic literary debates at the time.

Darwīsh’s Paris years are known as his most prolific, where he reached poetic maturity and produced his most important work. It is also the city where he became exposed to wider literary networks, from French Marxists, literary theorists and philosophers to Maghrebi writers and artists, as well as other Arab and Palestinian literary figures living in exile in Paris. Darwīsh’s Parisian networks included key intellectual figures such as Iliās Ṣanbār, Farouk Mardam-Bey and Subḥī Ḥādīdī whom he met through the Paris offices of the Institute of Palestine Studies (IPS) and its French-language quarterly Revue d’études palestiniennes (REP). Darwīsh also became part of the literary network around the PLO-supported, Paris-based, Arabic-language weekly Al-Yawm al-sābiʿ which was edited by an important Palestinian literary figure in Paris, Bilāl Ḥassan.

Initially established in Beirut in 1963, IPS began issuing its French-language quarterly REP in 1981 (it had launched its English-language periodical, the Journal of Palestine Studies in 1971). REP’s production was re-located to Paris after 1982, and lasted until 2008 when the periodical was suspended.⁸⁶ In Paris, REP was spearheaded and edited by Iliās Ṣanbār, an important Palestinian literary figure himself who made concerted efforts to translate and publish Darwīsh’s poetry in France. REP had a clear focus on Palestine but managed to engage pan-Arab, French and other international topics and issues. A survey of REP’s tables of contents reveals a diverse group of Arab contributors in addition to French contributors, including prominent Maghrebi literary figures.⁸⁷ The periodical consolidated the work of the previous decade of the 1970s which saw vibrant cultural and literary activity, but also the tragic assassinations of two PLO Paris representatives, both of whom were great proponents of Palestinian literature and arts: Maḥmūd al-Hamsharī, assassinated in 1972, and ʿIzz al-Dīn al-Qalaq, assassinated in 1978.⁸⁸

Although closely affiliated with networks around REP, Darwīsh contributed extensively to the Arabic-language weekly Al-Yawm al-sābiʿ.⁸⁹ The weekly newspaper covered a wide range of Arab-related political and cultural topics, with a perceptible focus on Palestinian issues. What stands out about Al-Yawm al-sābiʿ is that it had an international network of correspondents, reporting from Tunis, Cairo, Rabat, London, Washington, Bagdad, Stockholm, Sanaa, as well as the Gulf countries and Jordan. In other words, it represents a transnational network of Palestinian literary figures who remained connected despite fragmentation. Al-Yawm al-sābiʿ further illustrates how periodicals published at different places were linked through their editors, writers, and reports on each other’s latest issues. The periodical networks of the Tunis period are traceable through Al-Yawm al-sābiʿ’s regularly appearing announcements and coverage of new issues of other periodicals, including the Tunis-based Lotus⁹⁰ and Al-Ḥayāt al-thaqāfiyyah,⁹¹ and the Nicosia-based Palestinian periodicals Al-Karmel⁹² and Shuʾūn Filasṭīniyyah,⁹³ among others. The periodical network is further consolidated through the re-printing of articles from sister periodicals in Al-Yawm al-sābiʿ.⁹⁴

Its Tunis correspondent was Bashīr al-Bakr, a Syrian-Palestinian poet, writer, and journalist who had previously worked in PLO media outlets.⁹⁵ Al-Bakr reported on literary events in Tunis such as the famous Carthage Theatre Festival,⁹⁶ book fairs,⁹⁷ Tunisian cultural policies,⁹⁸ and interviewed Palestinian literary figures, including Samīḥ al-Qāsim.⁹⁹ In addition to its correspondents, Al-Yawm al-sābiʿ featured a wide base of Arab contributors regardless of their location. In this aspect, we see a significant number of Maghrebi literary figures present on the pages of the periodical, especially Moroccan writers ʿAbd al-Kabīr al-Khaṭībī,¹⁰⁰ Ṭāhir Bin Jallūn, Muḥammad Bennīs, and Muḥammad Barrādah,¹⁰¹ as well as the Tunisian novelists Ḥabīb al-Sālimī and Ḥassūnah al-Musbāḥī.¹⁰²

Through outlets such as REP and Al-Yawm al-sābiʿ, the Tunis/Paris networks overlapped on many occasions. One example is the Tunis-based correspondent of Al-Yawm al-sābiʿ, al-Bakr, who was also a contributor to Revue d’études palestiniennes.¹⁰³ Further overlaps can be seen through the initiatives of the Tunis-based ALECSO, where Rītā ʿAwaḍ worked, which organized international events such as the one dedicated to Palestinian literature held in Paris in 1984. The event offered prominent guests such as Edward Saʿīd, Maḥmūd Darwīsh, Muḥammad Bennīs, and ʿAbdallah al-Ḥūrānī a space to meet. Al-Laʿbī, a well-known Moroccan poet and journalist, published a contribution to this event in the Haifa-based literary periodical Al-Jadīd, thereby adding another axis that connected the Palestinian ‘inside’ to debates ‘outside’ in exile.¹⁰⁴

It is the city of Paris that allows for a local illustration of how the literary relationship between Maghrebi and Palestinian writers unfolded. Darwīsh symbolises these connections on the personal level. He benefited enormously from the numerous literary circles in Paris, establishing new networks and venues for collaboration that lasted well beyond the Paris years.¹⁰⁵ The city saw the flocking of some of the giants of Arabic poetry in the 1980s. The Moroccan poet al-Laʿbī, known for his foundational periodical Souffles-Anfas which ran between 1966–1971 and was one of the first North African periodicals to link Maghrebi culture and politics to the Palestinian question, was based in Paris from 1985.¹⁰⁶ The Syrian poet Adūnīs is another example, moving from Beirut to Paris in 1985, and relaunching his famous periodical Mawāqif in exile.

Darwīsh’s noteworthy collaboration with the prominent Moroccan poet, Muḥammad Bennīs, is representative of the reach of the Paris literary networks in facilitating further Maghrebi-Palestinian initiatives beyond France. After initially establishing Al-Thaqāfah al-jadīdah al-maghribiyyah (Al-Thaqāfah al-jadīdah for short) in the city Mohammedia in 1974, Bennīs moved it to Casablanca shortly thereafter where it continued to be published until 1984.¹⁰⁷ The periodical managed to attract widespread Arab literary interest, from both the Maghreb and the Mashriq. Many of the names associated with the Beirut literary scene, including Palestinian literary figures, can also be traced as contributors to Al-Thaqāfah al-jadīdah from the late 1970s.¹⁰⁸ These include Salīm Barakāt, Ḥaydar Ḥaydar, Sarkūn Būluṣ, Saʿdī Yūsuf, and Liyānah Badr, to name a few.¹⁰⁹

Al-Thaqāfah al-jadīdah’s engagement with Palestinian literature features many literary texts ranging from short story and novel extracts to poetry. ʿIzz al-Dīn al-Manāṣarah contributed a seven-page-long poem engaging with the theme of return which he wrote in 1978 while in Bulgaria.¹¹⁰ It also includes interviews with non-Palestinian writers affiliated with the Palestinian cause, such as a conversation with Iliās Khūrī on the overlaps between creative writing and political activism.¹¹¹ In 1984, the rich and versatile literary platform that Al-Thaqāfah al-jadīdah managed to foster was abruptly cut short. The periodical was forced to cease publication by official order of the Minister of the Interior when the bread riots broke out across North Africa.¹¹² Bennīs, and the periodical’s editors and contributors, regarded this as a flagrant violation of freedom of expression, and resolved to defy the ban by finding alternative routes for publishing.

In an effort led by Darwīsh, Al-Karmel, the then Nicosia-based literary periodical edited by Darwīsh, took on the publication of a joint issue with Al-Thaqāfah al-jadīdah. Al-Karmel, in its 11th issue of 1984, featured a short note stating that it had to publish the originally collaborative issue on its own, because its partner was forced to cease publication two months prior to the planned release date.¹¹³ Thus, Al-Karmel’s 11th issue becomes the very last issue of Al-Thaqāfah al-jadīdah. This final issue of Al-Thaqāfah al-jadīdah is dedicated to Moroccan culture and features contributions by key Moroccan intellectual and literary figures, including Muḥammad ʿĀbid al-Jābirī, al- Khaṭībī, al-Laʿbī, and Bennīs himself.¹¹⁴ Among other contributions, it also features selected translations of Michel Foucault and Gilles Deleuze.¹¹⁵ The French Marxist historian, Maxime Rodinson, a regular contributor to REP, writes an essay on the importance of Palestinian “Why Palestine?” (“Limādhā Filasṭīn?”)¹¹⁶ which also appears as part of the morphed Al-Thaqāfah al-jadīdah/ Al-Karmel. Beyond the important collaboration between Al-Karmel and Al-Thaqāfah al-jadīdah, Bennīs, whether as an editor, contributor, or through his literary texts, continued to play an important connecting role, especially in the context of Palestinian and Maghrebi literature. In 2017, Bennīs was awarded the Medal of Culture, Creation and Art by the Palestinian president Maḥmūd Abbās.¹¹⁷

The commitment to Maghrebi literature and culture continues to be present in Al-Karmel beyond the joint 11th issue. In July 1987, Al-Karmel released its 25th issue titled “al-Adab al-maghribī al-ḥadīth” (modern Moroccan literature) including several contributions exploring the encounters between Maghrebi and Mashriqi literature.¹¹⁸ In his editorial, Maḥmūd Darwīsh references the 11th issue, affirming a sense of continuity and ongoing collaboration.¹¹⁹ The special issue features the work of Muḥammad Barrādah, a regular contributor to Al-Karmel, and an important bridging figure between the Maghreb and Mashriq periodical and literary scenes.¹²⁰ The issue also comprises contributions by Moroccan authors who are less known such as an article relating to Maghrebi theatre by Ḥasan al-Manīʿī and a short story by Idrīs al-Khūrī.¹²¹ The publication of this special issue is covered by Al-Yawm al-sābiʿ in the same month, revealing a dynamic web of interconnections between North Africa, Paris, and the transnational Palestinian periodicals.¹²²

Following Maḥmūd Darwīsh’s literary itineraries and activities leads us to yet another parallel literary locale: Nicosia, where Al-Karmel moved its operations after the PLO left Beirut for Tunis in 1982. Nicosia was much closer to Beirut than Tunis, and cultural initiatives such as publishing houses and periodicals were easier to re-establish as commercial entities in Cyprus. Despite the fact that Darwīsh, its editor-in-chief, did not move to Cyprus but lived in between Paris and Tunis, Al-Karmel offers insights into another parallel literary sphere.¹²³ Al-Karmel published its first issue from Nicosia in the first quarter of 1983. The new location is clearly marked in the first sentence of Darwīsh’s opening editorial: “From Nicosia, this time, our voices come.”¹²⁴ Nicosia, in this case, appears to function as a safe commercial base for the production and printing of Al-Karmel. This technical and logistical presence did not lead to the emergence of a Palestinian literary scene in Nicosia, at least not one as rich, varied, and vibrant as the Paris literary locale that Darwīsh was immersed in. Combined with a survey of the periodical’s contents and contributors, it becomes clear that Al-Karmel was able to transcend its location of publication and to position itself as a transnational Palestinian and pan-Arab literary publication. In fact, Al-Karmel stands out during this period as one of the most important Palestinian periodicals to survive and emerge from the wreckage of Beirut to establish itself as a central interlocutor within intellectual and literary debates in the Arab world. While Lotus celebrated Palestinian literature as part of an agenda to promote Palestine as an internationally celebrated revolutionary cause, it is ultimately Al-Karmel that best captures and reflects the transnational literary reach, constellations, and networks of Palestinian literature during the Tunis period.

The transnational and pan-Arab positionality is reflected in Al-Karmel’s tables of contents, network of contributors, the expansive topics it covered, as well as its special issues, examples of which were discussed in the previous section. A survey of the tables of contents showcases a wide range of Arab contributors, including an overall high number of Maghrebi writers from the 1980s onwards, coinciding with Darwīsh’s Tunis/Paris period. The list of Maghrebi contributors to Al-Karmel is truly impressive. We find the names of the regular contributors present, such as al-Laʿbī, Bennīs, Barrādah, and al-Khaṭībī.¹²⁵ Other key Moroccan literary figures also make an appearance on the pages of Al-Karmel, including Tāhir Bin Jallūn (in translation),ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ Kīlīṭū, and Muḥammad al-Ṭūbi.¹²⁶ The Tunisian contributors include novelists such as Ḥassūnah al-Muṣbāḥī and Ḥabīb al-Sālimī, and poets such as Muḥammad al-Saghīr Awlād Aḥmad and Ādam Fatḥī.¹²⁷ Other central voices from the Tunisian literary scene, such as Maḥmūd al-Masʿadī, the founder of Al-Ḥayāt al-thaqāfiyyah, and the literary critic Tawfīq Bakkār, are also present on the pages of Al-Karmel.¹²⁸

Al-Karmel saw regular contributions from the Paris circles, including writers Subḥī Ḥadīdī and Ilyās Sanbār.¹²⁹ Tunis-based Palestinian writers, such as Yakhluf, al-Manāṣarah, Abū Shāwar, Daḥbūr, and Dānyāl published their literary works in Al-Karmel during the Tunis period. Al-Karmel was all-inclusive when it came to Palestinian contributions, whether from Tunis, other exiles, or from the ‘inside’ Palestinian literary locales like Haifa and Jerusalem, and later, the West Bank and Gaza after Al-Karmel’s relocation to Ramallah in 1994.¹³⁰

The contributions to Al-Karmel show that the periodical did not exclusively focus on Palestinian literature but was engaged in discussing the most pertinent topics in Arabic literature at the time. The network of its contributors positions the periodical as a point of connection for all the scattered Palestinian literary locales in exile and ‘inside’, as well as a bridge bringing together the Maghreb and the Mashriq. In this regard, Al-Karmel can be described as the most important literary address for Palestinian literature during this period, as well as being an important lynchpin periodical to the most significant literary discussions taking place on the level of modern Arabic literature at the time. As an illustration of constellations of literary figures within and across the different literary locales discussed in this article, see the network visualization in Figure 2. An alternative entry point to the articles published across the literary geographies in this period, Figure 3 is an interactive map whose features allow users to explore the titles of articles published in each of the cities covered in this article.

View Full Size

Screenshot of an interactive map showing articles published on Palestinian literature or by Palestinian literary figures in the literary locales of Paris, Tunis, Nicosia, Jerusalem, and Haifa. Access link: https://palread.geschkult.fu-berlin.de/view/84

Citation: Journal of Arabic Literature 55, 4 (2024) ; 10.1163/1570064x-12341519

Courtesy of the PalREAD project

• Download Figure
• Download figure as PowerPoint slide

While periodicals edited in Tunis, Paris, and Nicosia engaged with Palestine as a literary locale, Palestinian periodicals published within historical Palestine partook in the literary discourse and provided voices and reflections from the ‘inside’. The occupation effectively meant that for most Palestinians ‘inside’ communication across historic Palestine, let alone with other Arab countries and the rest of the world, became extremely difficult, and in many cases impossible or outlawed. Despite witnessing the era of Israeli occupation, contributors from the ‘inside’ still reached outwards, offering a perspective from within and contributing to the transnational debates at the same time. The literary lives and struggles of Palestinian literary figures ‘inside’ are reflected in the periodicals of the two semi-isolated and culturally stranded cities of Jerusalem and Haifa.

The three Jerusalem periodicals that stand out during the 1980s are Al-Bayādir, Al-Kātib, and Al-Fajr al-adabī.¹³¹ Through these three periodicals we can trace the emergence of terminology and categories that developed specifically to define and discuss Palestinian literature ‘inside’. The use of terms such as “al-dākhil” (inside) and “al-khārij” (outside, in exile), “adab maḥallī” (local literature), “al-adab al-filasṭīnī taḥt al-iḥtilāl” (Palestinian literature under occupation), and “adab al-intifāḍah” (Intifada literature) all emerge from the pages of these periodicals.

Al-Bayādir was founded in 1976 as a monthly magazine edited by Jacques Khazmo. Al-Bayādir was the first literary-cultural periodical to be published inside the occupied territories. From the very first issue of Al-Bayādir in March 1976, the table of contents, masthead, and editorial information reveal the language of the ‘inside’. For example, the annual subscription information lists prices for “al-dākhil” (inside) and “al-khārij” (outside). The table of contents points to the category of local literature in reference to “al-masraḥ al-maḥallī” (local theatre) and “al-thaqāfah al-maḥalliyya” (local culture).¹³² In its April 1977 issue, we see mention of “al-qiṣṣah al-qasīrah al-maḥalliyya” (the local short story).¹³³ Later issues introduce the category of literature under occupation with a study exploring the features of “al-shiʿr al-filasṭīnī taḥt al-iḥtilāl” (Palestinian poetry under occupation).¹³⁴

An important feature of Al-Bayādir is the section entitled “Shahriyyāt al-Bayādir” (Al-Bayādir monthly) which is a repository and record for literary events, allowing unique insight into Jerusalem as a Palestinian literary locale and counterpart to what was happening in Tunis and Paris during the same period. Although most of the contributors were Palestinians from the ‘inside’ (occupied territories as well as the areas of 1948), in Al-Bayādir’s July 1977 issue, we notice in the masthead the addition of the artist Kamāl Bullāṭah as an editor and correspondent based in Washington D.C.¹³⁵ Later issues begin to include a small scattering of Palestinian writers from the ‘outside’, as well as Arab authors, primarily those known to be linked, directly or indirectly, to the Palestinian Revolution, such as the Iraqi poet Saʿadī Yūsif.¹³⁶

In November 1979, the first issue of Al-Kātib appears, edited by Asʿad al-Asʿad who was formerly listed as a contributor to and editor in Al-Bayādir.¹³⁷ In the opening editorial, al-Asʿad states that the mission of the periodical is to enrich the Palestinian literary and cultural movement by: embracing the intellectual and humanist issues of “al-jamāhīr al-ʿarabiyyah al-maḥaliyyah” (the local Arab audiences); linking local literature to exilic Palestinian literature, and to Arab, socialist, and progressive culture and thought more broadly.¹³⁸ Particularly, Al-Kātib sought to appeal to “al-muthaqqafīn al-maḥaliyyīn” (local intellectuals), including students, laborers, and women.¹³⁹ No doubt, Al-Kātib features some of the same contributors as Al-Bayādir, but with time the former leans further towards covering labor and union issues, meetings of various communist parties around the world, social and political topics, in addition to publishing short stories, poetry, and literary studies. Al-Kātib published several special issues, including one on Algerian culture in 1980 (issue 9/10), and one dedicated to Palestinian literature under occupation in 1987 (issue 89).

On the pages of ‘inside’ periodicals in Jerusalem and Haifa we can trace the impact of the Palestinian North Africa foray through the publication of special issues dedicated to Maghrebi literature and an increased network of Maghrebi contributors. But it is the emphasis on the “maḥallī”, the local, that clearly dominates in the face of discrimination, occupation, isolation, and censorship. Hurdles to the freedom of movement, communication, expression, and exchange are reflected in these periodicals, particularly in their inability to fully cover and discuss impact of momentous events, such as the intifāḍah, on Palestinian literature. Al-Fajr al-adabī, a monthly periodical and literary supplement of the daily newspaper Al-Fajr, was founded by Ḥannā Sanyūrah and ʿAlī al-Khalīlī in 1980. The stated aim of the periodical was to widely disseminate “al-adab al-maḥallī” (local literature); develop a progressive Palestinian literary movement in the occupied territories that can transcend its difficult context; support local literary figures and stay in sync with the literary movements in the Arab and wider world.

In the editorial of the March 1982 issue, “Hāmish fī marḥalat al-istithnāʾ” (Margin on a state of exception), Palestinians are described as living under siege and oppression during a period that is referred to as a phase of exception and occupation.¹⁴⁰ Despite these extenuating circumstances, Al-Fajr al-adabī commits itself to bringing about the meeting, through its printed pages, of Palestinians inside and in exile, as well as other Arabs and peoples struggling against exceptional circumstances, in the hope of contributing to a culture of progress and peace worldwide.¹⁴¹ In spite of the communication hurdles, Al-Fajr al-adabī includes contributions from Palestinian writers outside of Palestine, such as those in Tunis, as well as writers from the Maghrebi and Parisian literary circles. For example, besides several poems published by Darwīsh,¹⁴² it also comprises interviews with Daḥbūr,¹⁴³ and literary studies by al-Laʿbī and Barrādah, one of which focuses on movements within contemporary Tunisian literature.¹⁴⁴

In contrast to Paris, Nicosa, and Jerusalem, Haifa—another important Palestinian literary hub and the home of Imīl Ḥabībī and Al-Jadīd journal—was an island of cultural activities in a disconnected context. Palestinian literary life in Haifa was severely limited in scope because of the difficult conditions Palestinians inside Israel experienced, ranging from a military occupation to second-class citizenship in a state that did not allow them equal rights. Nonetheless, Al-Jadīd stands out as an important Palestinian periodical that opens a window onto Palestinian literary life in Haifa. Al-Jadīd was first published in 1951 as a literary supplement of the Arabic-language Communist Party newspaper Al-Ittiḥād, and as of 1953 as an independent literary periodical. It was founded and edited by the lawyer Ḥannā Naqqārah, with the support of Imīl Ḥabībī who was the editor-in-chief of Al-Ittiḥād and played a crucial role in the establishment and editing of Al-Jadīd.¹⁴⁵

As a Palestinian Arabic-language periodical published within Israel, Al-Jadīd, as well as many of its editors and contributors, was effectively cut off from the rest of the Arab world due to the Israeli military occupation that lasted until 1966. Thereafter, the second-class Israeli citizenship that was reluctantly granted to Palestinians inside Israel became a citizenship which effectively and automatically barred them from entry into other Arab countries. One of the few avenues of contact with other Arab literary figures was via Communist party activities that took place abroad. An example is the first meeting of the Tunisian novelist Ḥassūnah al-Muṣbāḥī and Imīl Ḥabībī during the East-West Festival, which was held in Berlin 1989.¹⁴⁶

Given the conditions in which Al-Jadīd was published as a local Haifa literary periodical in a semi-sealed environment, contributions from other Arab writers, as well as exiled Palestinian writers, not to mention Palestinian writers under occupation, were logistically difficult and uncommon. As a periodical, Al-Jadīd mostly comprised of primary literary texts, particularly poetry and short stories, contributed by local authors, as well as literary studies, and reports on local cultural events. In the issues we had access to from the Tunis period, we were able to trace contributions featuring Muʿīn Bsīsū on the fourth anniversary of his death,¹⁴⁷ as well as poetry by Maḥmūd Darwīsh and Aḥmad Daḥbūr,¹⁴⁸ all of whom had Tunis connections. Interestingly, however, a link to the Paris-based Al-Yawm al-sābiʿ was also traced in a 1988 issue of Al-Jadīd. The periodical re-printed an interview originally published in Al-Yawm al-sābiʿ conducted by Riyāḍ Baydas with Al-Jadīd’s editor at the time, Salīm Jubrān.¹⁴⁹ This points to the irony of the situation of Palestinians inside Israel—it may have been easier to access and collaborate with Paris-based periodicals than with those published in other Arab countries or in the occupied territories.

Tunis-based Palestinian literary figures contributed mostly poetry to Al-Jadīd. Even more telling than the network of contributors to demonstrate Al-Jadīd’s reach is the section of collected cultural notes at the end of each issue. This is where we find reports on literary events such as the previously mentioned 1984 ALECSO event in Paris, as well as information on new publications or reprints. The locations from which reports are included cover many of the places explored in this article, and many more—from Beirut to Nicosia, but also Berlin, Sanaa, Damascus, and London, as well as ‘inside’ locations such as Taybeh and Tel Aviv. In fact, Al-Jadīd includes a literary awareness of the wider Maghreb, for example by publishing a supplement devoted to the Algerian novel.¹⁵⁰ One of the few mentions of the other ‘inside’, the occupied Palestinian territories, is the publication of a bibliographic list of books on the intifāḍah, among which is a Moroccan publication, in a 1990 issue of Al-Jadīd.¹⁵¹

Although Ḥabībī’s Haifa-based periodical Mashārif, founded in 1995, falls outside the Tunis period, it nonetheless provides a window into the wider networks he cultivated before, during, and after the Tunis period. Ḥabībī passed away in May 1996, a year after establishing Mashārif, and in 1997, a special issue was published in commemoration. The list of contributors to this special issue gives insight into Ḥabībī’s Arab literary networks. Among the studies, elegies, and obituaries published in this special issue, it is easy to spot the now-familiar names of Maghrebi literary figures: Ḥassūnah al-Musbāḥī, Muḥammad Bennīs, Ṭāhir Bin Jallūn, and Muḥammad al-Tūbi. A closer look at the table of contents reveals links to other Arab writers such as Raḍwā ʿĀshūr, Sabry Hafez, Inʿām al-Jundī, Karīm Muruwwah; diaspora Palestinian writers such as Māhir al-Sharīf, Muḥammad Dakrūb, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Yāghī, as well as local Palestinian literary figures such as Muḥammad Ghanāyim and Basilius Bāwārdī.¹⁵² Although Ḥabībī may have been exceptional within the Haifa context for his far-reaching networks, the special Mashārif issue gives insight into the links that were possible for Palestinians in Israel despite writing and publishing in conditions that isolated them from their Palestinian and Arab literary peers.

Conclusion

In the 1980s and early 1990s, the city of Tunis was the site of a Palestinian literary congregation of sorts, albeit one already fatigued and restricted after emerging from the wreckage of the Lebanese civil war. The Tunis period, however, remains obscure, hardly making an appearance in Palestinian literary histories. In probing a neglected period and place, this article undertook a multilayered exploration to uncover and re-map the contours of Palestinian literary history during the Tunis period both within and outside of Tunisia. Through an interdisciplinary approach combining literary history, periodical studies, and Digital Humanities, the article drew the main features of a period that typified the deterritorialization and decentralization of a Palestinian literature-in-exile. Surveying the literary periodicals of this period provided a crucial gateway to understanding the literary circulations, debates, and networks that spanned regional and international geographies. The literary trajectories and activities of key figures during this period presented another portal through which we traced networks of collaboration and discovered important literary locales. The process of engaging with the complexities of a literature operating outside the confinements of the nation state without centralized national institutions and infrastructure highlighted the challenges but also the possibilities of writing transnational literary histories.

The question that initiated the investigation was whether the Palestinian physical presence in Tunis had an impact on the local Tunisian and the wider Maghrebi literary scenes. In the process of answering this question, a complex and transnational web of cities emerged. In understanding the aftermath of the exodus from Beirut and its resulting fragmentation, Tunis serves as a first stop on the transnational itinerary of Palestinian literary history during that period. As a literary locale, Tunis allowed us to reveal that despite political restrictions and the geographical distance from historic Palestine, literary production, debate, and circulation not only continued, but were re-invented in a transnational sense expressed throughout the many periodicals surveyed—whether based and edited in Tunis by Tunisians or the PLO, or in Paris, Nicosia, Haifa or Jerusalem. The Tunisian periodicals surveyed reflect the reality of a restricted and isolated Palestinian literary presence in Tunis, compounded by the diminished cultural capacities of the PLO. Quite telling is the fact that many of these periodicals revealed a ‘delayed impact’, showing an increased engagement with Palestinian literature after the departure of the PLO from Tunis in 1994. Literary figures who remained in Tunis had a more perceptible impact on the Tunisian literary scene, contributing original literary works to Tunisian periodicals, publishing studies on Tunisian literature, organizing cultural events related to Palestinian literature, and establishing publishing houses that publish the works of Tunisian, Palestinian, and other Arab writers.

The multiple forms of exile that mark this period are underlined by efforts to reconnect the ‘inside’ with the ‘outside’. Access to the literary ‘inside’ proved more difficult and challenging than tracing the transnational literary networks in exile. Nonetheless, the two cities of Jerusalem and Haifa, each stranded in its own way, either under occupation or under oppressive conditions of isolation, emerge as two lonely local literary capitals of sorts. In Jerusalem, we saw the literary ‘inside’ trying to reach out to the ‘outside’, but at the same time working to buttress a local literary scene despite extenuating conditions. In Haifa, another local literary scene was struggling to keep afloat. Although the Communist party networks and publications provided an outlet to the ‘outside’, the links to the other ‘inside’, to Jerusalem, were difficult to trace. In this sense, not only was it difficult to reconnect the Palestinian ‘inside’ and ‘outside’, but it was an even bigger challenge to connect the two ‘insides’ of Jerusalem and Haifa. Tunis and Paris as parallel spaces allowed for a connection of these two poles from afar, through the meeting of writers and editors from both spaces and through their interactions with writers from other Arab countries, particularly from the Maghreb.

The transnational net cast to capture Palestinian literature during the Tunis period shed light on a relatively neglected period of Palestinian literary history. Palestinian literature’s North African networks brought the Maghreb and Mashriq closer together. While the physical presence in Tunis yielded a delayed impact in the Tunisian literary context, the impact is much more perceptible on the pages of Palestinian periodicals, both ‘outside’ and ‘inside’, with increased Maghrebi contributions and content. Despite the intense fragmentation of Palestinian literary production during this period, literary periodicals provide a crucial window onto a thriving Palestinian literary scene and an overall growing engagement with Palestinian literary topics and themes that cross the borders of nation-states to exist in a truly transnational sphere.