The Many Lives of Gaza: Refugee camps, resilience and the Right of Return

The Many Lives of Gaza narrates the story of Palestine through the daily life of Gazans who, like all Palestinians, have endured colonial violence from the Israeli state. The material displayed in the exhibition shows that the personal is often political, especially for indigenous people under colonization, as in the case of Palestine. This exhibition reflects Gaza’s life in refugee camps, acts of resilience, and Palestinians' longing for return to their villages of origin.

The exhibition hosts film photos taken in various refugee camps around the Gaza Strip, archived by the Palestinian Museum in its digital collections. Most photos were taken in 1987, the same year of the first intifada or ‘shaking off’ in Arabic, by French photographer Joss Dray, while others were captured by Palestinian photojournalist Yousif Qutob in the 1970s. Sadly, the names of most of the subjects nor their current whereabouts are unknown. The focus on Gaza not only presents the area’s context; it also shows a wider Palestinian reality in which people experience different forms and realities of Israeli apartheid. In 1948, over 202,000 Palestinians from across Palestine were expelled by Israel and made refugees in the Gaza Strip in eight refugee camps: Jabalia, Shati, Nuseirat, al-Bureij, al-Maghazi, Deir al-Balah, Khan Yunis, and Rafah refugee camps. The photographs in this exhibition were taken in various camps around the Gaza Strip, portraying various aspects of daily life for Gazans. New camps have been established since October 7th 2023 for Gazans displaced by the ongoing Israeli assault. Today, refugees form 2/3 of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million people, most of whom have now been displaced. 

Through oral histories captured in the videos in the exhibition, Gazan refugees take us to the cities and villages from which they were displaced and talk about what return has meant to them, their parents and grandparents. These intimate interviews recorded by the Palestinian Museum in 2013 expose visitors to stories of displacement and journeys of temporary return. Gazans reflect upon valuable objects which they have preserved, connecting them to their homeland and villages and cities of origin. The right to return has been key to Palestinian Gazans, who organized the peaceful Great March of Return in 2018. The protests called for an end of the Israeli siege of the Strip and the right of refugees to go home. Combining archival photos, videos and artworks, stories of refugees in the Gaza Strip are narrated and contextualized with factual infographics from Visualising Palestine.

Palestinians continue to live in this land, challenging colonial realities with resilience. Despite the often-heard claims in Western discourse, this exhibition asserts that it’s not complicated: against colonial greed and violence, a people has struggled for their liberation for over 75 years. The Many Lives of Gaza is a 21 Artists project co-curated by Nadine Aranki and Dr Meg Peterson. 

The exhibition was shown in London at Bermondsey Project Space from 4-6th January and 8-16th February in Birmingham at the Museum of Islamic Arts & Heritage.