A Girl's Paradise Lost

Book excerpt: Sitt Zubaida’s idyllic childhood on the al-Ajami Beach in Jaffa is nothing short of paradise. She spends her days with her loving family and with the enchanting sea, and spends her nights reading novels, immersing herself in stories of romance. But Sitt Zubaida’s world is changed with the arrival of the Palestinian Nakba in 1948, and her paradise is lost forever. The girl and her family join the more than 750,000 Palestinian Arabs displaced from their homes. Due to the tumultuous Israel-Palestine conflict, Sitt Zubaida and her family move from home to home, city to city, and country to country, causing years of anguish as she reflects on what was and yearns to return to her paradise. The partly autobiographical, partly fictionalized narrative of daily life and family traditions before and after the Nakba is interspersed with nostalgic memories and emotional reflections. Sitt Zubaida’s story captures the deeply human experience of loss and displacement, combined with a love and longing that can never be extinguished. A Girl’s Paradise Lost shines a humanizing light on the personal and social impact of a tragedy too often ignored in political accounts of historic Palestine and portrayals of Palestinians as either victims or terrorists.