After 180 countries ratified its inscription on the World Heritage List
Palestinian Embroidery...From the Fingers of Displaced Women to the "UNESCO" List
The art of Palestinian embroidery connects generations with the heritage of our ancestors.
Emirates today
Maha Al-Sakka: "Our Palestinian dress is a story of a rooted history and a civilized heritage, and it is our weapon and one of the aspects of our struggle."
The art of embroidery tells the story of Palestinian villages and cities.
Emirates today
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Zuhair Dolah À The Palestinian Territories With her fingers crossed by the pain of displacement and asylum, the Palestinian need, Ibtihaj Dolah (Umm Mustafa), who is 89 years old, weaves the traditional Palestinian dress for all her granddaughters and daughters, to link them to the history of their homeland Palestine and its cultural heritage.
The Palestinian need to wear the Palestinian peasant dress on all occasions, due to its close connection with the art of embroidery that she inherited from her mother before the displacement from the city of Jaffa in 1948, where she transferred the heritage of Jaffa to the Gaza Strip after the Palestinian Nakba, and despite the passage of decades, women continue to live in all Palestinian cities , to practice the art of embroidery, and pass it on to the generations, to link the grandchildren directly to the land of the fathers and grandfathers.
Preserving this civilized art made it top the lists of international institutions’ attention. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) announced the registration of Palestinian embroidery art and its heritage on the list of the intangible world heritage, and the announcement of this event, titled “From the Palestinian Heritage Campaign to the List ( UNESCO) is representative of the intangible cultural heritage of humanity.
On December 15, 2021, during the sixteenth session of the Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage, held at UNESCO headquarters in Paris, the art of embroidery in Palestine, practices, skills, knowledge and rituals were added to the Representative List of the Heritage the intangible cultural heritage of humanity, with the ratification of this Convention by 180 countries.
Historic achievement
The Palestinian Mrs. Ghada Abdel Hadi, from the city of Nablus in the northern West Bank, director of the Hawa Center for Culture and Arts, celebrated the registration of Palestinian embroidery art on the UNESCO list, in her own way. Simultaneously with this event, she launched an initiative entitled “Wear like who is like you,” to support the art of Palestinian embroidery and its encouragement, especially the traditional traditional dress, which was worn by Palestinian women hundreds of years ago.
Abdel Hadi told "Emirates Today", in an exclusive interview, "The inclusion of the art of embroidering the Palestinian dress on the list of world heritage is an important and historical achievement that must be built on in the present and the future, so that the Palestinian heritage can roam the countries of the world as a whole."
It stresses the importance of UNESCO's recognition of the art of embroidery at this particular time, when cultural heritage, historical heritage, culture and Palestinian rights are facing forgery, theft, and destruction, stressing the need to work hard and diligently to protect Palestinian heritage, and to preserve social practices and rituals, which it inherits. generations of parents and grandparents.
Abdel-Hadi says, “The Israeli occupation has a settlement policy that expropriates the land and the displacement of the population, and obliterates the cultural and civilizational identity of our Palestinian people, and attributes it to itself, and is trying to convince the world with false allegations that it has a long history, and the excavations that threaten the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque are but one of these attempts. Through which he tampers to find any trace that supports his Zionist narrative.”
She points out that the occupation deliberately theft of Palestinian heritage, by distorting folk costumes, inserting decorative units, establishing embroidery workshops, participating in international fashion shows, claiming that these costumes are from its heritage, buying old Palestinian embroideries, disposing of them, and ensuring that no trace of them remains. .
Abdel-Hadi explains that the occupation distorted the general shape of the Palestinian dress, by transforming the places of decoration, and changing the names and shapes of the decorative units, adding, “In spite of this, the heritage of the Holy Lands remained steadfast, resilient to breakage and extinction.”
Another fighter
Maha Al-Saqa, Director of the Palestinian Heritage Center in Bethlehem in the West Bank, has been practicing the art of Palestinian heritage embroidery for 31 years, where she weaves and weaves traditional dresses in all its forms, according to the customs and traditions of various Palestinian villages and towns, especially those displaced during the Nakba of 1948.
Al-Sakka told "Emirates Today" in an exclusive interview, "I started practicing the art of Palestinian embroidery when I felt that we had a different kind of struggle, in order to document the civilization of the Palestinian people that spanned thousands of years, and to preserve their historical heritage, where embroidery and weaving of traditional heritage dress, One of its pillars.
She added, "Our Palestinian dress is a tale of a rooted history and a civilized heritage. It is our weapon and one of the aspects of our struggle to defend the ancient history of our Palestinian people, and to protect this heritage from theft and extinction. We have proven to the whole world that the heritage of embroidery was acquired by instinct, through successive generations.”
Al-Saqa points out that the Palestinian woman wrote her history through her dress, which narrates the story of each Palestinian village, indicating that each city is famous for its own dress and the customs and traditions of its residents. of trees.
She says, "While Jericho, the oldest city on Earth, whose history extends back ten thousand years, is famous for its longitudinal Canaanite dress embroidered with geometric shapes, while the occupied city of Beersheba, its women were famous for wearing the embroidered dress in red, and in their divorce they wear the dress in blue, and when they marry again, they are embroidered." Her dress is of many colors.
Over the past years, Al-Saqa has conducted several field research in Palestinian villages and camps in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, the city of Jerusalem, and the occupied Palestinian territories, to discover that what women care about most is their dress, which they began to wear as a child, and it is the same that She was adorned by her mother and grandmother.
• "UNESCO" announced the registration of Palestinian embroidery art and its heritage on the list of intangible world heritage. The announcement came under the title "From the Palestinian Heritage Campaign to the (UNESCO) Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity."
Ghada Abdel Hadi:
• “Inclusion of the art of Palestinian thobe embroidery on the World Heritage List is an important and historical achievement.”
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