Zena Kamash, Heritage and Healing in Syria and Iraq (New Texts Out Now)

Zena Kamash, Heritage and Healing in Syria and Iraq (New Texts Out Now)

Zena Kamash, Heritage and Healing in Syria and Iraq (New Texts Out Now)

By : Zena Kamash

Zena Kamash, Heritage and Healing in Syria and Iraq (Manchester University Press, 2024).

Jadaliyya (J): What made you write this book?

Zena Kamash (ZK): A big question! One of the main motivations was as a process of healing for myself. I am British Iraqi and have lived alongside PTSD for many years. Conflict in Iraq has been a long-term source of sadness and trauma for me, as is true for many Iraqis. In recent years, I experienced a subtle layering of that trauma from the treatment of heritage in the region, both during and after conflict. In particular, I have found the competing claims to the region’s heritage to be challenging, especially as they so frequently seem to, at best, sideline and, at worst, ignore those who most matter: the everyday people of Syria and Iraq.

... the book envisages gentler, creative, and ethically driven ways to respond to heritage damaged in conflict ...

J: What particular topics, issues, and literatures does the book address?

ZK: In the book, I explore what to do with heritage that has been damaged in conflict. I chart a path through the colonial histories and traumatic wars of Syria and Iraq (Chapters 1 and 2) to examine the projects and responses currently on offer and assess their flaws and limitations, including issues of digital colonialism, technological solutionism, geopolitical manoeuvring, media bias, and community exclusion (Chapters 3 to 5). In the second half of the book, I switch to think about how we might do better. Drawing on current research into the psychology and neuroscience of trauma and trauma recovery (Chapter 6) and taking inspiration from artists and creative thinkers who challenge the status quo (Chapter 7), the book envisages gentler, creative, and ethically driven ways to respond to heritage damaged in conflict—ways that recenter the people and the hopes, dreams, and needs at the heart of these debates (Chapter 8).

J: How does this book connect to and/or depart from your previous work?

ZK: In Heritage and Healing in Syria and Iraq, I pick up numerous strands of my work from the past decade, particularly around ethics, promoting decolonial and anti-colonial practices, thinking about why we engage in archaeology and heritage, and trying to tease out how Western archaeology and archaeologists from the nineteenth century onwards have had impacts on what we see happening today. I have also worked a lot with artists and creative practitioners as a way to deepen engagements with heritage and archaeology, especially with communities who may feel significantly disenfranchised from their heritage. I think those influences come through very strongly in the second half of the book. As the themes in the book run deep into my soul, it felt difficult to wrestle with at first; for example, there was quite a long gap in 2020-21 where I could not write it at all. I decided that the only way to handle that was to let my personal reflections, feelings, and emotions be front and center. I think this makes it slightly unusual for an academic book as there are parts that definitely lean more towards creative non-fiction.

J: Who do you hope will read this book, and what sort of impact would you like it to have?

ZK: I have written the book with a wide readership in mind. I want it to be an opening of a dialogue, rather than a final say in how things should be done. I certainly do not expect everyone who reads this book to agree with all of my thinking! Each chapter ends with a set of questions that invite readers to reflect on what they have read and how it might relate to their own circumstances, whether they are from the region or somewhere entirely different. I hope readers will find these reflective sections enriching in thinking through some of the thorny issues the book tackles, both on their own and, potentially, in groups.

J: What other projects are you working on now?

ZK: I am actually about to embark on a bit of a side-step in my career, so over the next few months I will be writing a psychological crime fiction novel. My ideas are still taking shape, but the protagonist will be of mixed Middle Eastern and British heritage, like me, and an expert in heritage crime.

J: What has prompted this shift and how do you think it will link to your work so far?

ZK: I really enjoyed the freedom of writing the creative non-fiction parts of Heritage and Healing, so I would like to explore how far I can take that in a different genre. I am also so passionate about wanting to speak to and with the widest possible audience and think that fiction might allow me to reach people who would not normally pick up an academic book. Academic books are also often very expensive (like this one…), which does not fit easily with my values of accessibility and inclusivity, so writing commercial fiction would, at least partly, address this. Of course, commercial fiction has to be fun and entertaining, so the novel will be very different in style and tone from how I have written until now, but I think it will still be possible to weave in the big themes of identity, belonging, inclusion, social justice, and equality that have preoccupied me as an academic. In this, I am inspired by crime writers of color like Kellye Garrett and Vaseem Khan, who have really played with the tropes of the genre to bring in their particular lenses on the world. As a child, reading Agatha Christie books like Murder in Mesopotamia was one of my first ways of exploring who I was and where I came from, albeit through what I now know to be a rather colonialist perspective. This is why I would love to write a British Middle Eastern character, who might resonate with and inspire other people of mixed heritage. I have no idea how this experiment might turn out, but I am excited to see where it might lead!

 

Excerpt from the book (from Chapter 7: Embracing Ghosts: artistic reflections on conflict and cultural heritage in Syria and Iraq, pp. 214-7)

I do not include my textile art here because I believe it has much to add to our aesthetic world, but rather because it is this book in textile form. The making of the piece I reflect on here was part of the therapeutic process [of writing this book]. In creating this piece, I was able to process some of the emotion I feel around heritage reconstruction, at times viscerally, as we will see, and to bring into being some of my hopes for the future of Iraq, its people and heritage […]. The focus in my textile art more broadly is on craftivism and using creativity to reclaim my heritage, stitching links between my family, my feelings and Iraqi cultural heritage.

Hatra and Mosul: a triptych (2021) by Zena KamashStumpwork (raised) embroidery triptych with elements of goldwork and blackwork. Photo: Kamash.

Hatra and Mosul: a triptych (2021) represents three phases of heritage in Iraq: before Da’esh (archway 1); under Da’esh (archway 2); and after Da’esh (archway 3). Each archway element bleeds into the next as a reminder that each phase is inextricably linked to what came before and what will come after. The piece is inspired by heritage objects and architecture from a range of phases and places in the country, which it deliberately brings together in unconventional ways. The three heads are based on a bust portrait of the god Shamash from the city of Hatra. Hatra is well known for its religious buildings and sculpture and flourished during the Parthian period in the first and second centuries ce (broadly equivalent to the Roman period). As this is my period of archaeological specialism, I wanted to include it here. I also liked the rhyme with my own surname, which felt like a fun echo to play with. The architectural frame is inspired by arches found in the iwan (a rectangular hall walled on three sides and usually vaulted) in Ottoman-period houses in Mosul, specifically Beit al-Tutunji. This house was used as an ammunition factory by Da’esh during its occupation of the city and suffered a high level of damage. I also discovered recently that the house has a link to my family, so its inclusion felt especially poignant and significant as it crosses and joins my professional and personal relationships with the city and its heritage. Another aspect for which the city of Mosul is famous is the intricate carving of the local alabaster, also known as Mosul marble. This carving takes the form of Islamic geometric and biomorphic patterns, which are reflected here in the six-pointed star geometry rendered in blackwork embroidery on the arch piers. A nod to the biomorphic designs is also made in the gold- thread repairs on the right-hand arch.

Finally, I have also included some natural heritage in the form of bayboon flowers decorating the ‘after Da’esh’ phase. When I was running my ‘Rematerialising Mosul Museum’ project in 2018, I asked Moslawi musician Ameen Mokdad, also known as ‘the violinist of Mosul’, what heritage he would choose; he answered bayboon flowers […, so here] I have introduced them in embroidered form. This also brings in one of Mosul’s monikers: the green city. The result of combining all these elements is, of course, an archaeological mishmash: a fantasy that would never exist in the real world. We have oversized geometry on an archway that itself is not in proportion with the sculpture with chronologically incongruent references to Hatrene, Ottoman and natural heritage. But where is the rule that my creative reappearance […] has to be realistic?

[…]

The first archway represents time before Da’esh. Iraq had been a country in conflict and under the yoke of repression for several decades before Da’esh entered the picture. Heritage in the country may not have been under the direct threat of deliberate destruction, but it had still been neglected, looted and abused in other ways by those in power. The muted colours and tones in archway 1 reflect this period of neglect: receding into the background, a mere whisper of what might be possible. When I completed the blackwork embroidery on the arch piers for this section, it felt too perfect, too pristine. There was no sense of age and time to the piece, which is a common problem for many heritage reconstructions. Using a stitch unpicker, I pulled at some of the threads, dislocating them and roughening the surface. I used the same tool to fray the aida fabric of the archway and the backing fabric inside the archway. Distressing the surface in this way is, of course, not the same as something weathering and decaying over time, but it lent some of this effect.

Rip. Stab. Slice. Tear apart. These are all actions I took on the second archway. I knew from the outset of designing this piece that it would, and had to, involve destroying the central panel. I delayed doing it, but I knew I had to do it. It was a painful and sickening act. My actions were jerky. The noise of tearing and ripping and popping was wrong for embroidery. It happened so fast. Several hours of stitching shredded in less than five minutes. Like exploding a monument. Everything about it felt wrong and out of place. My chest hurt; my heart ached. The piece became increasingly unstable, flopping around, hard to handle and control. […] I did not enjoy the process even though I knew it was important that I feel that pain, both searing and deadening, of destruction: disgusted that my own hands could engage in these acts, but knowing they also held the possibility of creative beauty. These are choices we make.

The response on Instagram was telling. ‘4 November 2021: This evening I destroyed my own work. It was a painful and sickening thing to do’ (@zenakamash). Normally when I post some of my textile art, even if rather dull, I will instantly get ‘likes’. This time silence for several hours, except a worried text from my sister: ‘you ok hun?’ Eventually, I edited my post to add: ‘this is an integral part of the final piece’. With this reassurance, people felt they could then ‘like’ what appeared at first to be a senseless act of brutality against my own work. Why such discomfort? People were ready to show outpourings of grief when they saw reports of Da’esh destruction. Was it because I am not a nameless other, but instead someone they know, who writes in English? Is it because I should treasure my own art? Should I only be making beautiful things? Filling them with joy, not pain?

The black and grey colours in the second archway represent burning and destruction as well as the predominant colour of Da’esh imagery and propaganda. The blackwork geometry on the piers on either side of the archway bleeds and blends into the colours of the periods before and after to show that these phases exist in a continuum. The conditions of the pre-Da’esh phase laid the foundations for what happened under their brutal occupation, which in itself will continue to be felt for a long time into the future. I knew from the outset that I would not be able to bring myself to damage the face of Shamash, so instead the head is veiled behind a needlelace net, again in a grey- and-black colourway. I wanted the net to draw out a sense of being trapped and imprisoned under Da’esh, hiding in fear, hoping to go unnoticed. But the net can also be moved, manipulated and lifted up; the head has a route to escape.

The final part of the triptych skips ahead in time to an unspecified point in the future where healing has started. The colours here are bright – golds, greens and blues – colours of life and vigour. The gold is used predominantly for repairs in an echoing of the Japanese concept of kintsugi: that beauty can exist in broken objects. The scars of the past are not hidden, but accepted into the life that now exists in this archway. They are part of the archway’s biography and cannot be ignored. When stitching these elements, I felt strongly that these repairs had to be done by me. There was a sense that I would feel cheated if they were done by someone else. I had to be involved. I had to feel that I had the capacity to find hope in the pain for myself. The god Shamash also shines again, in a way that has been lost for many years, gleaming with the light of hope. Around the arch, bayboon flowers grow, lending their curative and restorative properties. They represent my hope for the flourishing of Iraq’s natural and intangible heritages alongside its cultural heritage: a world in better balance. I want this archway to be a shining, life-filled beacon of hope and change.

New Texts Out Now: Mandy Turner and Cherine Hussein, guest eds. "Israel-Palestine after Oslo: Mapping Transformations in a Time of Deepening Crisis." Special Issue of Conflict, Security & Development

Conflict, Security and Development, Volume 15, No. 5 (December 2015) Special issue: "Israel-Palestine after Oslo: Mapping Transformations in a Time of Deepening Crisis," Guest Editors: Mandy Turner and Cherine Hussein.

Jadaliyya (J): What made you compile this volume?

Mandy Turner (MT): Both the peace process and the two-state solution are dead. Despite more than twenty years of negotiations, Israel’s occupation, colonization and repression continue–and the political and geographical fragmentation of the Palestinian people is proceeding apace.

This is not news, nor is it surprising to any keen observer of the situation. But what is surprising–and thus requires explanation – is the resilience of the Oslo framework and paradigm: both objectively and subjectively. It operates objectively as a straitjacket by trapping Palestinians in economic and security arrangements that are designed to ensure stabilization and will not to lead to sovereignty or a just and sustainable solution. And it operates subjectively as a straitjacket by shutting out discussion of alternative ways of understanding the situation and ways out of the impasse. The persistence of this framework that is focused on conflict management and stabilization, is good for Israel but bad for Palestinians.

The Oslo peace paradigm–of a track-one, elite-level, negotiated two-state solution–is therefore in crisis. And yet it is entirely possible that the current situation could continue for a while longer–particularly given the endorsement and support it enjoys from the major Western donors and the “international community,” as well as the fact that there has been no attempt to develop an alternative. The immediate short-term future is therefore bleak.

Guided by these observations, this special issue sought to undertake two tasks. The first task was to analyze the perceptions underpinning the Oslo framework and paradigm as well as some of the transformations instituted by its implementation: why is it so resilient, what has it created? The second task, which follows on from the first, was then to ask: how can we reframe our understanding of what is happening, what are some potential alternatives, and who is arguing and mobilizing for them?

These questions and themes grew out of a number of conversations with early-career scholars – some based at the Kenyon Institute in East Jerusalem, and some based in the occupied Palestinian territory and elsewhere. These conversations led to two interlinked panels at the International Studies Association annual convention in Toronto, Canada, in March 2014. To have two panels accepted on “conflict transformation and resistance in Palestine” at such a conventional international relations conference with (at the time unknown) early-career scholars is no mean feat. The large and engaged audience we received at these panels – with some very established names coming along (one of whom contributed to this special issue) – convinced us that this new stream of scholars and scholarship should have an outlet.  

J: What particular topics, issues, and literatures do the articles address?

MT: The first half of the special issue analyzes how certain problematic assumptions shaped the Oslo framework, and how the Oslo framework in turn shaped the political, economic and territorial landscape.

Virginia Tilley’s article focuses on the paradigm of conflict resolution upon which the Oslo Accords were based, and calls for a re-evaluation of what she argues are the two interlinked central principles underpinning its worldview: internationally accepted notions of Israeli sovereignty; and the internationally accepted idea that the “conflict” is essentially one between two peoples–the “Palestinian people” and the “Jewish people”. Through her critical interrogation of these two “common sense” principles, Tilley proposes that the “conflict” be reinterpreted as an example of settler colonialism, and, as a result of this, recommends an alternative conflict resolution model based on a paradigm shift away from an ethno-nationalist division of the polity towards a civic model of the nation.

Tariq Dana unpacks another central plank of the Oslo paradigm–that of promoting economic relations between Israel and the OPT. He analyses this through the prism of “economic peace” (particularly the recent revival of theories of “capitalist peace”), whose underlying assumptions are predicated on the perceived superiority of economic approaches over political approaches to resolving conflict. Dana argues that there is a symbiosis between Israeli strategies of “economic peace” and recent Palestinian “statebuilding strategies” (referred to as Fayyadism), and that both operate as a form of pacification and control because economic cooperation leaves the colonial relationship unchallenged.

The political landscape in the OPT has been transformed by the Oslo paradigm, particularly by the creation of the Palestinian Authority (PA). Alaa Tartir therefore analyses the basis, agenda and trajectory of the PA, particularly its post-2007 state building strategy. By focusing on the issue of local legitimacy and accountability, and based on fieldwork in two sites in the occupied West Bank (Balata and Jenin refugee camps), Tartir concludes that the main impact of the creation of the PA on ordinary people’s lives has been the strengthening of authoritarian control and the hijacking of any meaningful visions of Palestinian liberation.

The origin of the administrative division between the West Bank and Gaza Strip is the focus of Tareq Baconi’s article. He charts how Hamas’s initial opposition to the Oslo Accords and the PA was transformed over time, leading to its participation (and success) in the 2006 legislative elections. Baconi argues that it was the perceived demise of the peace process following the collapse of the Camp David discussions that facilitated this change. But this set Hamas on a collision course with Israel and the international community, which ultimately led to the conflict between Hamas and Fateh, and the administrative division, which continues to exist.

The special issue thereafter focuses, in the second section, on alternatives and resistance to Oslo’s transformations.

Cherine Hussein’s article charts the re-emergence of the single-state idea in opposition to the processes of separation unleashed ideologically and practically that were codified in the Oslo Accords. Analysing it as both a movement of resistance and as a political alternative to Oslo, while recognizing that it is currently largely a movement of intellectuals (particularly of diaspora Palestinians and Israelis), Hussein takes seriously its claim to be a more just and liberating alternative to the two-state solution.

My article highlights the work of a small but dedicated group of anti-Zionist Jewish-Israeli activists involved in two groups: Zochrot and Boycott from Within. Both groups emerged in the post-Second Intifada period, which was marked by deep disillusionment with the Oslo paradigm. This article unpacks the alternative – albeit marginalized – analysis, solution and route to peace proposed by these groups through the application of three concepts: hegemony, counter-hegemony and praxis. The solution, argue the activists, lies in Israel-Palestine going through a process of de-Zionization and decolonization, and the process of achieving this lies in actions in solidarity with Palestinians.

This type of solidarity action is the focus of the final article by Suzanne Morrison, who analyses the “We Divest” campaign, which is the largest divestment campaign in the US and forms part of the wider Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. Through attention to their activities and language, Morrison shows how “We Divest”, with its networked, decentralized, grassroots and horizontal structure, represents a new way of challenging Israel’s occupation and the suppression of Palestinian rights.

The two parts of the special issue are symbiotic: the critique and alternative perspectives analyzed in part two are responses to the issues and problems identified in part one.

J: How does this volume connect to and/or depart from your previous work?

MT: My work focuses on the political economy of donor intervention (which falls under the rubric of “peacebuilding”) in the OPT, particularly a critique of the Oslo peace paradigm and framework. This is a product of my broader conceptual and historical interest in the sociology of intervention as a method of capitalist expansion and imperial control (as explored in “The Politics of International Intervention: the Tyranny of Peace”, co-edited with Florian Kuhn, Routledge, 2016), and how post-conflict peacebuilding and development agendas are part of this (as explored in “Whose Peace: Critical Perspectives on the Political Economy of Peacebuilding”, co-edited with Michael Pugh and Neil Cooper (PalgraveMacmillan, 2008).  

My first book on Palestine (co-edited with Omar Shweiki), Decolonizing Palestinian Political Economy: De-development and Beyond (PalgraveMacmillan, 2014), was a collection of essays by experts in their field, of the political-economic experience of different sections of the Palestinian community. The book, however, aimed to reunite these individual experiences into one historical political-economy narrative of a people experiencing a common theme of dispossession, disenfranchisement and disarticulation. It was guided by the desire to critically assess the utility of the concept of de-development to different sectors and issues–and had a foreword by Sara Roy, the scholar who coined the term, and who was involved in the workshop from which the book emerged.

This co-edited special issue (with Cherine Hussein, who, at the time of the issue construction, was the deputy director of the Kenyon Institute) was therefore the next logical step in my research on Palestine, although my article on Jewish-Israeli anti-Zionists did constitute a slight departure from my usual focus.

J: Who do you hope will read this volume, and what sort of impact would you like it to have?

MT: I would imagine the main audience will be those whose research and political interests lie in Palestine Studies. It is difficult, given the structure of academic publishing – which has become ever more corporate and money grabbing – for research outputs such as this to be accessed by the general public. Only those with access to academic libraries are sure to be able to read it – and this is a travesty, in my opinion. To counteract this commodification of knowledge, we should all provide free access to our outputs through online open source websites such as academia.edu, etc. If academic research is going to have an impact beyond merely providing more material for teaching and background reading for yet more research (which is inaccessible to the general public) then this is essential. Websites such as Jadaliyya are therefore incredibly important.

Having said all that, I am under no illusions about the potential for ANY research on Israel-Palestine to contribute to changing the dynamics of the situation. However, as a collection of excellent analyses conducted by mostly early-career scholars in the field of Palestine studies, I am hopeful that their interesting and new perspectives will be read and digested. 

J: What other projects are you working on now?

MT: I am currently working on an edited volume provisionally entitled From the River to the Sea: Disintegration, Reintegration and Domination in Israel and Palestine. This book is the culmination of a two-year research project funded by the British Academy, which analyzed the impacts of the past twenty years of the Oslo peace framework and paradigm as processes of disintegration, reintegration and domination – and how they have created a new socio-economic and political landscape, which requires new agendas and frameworks. I am also working on a new research project with Tariq Dana at Birzeit University on capital and class in the occupied West Bank.

Excerpt from the Editor’s Note 

[Note: This issue was published in Dec. 2015]

Initially perceived to have inaugurated a new era of hope in the search for peace and justice in Palestine-Israel, the Oslo peace paradigm of a track one, elite-level, negotiated two-state solution is in crisis today, if not completely at an end.

While the major Western donors and the ‘international community’ continue to publicly endorse the Oslo peace paradigm, Israeli and Palestinian political elites have both stepped away from it. The Israeli government has adopted what appears to be an outright rejection of the internationally-accepted end-goal of negotiations, i.e. the emergence of a Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital. In March 2015, in the final days of his re-election campaign, Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, visited the Jewish settlement of Har Homa in Palestinian East Jerusalem, which is regarded as illegal under international law. Reminding its inhabitants that it was him and his Likud government that had established the settlement in 1997 as part of the Israeli state’s vision of a unified indivisible Jerusalem, he promised to expand the construction of settlements in East Jerusalem if re-elected. And in an interview with Israeli news site, NRG, Netanyahu vowed that the prospects of a Palestinian state were non-existent as long as he remained in office. Holding on to the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt), he argued, was necessary to ensure Israel’s security in the context of regional instability and Islamic extremism. It is widely acknowledged that Netanyahu’s emphasis on Israel’s security—against both external and internal enemies—gave him a surprise win in an election he was widely expected to lose.

Despite attempts to backtrack under recognition that the US and European states are critical of this turn in official Israeli state policy, Netanyahu’s promise to bury the two-state solution in favour of a policy of further annexation has become the Israeli government’s official intent, and has been enthusiastically endorsed by leading ministers and key advisers.

[…]

The Palestinian Authority (PA) based in the West Bank also appears to have rejected a key principle of the Oslo peace paradigm—that of bilateral negotiations under the supervision of the US. Despite a herculean effort by US Secretary of State, John Kerry, to bring the two parties to the negotiating table, in response to the lack of movement towards final status issues and continued settlement expansion (amongst other issues), the Palestinian political elite have withdrawn from negotiations and resumed attempts to ‘internationalise the struggle’ by seeking membership of international organisations such as the United Nations (UN), and signing international treaties such as the Rome Statute, the founding treaty of the International Criminal Court. This change of direction is part of a rethink in the PA and PLO’s strategy rooted in wider discussions and debates. The publication of a document by the Palestine Strategy Study Group (PSSG) in August 2008, the production of which involved many members of the Palestinian political elite (and whose recommendations were studiously discussed at the highest levels of the PA and PLO), showed widespread discontent with the bilateral negotiations framework and suggested ways in which Palestinians could ‘regain the initiative’.

[…]

And yet despite these changes in official Palestinian and Israeli political strategies that signal a deepening of the crisis, donors and the ‘international community’ are reluctant to accept the failure of the Oslo peace paradigm. This political myopia has meant the persistence of a framework that is increasingly divorced from the possibility of a just and sustainable peace. It is also acting as an ideological straitjacket by shutting out alternative interpretations. This special issue seeks a way out of this political and intellectual dead end. In pursuit of this, our various contributions undertake what we regard to be two key tasks: first, to critically analyse the perceptions underpinning the Oslo paradigm and the transformations instituted by its implementation; and second, to assess some alternative ways of understanding the situation rooted in new strategies of resistance that have emerged in the context of these transformations in the post-Oslo landscape.

[…]

Taken as a whole, the articles in this special issue aim to ignite conversations on the conflict that are not based within abstracted debates that centre upon the peace process itself—but that begin from within the realities and geographies of both the continually transforming land of Palestine-Israel and the voices, struggles, worldviews and imaginings of the future of the people who presently inhabit it. For it is by highlighting these transformations, and from within these points of beginning, that we believe more hopeful pathways for alternative ways forward can be collectively imagined, articulated, debated and built.