My Arab Heritage
Azi Khalili [International Liberation Reference Person for South, Central, and West Asian-Heritage People] recently led a group of Arab Co-Counselors. We were from six countries and three continents. She asked us to tell our stories as Arab people. We also discharged on the U.S.-backed war in Israel and Palestine.
My story as an Arab American woman has everything to do with assimilation. My family did not want me to know that we were Arab. We are Arab Christians (Maronite Catholics) who left Lebanon and Syria about a century ago and were targeted for being Christian. The most important thing for my ancestors was their religion, so my heritage was primarily passed on to me through Catholicism. This was clear to me when I went back to our villages in 2008. I attended mass at a Maronite Catholic church and understood everything that was happening, even though I don’t speak Arabic.
Recently, after a South, Central, West Asian, and North African support group, I gained enough hope and confidence to ask my aunt something about our family. I found that she is willing to talk about our culture if it’s about the food. So I’m learning how to cook Arabic food. I am a female who rejected “women’s work” (work women are traditionally made to do), and it has been a contradiction [to distress] to take an interest in cooking. I recently had a big session about it at a women’s workshop. Afterward I was able to shop at an Arabic market near my house. I typically feel heartache going there because of what I’ve lost. I don’t know how to use the spices or speak Arabic. Last week it was much easier. I have to keep discharging both on the erasure of my culture and on embracing it.
I was more numb than usual the last few weeks, as the U.S.-funded war escalated in Palestine and Israel. I found myself stubbornly refusing to discharge. The heartbreak felt too unbearable—especially when considering the magnitude of the loss of Palestinian lives; COVID in India, where my close friend just lost two family members; and the passing of a close Co-Counseling buddy. I thought the despair might consume me. Thankfully, I finally gave in and started discharging on things being unfair and feeling helpless and responsible (what a terrible combination). I went back to my earliest memory of learning about the inequality in the world: I’d been a girl who was aware of being a USer with privilege but I’d had no idea what to do about it. I cried hard saying, “I don’t know what to do” (which I once heard Tim Jackins say is an important session to have, because as young people we really didn’t know what to do).
The more sessions I have, the more actions I find I can take, including reaching out to Palestinian female friends and donating to non-profits in Palestine. I will continue to do all of this.
Los Angeles, California, USA
Reprinted from the RC e-mail discussion list for leaders of South, Central, and West Asian-heritage people
(Present Time 204, July 2021)