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Statement of First National Festival of Palestinian Literature in the Occupied Land
First National Festival of Palestinian Literature in the Occupied Land
Statement of Participating Writers
(Excerpts)
Jerusalem, 18 August 1981
We, Palestinian writers assembled at our first mass cultural meeting – the first national assembly for Palestinian literature in the occupied territories - meeting in occupied Jerusalem from August 15-18, 1981, affirm:
I. From our belief that literary, intellectual and artistic activities are activities in the field of knowledge that promote the liberty and happiness of mankind, and that writers, artists and thinkers work for the liberty and happiness of mankind;
II. From our belief that colonialism, imperialism, racial discrimination, destruction and mass killing are the worst enemies of the liberty and happiness of mankind and that it is the duty of writers to resist them;
III. From our belief that the occupation of territory by force and the prevention of peoples from living in peace in their countries, deciding their political and social fate and choosing their representatives who express their national consciousness, are inhuman moves and measures, and that to struggle against them is a human duty required of men of letters, writers and artists;
IV. From our belief in the unity of our people and the necessity to consolidate this unity and to maintain the Palestinian identity and presence, we shall continue along the road trodden by our people and never turn aside from it;
V. From our belief that the military settler occupation of our territories is against the will of our people;
VI. From our belief that the aim of all solutions involving liquidation, the Camp David agreements and the autonomy plans is to thwart our national aspirations and to invalidate our right to establish our free and independent state;
VII. And from our belief that the aim of settlement, the changing of the status of our occupied Palestinian land, the confiscation of lands, the prevention of their cultivation and the destruction of their crops, is to create a spurious situation in the hope of thwarting our legitimate national aspirations:
We affirm and decide that it is the duty of Palestinian writers and men of letters wherever they may be to:
1. Be committed to and promote the causes of our people and our masses and to make known matters that concern them, so that literary and intellectual creative activity may be an emotional weapon for the embodiment of popular ambitions and national aspirations.
2. Repudiate and combat all isolationist and defeatist ideas, ideologies and trends in literature and art that try to halt the march of human progress.
3. Act in cohesion with the Arab national liberation front and combat all Arab reactionary and dictatorial regimes that are hostile to their own peoples and to our people.
4. Combat and isolate the influence of the reactionary Arab regimes that agents of world imperialism and American imperialism so as to prevent their meddling with our national cause
5. Take action to ensure the liquidation of imperialist influence and the abolition of foreign military bases in our area, the aim of which is to destroy our nationalist movement.
6. Condemn and disapprove the production and use of weapons of mass killing. We demand that their production be halted immediately because they are directed against the peoples of the world, including our people.
We, Palestinian writers and men of letters in the occupied territory also condemn the practices of the occupation, including:
1. The imposition of censorship on literary, intellectual and artistic activities.
2. The prohibition of freedom of speech and writing, the confiscation of books and the prohibition of their circulation, and the closing of libraries.
3. The house arrest of writers and thinkers, their being prevented from pursuing their activities, the placing of restrictions on them and their imprisonment.
4. The completely unlawful deportation and eviction from their land and country of many intellectuals.
5. The impeding of the activities of universities and cultural institutions and the enforcement against them of unjust law.
6. Refusal to permit our people to form associations that express their will, such as clubs, associations and other institutions, and the placing of restrictions on those that already exist.
7. The persecution and arbitrary transfer of teachers and the dismissal of many of them.
8. The persecution of students and the banning of their associations, and their prevention from travelling in pursuit of knowledge.
9. The refusal to permit the convening of cultural seminars, meetings and theatrical activities.
10. The refusal to allow the publication of new magazines and newspapers.
11. The passing of unjust laws and military orders, and the exercise of repression.
….
Source: International Documents on Palestine, 1981. Beirut : Institute for Palestine Studies, 1983, p. 282-83.