Under the Mermaid Flag: Achzivland and the performance of micronationality on ancestral Palestinian land.

Philip Hayward

doi:10.1344/co20192772-89

Abstract

This article considers the relationship between symbolism, interpretation and grounded reality with regard to “Achzivland,” a small area on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean that was declared an independent micronation in 1972. The article commences by identifying the principal geo-political and military factors that created the terrain for the enactment of fantasy utopianism, namely the forced removal of the area’s Palestinian population in 1948 and the nature of Israeli occupation and management of the region since. Following this, the article shifts to address related symbolic/allusive elements, including the manner in which a flag featuring a mermaid has served as the symbol for a quasi-national territory whose founder — Eli Avivi — has been compared to the fictional character Peter Pan, and his fiefdom to J.M. Barrie’s fictional “Never Never Land”. Consideration of the interconnection of these (forceful and figurative) elements allows the discourse and rhetoric of Achzivland’s micronationality to be contextualised in terms of more concrete political struggles in the region.

Highlights

Over the last 50 years, the term “micronation” has been applied to usually small territories that have been declared independent by their inhabitants
In the early 21st century it has occupied a problematic position as a micronation affectionately tolerated by a nation-state that remains resolutely opposed to statehood for the population of its two major Palestinian enclaves, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip
As the above discussion has identified, Achzivland owes its existence to the dispossession of the Palestinian population who resided in the area until 1948 and its whimsical enclavity within the contemporary nation-state of Israel is entirely rooted in a recent process of dispossession

Summary

Introduction

Over the last 50 years, the term “micronation” has been applied to usually (but not exclusively) small territories that have been declared independent by their inhabitants. Achzivland was established in a small area of Israel’s far north coast, immediately to the north of the historical site of Achziv2 (from which the micronation takes its name) and south of the highly sensitive Lebanese border region (Figure 1), which has been the site of recurrent clashes between Palestinian guerrilla groups and the Israeli armed forces since the 1940s.

Results

Conclusion