5,99 €
Mehr erfahren.
- Herausgeber: Spines
- Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
- Sprache: Englisch
Haifa has become the most comfortable and sought‐after destination for LGBT asylum seekers from the West Bank and the Gaza Strip thanks to its status as a mixed city of Jews and Arabs. Sami fell in love with its streets, its Arab neighborhoods, its Eastern restaurants serving tasty and familiar food, the Haifa Bay as seen from the Independence Shield, and of course with the sea that was always there, like a promise that everything was still possible…
Nimaar was born as Sami in a small Palestinian village near Ramallah into a reality of violence. His abusive and estranged father, clashes with the Israeli Army, and persecution due to rumors about his sexual orientation turned his childhood into a living hell. He manages to find solace on the football field, but when his sexual identity is exposed and the danger to his life becomes clear, he has no choice but to flee to Israel, a place he had always seen as a cruel enemy. In Haifa, he tastes freedom for the first time and meets LGBT youth from the territories and Israel. Yet even there, he discovers that the past does not let him go and continues to haunt him.
"Korak'ah" is a stirring and heartfelt novel about loneliness, survival, and courage, and about the relentless pursuit of freedom and a safe haven.
Eli Avraham was born in 1960 and raised in Beit Dagan., He is a graduate of the agricultural program at the religious youth village "Kfar Hassidim", completed his archival studies at "David Yellin College", and worked for approximately 33 years in the emergency department at "Assaf Harofeh Hospital" and in outpatient clinics. Divorced, a father of seven children and a grandfather to four grandchildren.
Das E-Book können Sie in Legimi-Apps oder einer beliebigen App lesen, die das folgende Format unterstützen:
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025
Ähnliche
Kurkaah
Kurkaah
Eli Avraham
Eli Avraham
Kurkaah
All rights reserved
Copyright © 2025 by Eli Avraham
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
Published by Spines
ISBN: 979-8-89950-758-8
Contents
Prologue
1. Rumors
2. The Reign of Fear
3. Harvest in Toubas
4. A Journey to One's Roots
5. Sabah’s Final Battle
6. Gateway to Hope
7. A Surprise Encounter in Ramallah
8. The Arrest
9. A Meeting at the Checkpoint
10. The Humiliation in Manara Square
11. The Mute Shepherd
12. Lynching
13. Redemption
14. City of Refuge
15. Memorial Park
16. Trap in the Park
17. Ghosts from the Past
18. To Reach Happiness
19. Cabaret in the Lower City
20. The Dream and Its Demise
21. A Visit to the Homeland
22. Drifting to Haifa
23. Identity Amidst the Shadows
24. The Cave in Dehisha
25. On the Horizon
26. Into the Unknown
27. Canada
28. Welcome in the Name of God
Prologue
The animal that Nimaar loved most was the turtle, “Kurkaah” in Arabic. It was no accident that he chose it in particular – there is a precise analogy and a deep, almost painful symbolism between the turtle, which carries its home on its back, and Nimaar and his friends, the members of the Palestinian LGBT community.
Like the turtle, they too lack a permanent home. But while the turtle always has its natural shield in the form of its shell, they are defenseless, deprived of even the most basic sense of security, vulnerable and exposed to danger at every moment and in every place.
Even in Israel, which offered them temporary refuge, the state of alert never waned. They were always on guard, tense, and ready to protect themselves against a multitude of threats, not infrequently even from those closest to them, and sometimes even from their own family members.
Indeed, it seemed as though the saying, “Wherever I lay my hat – that’s my home,” had been written for them.
Rumors
Sami was born in the village of Beit Sira, not far from the town of Salfit near Ramallah. As long as his mother, Sabah —may Allah have mercy on her —still lived, there was someone to defend him against his father. His father, Yousef, was cruel and tempestuous like no other, and woe to anyone who was around him when he was angry. He used to beat his family members with brutality—his late wife, his sons, and his daughters.
Everyone suffered under the lash of his arm—through beatings, curses, and humiliations—but Sami suffered more than anyone else. It seemed as though his father detested him with all his might. Thus, in his own home, Sami experienced not a single moment of mercy, not a drop of warmth or love. His beloved mother bore the marks of the beatings on her body for years. With unimaginable courage, she always stood as a barrier between him and his raging father, absorbing the punches and kicks that were meant for him.
None of the other household members—not the brothers, not the sisters, not even the extended family—dared to defy the father’s harsh violence. Everyone was deathly afraid of him and had accepted their fate. The community, too, chose to turn a blind eye. Even the neighbors, who lived right next to the family’s house, would shut their windows to avoid hearing. Nevertheless, the cries and wails from within the house still managed to reach them.
Yousef sensed, perhaps instinctively, that there was something different about his son, though he did not yet know what it was. Until his secret was revealed, Sami served as his primary punching bag. But the rumor about him soon broke out and spread like wildfire through the thickets of Beit Sira. According to the village gossip, he and young Nasr, the caretaker of the Abu Bakr Mosque, were regularly engaged in sexual relations. Sami had volunteered for cleaning duties at the mosque after the Friday prayers, and, according to the rumor, the two would isolate themselves in Nasr’s small room on the outskirts of the mosque, where they fulfilled their desires.
With the untimely death of his sorrowful mother and the spreading rumor in the village about his forbidden affair with Nasr, Sami was left completely alone in the struggle. There was no one to protect him. His older brothers were so terrified of their father that they did everything to distance themselves from him, while his sisters either ignored him or fled the house the moment the beatings began. Even the neighbors had gotten used to it—when they heard heartbreaking cries and sobbing, they just shut their windows or left their houses.
Sami had no choice but to flee from home and live on the street for a while. Anything waiting for him out there was preferable to being his father’s punching bag. He wandered through the hills for hours, rode his bicycle, but above all, he did the one thing that brought him moments of happiness—he played football. For hours on end, he played on every field and in every kind of weather, channeling all the pain, fear, and frustration he carried within him through the game.
Ironically, it was the rumor about his forbidden relationship with Nasr—which he had tried to deny for fear of his father—that drove him to excel extraordinarily in sports, particularly in football. After all, lovers of men are not, it would seem, inclined toward ball games. But Sami was strong, and he quickly mastered every technique of the game. He controlled the ball perfectly with both feet, was astonishingly fast, and achieved an exceptional command of every nuance of play. For him, football became a temporary escape from the violence he endured at home.
A month after Sami left home, late one night, soldiers broke into Beit Sira. Young men from the village who noticed them approached and hurled Molotov cocktails at the soldiers. In response, gunfire was opened upon them, and Nasr was struck in the abdomen. He was rushed to a hospital near Salfit, but after prolonged resuscitation attempts, the doctors were forced to pronounce him dead.
