Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-cc8bf7c57-n7pht Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-10T18:15:38.037Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

1 - Dispossession and Displacement within the Contemporary Middle East: An Overview of Theories and Concepts

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2012

Dawn Chatty
Affiliation:
University of Oxford
Get access

Summary

We came in carts – big carts – we didn't stop. Eating and drinking were all done in the carts – all the way from Abkhazia to Sham [Syria]. What can I say? Death would have been much better. When a person dies, he is rested. But those grandfathers of ours suffered a lot, as no other people ever did. They came from Abkhazia in carts, as I told you, all the way through Turkey to the Jaulan. In the Jolan, you know, it was like implanting a piece of wood in a member of your body. If a piece of wood were inserted in your arm, would your arm accept it? It has been continuous tragic mishaps and suffering. Then, just when we started to belong, to become rested, and as if to make things worse, the Jews took over and we were driven out. We left the Jolan empty-handed with nothing but the clothes on our backs.

Abdul-Salam (2005)

INTRODUCTION

Abdul-Salam was 93 years old when he recalled the story of his parents' and grandparents' dispossession, eviction, and forced march out of the Northern Caucasus at the end of the nineteenth century during one of the many Russian–Ottoman wars. The Russian Imperial Empire, determined to expand south and west, had conquered the Ottoman Empire's borderlands in Abkhazia, sending hundreds of thousands of Muslim peasant and Jewish artisanal and trader families south and west into Anatolia and the Syrian provinces of the Ottoman Empire.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×