Summary
Palestinian intellectual living in the United States since the 1940s, quoted by Christison on the demand that Palestinians be ‘moderate’ to be heard (Perceptions of Palestine, lines 1578-1620).
Details
- Sharabi: the difference between Palestinian moderation and Israeli moderation has always lain primarily in the desire of the Palestinians to remember and of the Israelis to forget (Perceptions of Palestine, lines 1578-1620).
- “I know moderation through direct experience”, he wrote. “Like many Palestinians in the United States, I had to be ‘moderate’ to be heard, that is, to be allowed to tell our side of the story. … This meant, above all, restricting our discourse to the practicalities of the present and always refraining from dredging up the past. What was the point in talking about 1948, about the dispossession, expulsion, exile, and suffering of the Palestinians, when Jews could talk about the Holocaust?” (Perceptions of Palestine, lines 1578-1620)