Cultural Resistance

Photo by Steve P.

In Ramallah, some of us met with leaders at the Popular Art Center. Their oral presentation focused on the Dabke, Palestine's national dance , an important art of cultural resistance.

This experience was extended and enriched with our time in Deheisheh Camp where the Shoruq youth dance troupe performed Dabke for us with pride and joy on their faces, and, with an energy of resistance.

Then, they gave us the gift of a Dabke workshop to teach us the basics, and we all danced together! By the end of my experience in the Creative Resistance Delegation, I concluded that dance is the strongest of all the arts during siege because it keeps the culture alive, it can never be erased as a mural can, and, it offers a physical outlet from the stress and trauma of Occupation.