Memory Wrestles with Truth

Thinking about the preservation of memory and what happens when that connection severs.

Umar, our guide, walking us step by step over the rocky terrain of Lifta, explaining how each disappeared village is meticulously recorded, preserved, named once again. They become, again, dots on a map, destinations now accessible by internet. Hauled out of strategic obscurity. Restored. Sixty down, 90% remaining.

Dr. Ruchama Marton, diminutive founder of Physicians for Human Rights - Israel, embodying the burden of memory’s demands. She challenges us to resist complicity and historical obliteration. “Change does not come when we are comfortable.”

Here, memory wrestles with truth. Here live people defined and catalyzed by history. Soon we who visit return to a culture unmoored by historical amnesia. Our screens change so rapidly we cannot remember what happened last week, what constituted the truth of the last crisis. How do we act if we cannot remember who we were? 

Meanwhile Umar records and Ruchama stands witness.