MY VOICE IS MY WEAPON MY VOICE IS MY WEAPON Music, Nationalism, and the Poetics of Palestinian Resistance David A. McDonald Duke University Press ✹ Durham and London ✹ 2013 © 2013 Duke University Press All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America on acid- free paper ♾ Cover by Heather Hensley. Interior by Courtney Leigh Baker Typeset in Minion Pro by Tseng Information Systems, Inc. Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data McDonald, David A., 1976– My voice is my weapon : music, nationalism, and the poetics of Palestinian resistance / David A. McDonald. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn 978-0-8223-5468-0 (cloth : alk. paper) isbn 978-0-8223-5479-6 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Palestinian Arabs—Music—History and criticism. 2. Music—Political aspects—Israel. 3. Music—Political aspects—Gaza Strip. 4. Music—Political aspects—West Bank. i. Title. ml3754.5.m33 2013 780.89′9274—dc23 2013012813 For Seamus Patrick McDonald Illustrations viii Note on Transliterations xi Note on Accessing Performance Videos xiii Acknowledgments xvii introduction ✹ 1 chapter 1. Nationalism, Belonging, and the Performativity of Resistance ✹ 17 chapter 2. Poets, Singers, and Songs ✹ 34 Voices in the Resistance Movement (1917–1967) chapter 3. Al- Naksa and the Emergence of Political Song (1967–1987) ✹ 78 chapter 4. The First Intifada and the Generation of Stones (1987–2000) ✹ 116 chapter 5. Revivals and New Arrivals ✹ 144 The al- Aqsa Intifada (2000–2010) CONTENTS chapter 6. “My Songs Can Reach the Whole Nation” ✹ 163 Baladna and Protest Song in Jordan chapter 7. Imprisonment and Exile ✹ 199 Negotiating Power and Resistance in Palestinian Protest Song chapter 8. New Directions and New Modalities ✹ 231 Palestinian Hip- Hop in Israel chapter 9. “Carrying Words Like Weapons” ✹ 262 DAM Brings Hip- Hop to the West Bank epilogue ✹ 283 Appendix: Song Lyric Transliterations 287 Notes 305 Bibliography 321 Index 329 Figure 2.1. Lake Tiberias, the Galilee, and the Israeli city Teveria as seen from Umm Qais ✹ 35 Figure 2.2. Adnan Odeh, ʿudist and composer for Firqat Aghani al- ʿAshiqin ✹ 38 Figure 3.1. Image of the fidāʾiyīn ✹ 90 Figure 3.2. Firqat Aghani al- ʿAshiqin’s Min Sijn ʿAkka cover art ✹ 107 Figure 4.1. Boom box as weapon of resistance ✹ 124 Figure 4.2. A kiss good- bye to the fighting✹ 134 Figure 4.3. Sabreen, Jay al- Hamam (Here come the doves) ✹ 137 Figure 5.1. ʿAla Abwab al- Quds (On the doors of Jerusalem), intifada song cover art ✹ 146 Figure 5.2. Damaʿ al- Aqsa (Tears of al- Aqsa), intifada song cover art ✹ 147 Figure 5.3. Mais Shalash ✹ 156 ILLUSTRATIONS Figure 6.1. Kamal Khalil ✹ 165 Figure 6.2. Baladna in performance ✹ 168 Figure 6.3. Depictions of thirst in intifada cover art, Sawt al- Hurriya (The voice of freedom) ✹ 186 Figure 7.1. Ibrahim Nasrallah ✹ 223 Figure 8.1. dam Performing in Lyd ✹ 234 Figure 8.2. Tamer Nafar ✹ 235 Figure 8.3. dam (Tamer Nafar, Suheil Nafar, Mahmoud Jrere) ✹ 244 Figure 9.1. dam (Suheil Nafar, Tamer Nafar, Mahmoud Jrere) ✹ 264 Figure 9.2. dam concert flyer in Ramallah ✹ 265 Figure 9.3. Nadi al- Braykdanz (Break-Dancing Club) ✹ 275 example 2.1. “Yama Mawil al- Hawa” ✹ 37 example 2.2. “Min Sijn ʿAkka” (From ʿAkka Prison) and Palestinian “ʿAla Dalʿuna” variant ✹ 54 example 2.3. “ʿAla Dalʿuna” melody variant ✹ 63 example 2.4. “Ya ẓarif al- ṭul” basic melody structure ✹ 65 example 3.1. Melodic and rhythmic structure of “Wayn al- Malayin?” (Where are the millions?) ✹ 100 example 3.2. “Hubbat al- Nar” (The fire swelled) in melody and rhythm✹ 109 example 3.3. “Ishhad Ya ῾Alam” (Witness oh world) in melody and rhythm ✹ 112 example 6.1. “Laya wa- Laya” ✹ 183 example 7.1. “Dawla” ✹ 201 NOTE ON TRANSLITERATIONS Transliteration of Arabic words has followed the system used by the International Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, except for colloquial Pal- estinian names, texts, and phrases for which I have adapted the system used in the Hinds and Badawi dictionary to Palestinian dialect. At times throughout the research and writing of this book it was extremely dif- ficult to distinguish between colloquial and formal texts. Throughout I have attempted to provide transliterations of popular song texts, poetry, dialogue, and commentary that remain legible to the reader while pre- serving essential aspects of dialect, accent, and inflection. However, there are several instances where song texts, slang, and other commentary re- quired a bit of creativity in transliteration. Palestinian poets, singers, and musicians are notorious for manipulating the pronunciation of their texts to fit syllabic patterns and rhyme schemes, to shield meaning from cen- sors and the secret police, and to play with words and their relations. In- sofar as is practicable, I have tried to maintain a middle ground between what was said or sung and what was meant or intended. Consistency has been difficult to maintain as artists often shift their pronunciation from performance to performance. Song titles, poetry titles, and other titles of published works have been capitalized and transliterated without diacriti- cal marks (except for ʾ and ʿ). Common names have also been capitalized throughout, transliterated, and italicized without diacritical marks (except for ʾ and ʿ). Words that appear in Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary or that have an accepted English spelling and/or pronunciation, such as Cairo, Beirut, and Yasser Arafat, remain in their familiar forms without diacrit- ics. In instances where individuals, ensembles, or other organizations have readily adopted an English transliteration (for example, El- Funoun instead of al- Fanūn), I have maintained their transliteration throughout. I adopted the same approach for the one Hebrew transliteration in this text as well. NOTE ON ACCESSING PERFORMANCE VIDEOS I have deposited a portion of my ethnographic field recordings with the evia Digital Archive Project housed at Indiana University (www.eviada .org). The evia project is a collaborative venture to establish an online digital archive of ethnographic field videotapes for use by scholars and instructors. Funded from 2001 to 2009 by the Andrew W. Mellon Foun- dation, Indiana University, and the University of Michigan, the project developed from the joint efforts of ethnographers, scholars, archivists, librarians, and information technologists to make available ethnographic field tapes for use online in teaching and research environments. How- ever, the evia project is much more than simply a digital archive. The process of depositing these recordings requires rigorous annotation and peer review whereby each performance, each song, is painstakingly docu- mented, analyzed, and fully searchable across the entire collection by various keywords and controlled vocabularies. As a companion to this text, my evia project, entitled Music, Folklore, and Nationalism among Palestinian Refugees in Amman, Jordan (2003– 2005), allows the reader to view video field recordings of many of the per- formances discussed in this monograph; easily search within the collec- tion for titles, lyrics, or artists; and quickly toggle between performances of the same songs and dances by various performers. While making their way through this monograph, readers are invited to explore this ethno- graphic video collection for further explanations, performances, and dem- onstrations of core aspects of Palestinian music and dance. Below is a list of pertinent audio/video examples available for viewing on the evia website. Each example below has been assigned a persistent uniform resource locator, or purl, which functions as a unique marker or web address for locating the audio/video example in the evia project collections. Throughout the text I have also labeled each example with a parenthetical code (e.g., evia 14- a3387). Those who wish to access the evia project collections must first create a free account by clicking “enter the archive” and then clicking the login button, which opens the “create an account” page where they may register with the evia project. Once an account has been created, the listed examples below may be easily located. Readers of the print edition of this book may access the videos by logging into the evia project and typing into their web browser the full purl ad- dress associated with a specific media example. These purl addresses are listed below as well as in the endnotes of the chapter wherein an example is discussed. A purl address includes a root that never changes and a six- digit, one-character, purl identifier at the end of the address (e.g., 14- S9030) that is unique to each specific media example. Once the full purl address has been entered, readers may view other media examples simply by replacing the unique purl identifier at the end of the address with the purl identifier of the media example they wish to view. Readers of the electronic version of this book may simply click on the purl address for each example wherever it arises; once they have logged into the evia website, this active link will take them directly to the requested media ex- ample. Once registered with evia, readers may create a playlist of events and scenes for future reference. This playlist will eliminate the need to search for each example when returning to the site. The list below, orga- nized by chapter, includes the segment title, parenthetical code, and the full purl address for each audio/video example discussed in this book. Audio and Video Examples chapter 2 evia 14- s9039 | “Yama Mawil al- Hawa” (Oh song of longing) [http://purl.dlib.indiana.edu/iudl/eviada/14-