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Elias Shoufani

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Elias Shoufani
Born
Elias Shukri Shoufani

1932
Mi'ilya, Mandatory Palestine
Died26 January 2013 (aged 80–81)
Damascus, Syria
Alma mater
Years active1960s–1980s
Political partyFatah (until 1983)
Academic background
ThesisAl-Riddah and the Muslim Conquest of Arabia (1968)
Academic work
DisciplineHistory
Sub-disciplineHistory of Islam
Institutions

Elias Shoufani (Arabic: إلياس شوفاني; 1932–26 January 2013) was a Palestinian author and historian whose studies were mostly about the history of Islam and the Israeli affairs. He was one of the leading Arab scholars in the latter topic.[1] He was a member of the Fatah movement until 1983 when he joined the dissident group in Damascus, becoming part of the Fatah upraising.

Early life and education

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Shoufani was born in Mi'ilya in the Galilee in 1932.[2][3] His father, Shukri, was a community leader in Mi'ilya which was a Christian Arab village.[4][5] Elias had two brothers, Naim and Muhanna.[6] The family owned a flour mill in the Wadi al-Qarn stream.[5][6]

Their home in Mi'ilya was demolished by the Israel Defense Forces in 1948.[4][6] The Israeli soldiers killed Nimr, the dog of the family, who was trying to protect the house.[6] Elias and his family had to leave Mi'ilya after this incident on 30 October 1948.[5]

Shoufani graduated from the Teachers' Institute in Jaffa in 1949.[7] He received a degree from the Hebrew University in 1962.[7] He obtained a master's degree in 1965 and a PhD in Islamic studies in 1968 from Princeton University.[7]

Career and activities

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Shoufani worked as a teacher from 1949 to 1951.[7] He worked at the Georgetown University and then at the University of Maryland, College Park as a faculty member between 1967 and 1972.[7][8] In the latter he worked as an associate professor of history.[1][9] He left his teaching post and settled in Beirut in 1972.[2] There he worked at the Institute for Palestine Studies (IPS) as a translator and was named as the head of the IPS's research department in 1973 which he held until 1982.[7] He also worked for the Palestine Liberation Organization Center in Beirut.[10] He became a member of the Fatah's Revolutionary Council in 1980.[7]

Shoufani left Beirut in 1982 when the Palestinian revolutionaries was forced to leave Lebanon.[2] He settled in Damascus, Syria, and continued to work for the IPS.[7] He became a member of the dissident group, known as Fatah Intifada, against the Fatah leadership.[7] However, he left the group and focused on his studies.[7]

Work

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Shoufani is one of the Palestinian scholars who analysed the causes and outcomes of the Nakba.[11] He published books and articles on the history of the Middle East and Palestine. One of his books is Al-Riddah and the Muslim Conquest of Arabia (1973) which was an extended version of his PhD thesis.[8][12] He published an autobiography in Arabic in 2009.[13] He translated Mudhakkirāt Simsār Arāḍı̄ Ṣuhyūnı̄ (Arabic: Memoirs of a Zionist land broker) in 2010.[12]

Personal life and death

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Shoufani was married to an American woman, and they divorced before he left the US.[14] He later married Yasmine, an American woman of Palestinian origin.[14][15] They had two daughters.[14]

Shoufani died of a heart attack in Damascus on 26 January 2013.[7]

Legacy

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His daughter, Hind Shoufani, produced a documentary, Trip Along Exodus, in memory of Elias Shoufani. It was premiered at the Dubai International Film Festival in December 2014.[14][16]

References

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  1. ^ a b Sherene Seikaly (2022). "In the Shadow of War: The Journal of Palestine Studies as Archive". Journal of Palestine Studies. 51 (2): 13. doi:10.1080/0377919X.2022.2050630.
  2. ^ a b c Rashid Khalidi. "In Remembrance: Elias Shoufani". Institute for Palestine Studies. Retrieved 8 November 2023. Citing Journal of Palestine Studies 42(3), Spring 2013
  3. ^ Elias Shoufani (Summer 1972). "The Fall of a Village". Journal of Palestine Studies. 1 (4): 108–121. doi:10.2307/2535666. JSTOR 2535666.
  4. ^ a b Shoukri Abed (1979). "Galilee Village Fights Israeli Land Grab". Middle East Report (83): 25. doi:10.2307/3012398. JSTOR 3012398.
  5. ^ a b c Kobi Peled (2016). "The Battle of Red Hill: A Little-Known Episode of the 1948 War". Journal of Palestine Studies. 46 (1): 21, 24. doi:10.1525/jps.2016.46.1.20.
  6. ^ a b c d Kobi Peled (2018). "The fall of a village in the 1948 war: a historical close-up of the conquest of Mi'ilya and its surrender". British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies. 45 (3): 416, 424–426. doi:10.1080/13530194.2016.1273091.
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k "Elias Choufani". all4palestine.org. Retrieved 8 November 2023.
  8. ^ a b Elias S. Shoufani (1973). Al-Riddah and the Muslim Conquest of Arabia. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. doi:10.3138/9781487579920. ISBN 9781487579920.
  9. ^ Joe Stork; et al. (Summer 1972). "How American Radicals See The Resistance Dilemma". Journal of Palestine Studies. 1 (4): 3–26. doi:10.2307/2535661. JSTOR 2535661.
  10. ^ Clovis Maksoud (31 January 2013). "Remembering Elias Shoufani". Al-Monitor. Retrieved 8 November 2023.
  11. ^ Nur Masalha (2014). "Liberating Methodologies and Nakba Studies: Palestinian History and Memory from below as Sites of Lifelong Learning". Holy Land Studies. 13 (1): 34–35. doi:10.3366/hls.2014.0077.
  12. ^ a b Feissal Darraj (April 2012). "Book review". Contemporary Arab Affairs. 5 (2): 307. doi:10.1080/17550912.2012.668327. JSTOR 48599892.
  13. ^ Philipp O. Amour (2018). "Yusif Sayigh: Personal Account of the Palestinian National Movement". Journal of Holy Land and Palestine Studies. 17 (1): 141. doi:10.3366/hlps.2018.0184.
  14. ^ a b c d Afshan Ahmed (9 December 2014). "Filmmaker Hind Shoufani captures many faces of her father in Trip Along Exodus". The National. Retrieved 17 January 2024.
  15. ^ Karim Traboulsi (25 May 2016). "Portrait of the Palestinian revolutionary as a Shakespearean character". The New Arab. Retrieved 8 November 2023.
  16. ^ "Trip Along Exodus". Hind Shoufani. 30 June 2023. Retrieved 17 January 2024.
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