An acclaimed economist and lifelong Palestinian nationalist Yusif Sayigh (1916-2004) came of age at a time of immense political change in the Middle East. Born in al-Bassa, near Acre in northern Palestine, he was witness to the events that led to the loss of Palestine and
his memoir therefore constitutes a vivid social history of the region, as well as a revealing firsthand account of the Palestinian national movement almost from its earliest inception. Family and everyday life, co-villagers, landscapes, pleasures, outings, schooling, and political figures recreate the vanished world of Sayigh’s formative years in the Levant. An activist in Palestine, he was taken prisoner of war by the Israelis in 1948. Later, as an economist, he wrote extensively on Arab oil, economic development, and manpower, teaching for many years at the American University of Beirut and taking early retirement in 1974 to work as a consultant for a number of pan-Arab and international organizations. A single chapter on Palestinian politics provides insights into his later activist work and experiences of working as a consultant with the Palestine Liberation Organization to produce an economic plan for an eventual Palestinian state. This fascinating memoir by a pioneer and major figure of the Palestinian national movement is a welcome addition to the growing literature on Palestinian life during the first half of the twentieth century as well as an account of some of the most pressing political and economic issues to have faced the Arab world for the better part of the twentieth century.
Table of Content
Introduction Chapter 1:
Earliest memories, Kharaba, 1918 -1925 Chapter 2
: Al-Bassa, 1925-1930 Chapter 3:
Boarding school, Sidon, 1929-1934 Chapter 4:
Tiberias, as a boy, 1930-1938 Chapter 5:
At AUB, 1934-1938 Chapter 6:
Ain Qabu; first job; work for the PPS, 1938-1939 Chapter 7:
Teacher in Iraq, 1939-1940 Chapter 8
: Life in Tiberias as an adult, 1940-1944 Chapter 9:
Jerusalem, 1944-1948 Chapter 10
:
Prisoner of war, May 1948 – spring 1949 Chapter 11:
‘
Life will never be the same without her’: Um Yusif’s death (December 1950) Chapter 12:
Palestinian Politics Epilogue:
‘Bread with Dignity: Yusif Sayigh as an Arab Economist
About the author
Rosemary Sayigh, the wife of Yusif Sayigh, is an oral historian and anthropologist and the author of
Palestinians: From Peasants to Revolutionaries,
Too Many Enemies: The Palestinian Experience in Lebanon, and
Voices: Palestinian Women Narrate Displacement. She is a currently visiting professor at the Center for Arab and Middle Eastern Studies at the American University of Beirut.
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