Occupied from within: Embodied memories of occupation, resistance andsurvival among the Palestinian diaspora

Dominika Blachnicka-Ciacek

Abstract

This article explores the relationship between the body, memory and past violence. Drawing on the narratives ofPalestinians who grew up in the occupied Palestinian territories, but who are now living in Poland and the UK, itexamines how their bodies serve as vehicles for remembering their life under occupation. These memories ofharassment, control and fear, which are mediated through their bodies, reveal the all-encompassing character ofthe Israeli occupation that has accompanied them through their childhood and adolescence. This article ex-amines how these‘body memories’continue to affect participants' present, arguing that the memories of pastviolence need to be considered when analysing how migrants transition to new environments. The article closeswith a reflection on the subversive potential of migrants' affective bodies as sites of‘counter-memories’thatspeak against the ongoing practices of Palestinian dispossession. These arguments are based on a two-year,multi-sited ethnography, which included oral histories from three generations of Palestinian refugees and mi-grants, as well as their descendants, who are now living in Poland and the UK.