Stereotypes and demonization in contemporary Palestinian literature in Jordan: Israel and the Israelis in the works of Samia ʿAtʿut

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article examines the way in which the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Israel and the Israelis are reflected in contemporary Palestinian writing in Jordan, taking the work of Nablus-born Jordanian author Samia ʿAtʿut as a case study. The article shows how, on the one hand, ʿAtʿut uses literary writing as a tool to reflect the mood of the people in relation to the Palestinian issue. On the other hand, through writing full of obscurity, sophistry and deception, and by the incorporation of political-national texts within collections of stories dealing mainly with social issues, ʿAtʿut manages to prevent her writing from being perceived as ideological, and transforms her work into texts that carry a deep and universal social message. The article shows that the Israel-Jordan peace agreement, the Jordanian establishment’s changing attitudes toward Israel, the contemporary trends of ‘personal’ literary writing, and the attempt to understand the ‘other’ that exists in the literary works of other contemporary female writers – all fail to overcome the writer’s abrasive opinions, which she expresses in seemingly ideological writing.