"Jerusalem is an artistic memory". How did the Arabic song embody the chapters of the Palestinian cause?

Palestinian musician Yahya al-Lababidi (1900-1943) and the crew of Radio Jerusalem during a visit to Jaffa (social media)

"The Directorate of Endowments in the Jordanian capital Amman asked the General Directorate of Endowments in Damascus to help melt lead for the maintenance of the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque, and the General Directorate of Endowments in Damascus approved this request, and will bring a quantity of lead to Damascus to be melted in the oven of the Umayyad Mosque."

With this brief press release, which was quoted by a local Syrian newspaper in the fifties of the last century, the Palestinian-Syrian researcher and journalist Muhammad Mansour concludes his book "Jerusalem is an Artistic and Arab Memory", enabling the link between the Palestinian and Syrian artistic memories with the process of "smelting bullets that took place in Damascus for Jerusalem", thus confirming the intersection of these two memories and their fusion in one crucible throughout history, as Al-Aqsa lead melted in the Umayyad Mosque decades ago from today.

Perhaps this news was a condensed summary of what Mansour tried to prove through the last two chapters of his research book recently issued by Mosaic House for Studies and Publishing, which consists of two chapters, each of which includes two chapters and extends to 180 pages of medium cut, as the researcher in the Arab art archive in general and the Palestinian and Syrian in particular digged to prove to the reader the unity of the Arab conscience expressed artistically towards everything related to the Palestinian cause, and to highlight the centrality of Jerusalem as a city in the Arab artistic memory.

The book "Jerusalem is an artistic and Arab memory" by researcher and journalist Muhammad Mansour (Al Jazeera)

In addition to this emphasis on the unity of the Arab conscience towards the Palestinian cause, the researcher presented what looks like a guide to the Arab musical and lyrical artistic production directed to the cause and in line with its developments over 6 decades since the Nakba in 1948 until 2010, and stood through critical analysis on the most prominent transformations that accompanied that production, highlighting the development of artistic and production elements, and the contribution of some musical projects in consolidating the issue in the conscience of the Arab peoples.

Rebellion against weeping

The researcher devoted the first chapter of his book to review and analyze the vocabulary and elements of poetry, music and artistic construction that formed the distinguished project of the brothers (Mansour and Assi) Rahbani and Mrs. Fairouz, and this project consisted of 11 songs or songs through which the Lebanese trio kept pace with the Palestinian cause in its process full of transformations.

Despite the researcher's reference to the orientation of Arab artistic and lyrical production in general, after the setback in 1967, to the city of Jerusalem, which became a "collector of the throats of Arab singers" after its fall to the Israeli occupation and the accompanying emotional eruption that included the Arab world from the ocean to the Gulf, he emphasizes the distinction of the Rahbani experience in this context as the "cornerstone" of Jerusalem songs and the Palestinian cause.

The researcher saw in the Rahbaneh project the most comprehensive and qualitative in expressing the issue in its various transformations and successive chapters, and found that it is possible to approach this project according to 4 main vocabulary or themes, the first of which is asylum, where the project presented songs such as "Another Day Gone" and "Professional Sadness and Waiting", through which Al-Rahbaneh highlighted the suffering of the diaspora experienced by the refugees.

Second, the memory of the place that characterized songs such as "Ya Rabou Biladi", "Jaffa" and "Bisan", so Al-Rahbana took the nostalgia for places as a poetic basis to express the dream of return, and the third is Jerusalem, which the Lebanese trio excelled in expressing, inspiring and employing its religious and geographical symbols, so they presented songs such as "Old Jerusalem" and "Zahrat Al-Madaen", and the last of which is the dream of return and the issue that emerged clearly in songs such as "Rajoun", "We will return someday" and "The Bridge of Return".

In addition to this comprehensiveness in covering the vocabulary of the Palestinian cause, Mohammed Mansour concludes through a critical analysis of the Rahbana project that the artistic achievement of the Rahbani brothers and Sayyida Fairuz regarding Palestine achieved a breakthrough in the field of "national song" for reasons related to musical construction and poetry, that is, the ability to reconcile the vocabulary of sadness and the pain of displacement on the one hand, and the vocabulary of resistance and the right of return on the other, whether at the level of poetry or musical composition, where the classical crying that was attached to the songs of Palestinian patriotism was transcended. to a state of renewal that mixes legitimate grief with the right to resist at the same time.

Perhaps the song "Zahrat al-Mada'in", which was presented after the fall of East Jerusalem to the Zionists in 1967, is the best example of this renewal, as the musical and poetic expression mixed the state of sadness that prevailed after the setback and the occupation of Jerusalem with the state of anger, so the melody and construction, music and poem underwent a radical coup at the end of which we hear military marshals, copper trumpets and angry vocabulary that confirms that "bright anger is coming" through resistance to defeat the "face of force".

Jerusalem in Arabic Song

The researcher devoted the second chapter to analyzing the development of the presence of the city of Jerusalem and its manifestations in the Arabic song, and monitoring the most prominent lyrical artworks that made Jerusalem its subject, as the city of Jerusalem had a presence in the first songs that followed the Nakba in 1947, such as "Palestine" by Muhammad Abdel Wahab, and "Palestine and its brothers" for the success of peace.

As for the song of Palestine, composed and sung by Abdel Wahab and lyrics by the poet Ali Mahmoud Taha, it was the most famous at the time, and Jerusalem attended some verses:

My brother, Jerusalem is our
sister, for which the slaughterers have prepared our patience
for their treachery,
and we were able to monitor them.

However, according to the researcher, Jerusalem did not gain its place in the memory of Arabic song until it fell into the hands of the occupation in 1967, as songs continued to be considered "the icon that reduces Palestine to history, geography and struggle."

Among the most prominent songs of the sixties that dealt with Jerusalem was the song "Al-Masih" by Abdel Halim Hafez from the lyrics of the poet Abdul Rahman Al-Abnudi and composed by Baligh Hamdi, and this song carried connotations directed to the Christian West, which lined up with the occupation at the time, and likened the lyrics of the song with the end of the fall of Jerusalem to the second betrayal of Jesus son of Mary, peace be upon him, as well as the songs "Saha Ya Rijal" and "Quds Al-Arab" by the Syrian artist Fahd Ballan, in which he called on Palestinians to strengthen their determination in the face of the occupation.

The researcher also refers to the impact of the phenomenon of guerrilla action on Palestinian national songs after the beginning and spread of guerrilla action in the sixties of the last century and its declaration of "one way to liberate Palestine, which is the path of armed struggle."

The song "I now have a gun" stands out as one of the most influential songs in the Arab artistic memory and in support of the fedayeen action, and part of its impact lies in the fact that it brought together the three great statures um Kulthum singing and Nizar Qabbani poetry and Mohammed Abdel Wahab composed us, and stressed the song as a matter of armed struggle by saying "to Palestine one road passes through the barrel of a gun" and with time turned into one of the singing classics of the occupied territory.

The researcher concludes his chapter by pointing out that the image of Jerusalem in Arabic song has been changing and interacting with the various transformations that have affected the Palestinian cause over the decades, with which songs and poems inspired by the religious, geographical and militant elements of the city have followed, glorifying the uprisings and emphasizing the right of return, with a disparity and variation in artistic value between the old influential and the new commercially inflamed.

Syrians on the air of Jerusalem

From the artistic memory of Jerusalem, which was formed by the songs of hundreds of Arab artists over decades, Mansour moves us in the third chapter of his book to the factories of those songs and that memory, that is, to the studios of Arab radio stations that embraced dozens of singing projects for Jerusalem, so they were recorded in their moment, and broadcast to millions of Arabs through the air.

Mansour focuses on the biography of Al-Quds Radio, which was broadcast in the thirties of the last century from the city of Jerusalem, and through which we can read "the features of the biography of the Levantine renaissance and the disappearance of the boundaries separating in the crucible of the Arab renaissance openness aspiring to build and establish," according to the researcher's expression.

Although the radio was founded by the British Mandate in 1936 to serve its goals and speak its voice, it quickly became a "center of artistic radiation and voice for the Palestinians."

The assumption of the position of radio by a group of Palestinian intellectual, artistic and cultural elites contributed to making it quickly a pure Palestinian platform to express the cause of the people after the grave violations against its children, and the most prominent of these directors were the great poet Ibrahim Toukan (1905-1941), and the historian and writer Ajaj Nuwayhid (1897-1982).

Historian and writer Ajaj Nuwayhid (right) with Syrian historian Muhammad Ali Kurd (social media)

The radio attracted dozens of Arab artists, especially Syrians, so it allocated singing periods for popular singers, and broadcast CDs by Arab and Palestinian singers in its music section under the management of the Palestinian musician Yahya Lababidi (1900-1943).

Lababidi was able to dedicate weekly solo links on the radio to the Syrian composer Muhammad Abd al-Karim (1911-1989), nicknamed the "Amir al-Buzuq". In addition to the famous Syrian violinist Sami Shawa (1885-1965), to whom a performance is also dedicated every Sunday.

Syrian singer Asmahan (1912-1944) also went to Al-Quds Radio with her brother Farid al-Atrash (1917-1974), who recorded the famous song "Ya Retni Tair" on the radio.

While the Syrian composer Abdel Fattah Sukkar (1930-2008) received an administrative position in the radio, and presented through it many Syrian folk melodies and songs, such as "Shadwa Al-Bulbul a Al-Ghosn" and "If I Was Forgetful".

Thus, Al-Quds Radio turned into a fertile incubator for the manufacture of the joint Palestinian and Syrian artistic memory, taking advantage of the unity of conscience between the two peoples, before the British Mandate authorities took a decision to deport non-Palestinian Arabs in 1948 loaded on vehicles to the border, where they were thrown and left there to return to Damascus, including all the Syrians working for Al-Quds Radio.

Palestinians co-founded

The last chapter of the book is devoted to reviewing Palestinian experiences that influenced the nascent Syrian art movement in theater, cinema and television, and the contents of these arts in the founding stage, where Palestinian artists played foundational roles and made remarkable contributions to all artistic fields in Syria.

The researcher sheds light on the biography of the artist Yacoub Abu Ghazaleh (1926-1989) as one of the most prominent Palestinian artists who contributed to the renaissance of the Syrian theater, Abu Ghazaleh participated in the establishment and opening of the Syrian National Theater in 1960, and worked as a theater actor and presented works in cooperation with important Syrian names such as the late artist Nihad Kalai (1928-1993), and his credit exceeded 150 theatrical works.

Next to him is the actor Bassam Lotfi (1940-2022), who came to Damascus in the forties with his family, and founded with the Syrian actor Salim Sabri the Arab Youth Club, and was one of the co-founders of the Syrian National Theater and the Palestinian National Theater of the Palestine Liberation Organization, and Lutfi participated in prominent Syrian cinematic works, including "What is left for you (1971)", "Men under the sun (1963)", "The Deceived (1972)" and other works.

Palestinian-Syrian actor Bassam Lutfi (social media)

As for the Palestinian actor Adeeb Kaddoura, he became the first star in Syrian cinema after being presented by the late Syrian director Nabil Al-Maleh in his film Al-Fahd (1972), after which he won the championship of many famous Syrian dramas such as "The Intruder (1971)", "The Statue (1977)" and "Izz al-Din al-Qassam (1981)".

Palestinian actor Adeeb Kaddoura in the film Al-Fahd (social media)

Syrian drama has opened the door for directors of Palestinian origin, such as Palestinian director Salim Musa, who has presented a large number of prominent works such as "Warm Roots (1990)" and "The Pottery Castle (1995)", among others.

Since the forties of the last century, Palestinians have been involved in the Syrian artistic community, and later young generations of Palestinians who graduated from the Higher Institute of Dramatic Arts in Damascus have enriched Syrian theatrical, television and cinematic artistic works, most notably the director "Muthanna Sobh", the actor "Abdel Moneim Amayri", and the actress "Shukran Murtaja".

Perhaps the title chosen by the researcher for the chapter that included the last two chapters of the book "From Jerusalem to Damascus and vice versa" was the threshold through which Mansour summarized the summary of his research diligence in emphasizing the intertwining of the artistic and cultural memory of the two peoples to reflect their unity in identity, conscience and struggle.

Mohammed Mansour is a Palestinian-Syrian researcher, critic, journalist and documentary producer, born in Damascus in 1970, who has published extensively on short stories, literary and artistic criticism, and heritage research.

Source : Al Jazeera