The Violence of Representation: The (Un) Narration of Palestine in Public Discursive Space in Canada

The thesis examines representations of Palestine and Palestinians in Canada by drawing on the historical literature, statements from Canadian officials, media items, and through interviews conducted with Palestinian exiles in London and Toronto. Based on this research, I argue that the colonization of Palestine went, and still goes, hand in hand with a particular narrative construction in North America. I propose that the pervasiveness of Zionist discourse in Canada is sustained by drawing on three main ideas or sources: a long colonial and Orientalist tradition (which sees Arabs and Muslims as the uncivilized and inferior others of Europeans), the instrumentalization of particular Biblical stories, and a narrative of eternal Jewish and Israeli victimhood. These powerful and pervasive narratives have displayed remarkable historical continuity, as they are reproduced in ways which appeal to Canadian national mythologies at given historical moments

Excavating Zion: Archaeology and Nation-making in Palestine/Israel

This paper demonstrates that archaeological discourse and practice in Palestine/Israel is intertwined with a nation-making project of settler colonialism that contains both spatial and temporal dimensions. This project primarily serves to invent a link between the ancient Israelite past and the modern Israeli state, presenting colonization as “return” to “the homeland” through familiar narratives of frontier settlement. This article proposes that Israeli archaeological practices not only help to reproduce these narratives, but also participate in the inscription of the national territory as Jewish, and the consequent dispossession of the Palestinian

Excavating Zion: Archaeology and Nation-making in Palestine/Israel

This paper demonstrates that archaeological discourse and practice in Palestine/Israel is intertwined with a nation-making project of settler colonialism that contains both spatial and temporal dimensions. This project primarily serves to invent a link between the ancient Israelite past and the modern Israeli state, presenting colonization as “return” to “the homeland” through familiar narratives of frontier settlement. This article proposes that Israeli archaeological practices not only help to reproduce these narratives, but also participate in the inscription of the national territory as Jewish, and the consequent dispossession of the Palestinian