Children of the Stone
Elaine Miles reflects on a book on young Palestinians
‘Children of the Stone’ is a phrase used to describe the young Palestinians of the First Intifada (1987-93) who threw stones at the Israeli invaders of their country because they could think of no other way of defending their land after the invasion of 1987. Sandy Tolan, in his book of the same name, has taken immense trouble to research the facts of the failed negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians since the 1987 invasion, and more recently the effects of the Oslo Agreement of 1993. He tells the story of a young Palestinian boy living with the results: the security ‘wall’, the checkpoints and the demolition of Palestinian houses.
Ramzi Hussein Aburedwan was a stone-thrower in the Intifada at the age of eight, and had already attracted attention in press photographs. Ten years later Sandy Tolan finds him again living in a refugee camp with his grandparents. The Oslo Agreement has given the Palestinians some hope and refugees have come flooding back into Palestine. Ramzi longs to learn the viola, and through his viola comes into contact with Europeans, in particular with members of the Conservatoire d’Angers in the Loire Valley in France, where he gets tuition, and from there is able to join Daniel Barenboim’s West-Eastern Divan Orchestra.
Gradually, however, he becomes disillusioned, as the only Palestinian in the orchestra, when the others refuse to issue a statement on behalf of the orchestra denouncing the Israeli occupation of Palestine. The Oslo Agreement had met Palestinian aspirations only to the very limited extent of giving them Gaza and Jericho. It entrenched Israeli belief that they had a right to the rest of the occupied territories, and could build Israeli settlements on them, and blockade Gaza. The Palestinians felt that they had been let down. Yasser Arafat, who had signed the agreement, died in 2004. Many Palestinians believe that he was assassinated. Ramzi returned to Palestine and set about creating a Palestinian orchestra.
Children of the Stone is a wonderfully humane book by an author who has a deep affection for Palestine and the Palestinians, and a love of music. No doubt Sandy Tolan chose Ramzi as his hero because he is a musician and has made a name for himself. In doing so he has attracted the world’s attention to their country, which the author feels it needs. The Norwegian government and those French musicians are among the few who have kept hope alive for the Palestinians.
Sandy Tolan’s book will particularly appeal to those who are music lovers, with its demonstration of how music can transform a young person’s life and allow him to forget the tragedies that he suffered. Ramzi had lost both his parents and his brother in the fighting. Playing in an orchestra brought him ‘brothers and sisters’ and Daniel Barenboim was probably like a father to him. Ramzi could see a future for himself and the photographs show him relaxed and smiling. This is a book of imagination and love. It is written by an American whose own country is accused by many of showing little consideration for Palestine by supporting, for its own interests, Israel militarily.
You will love this book and not be able to put it down. Sandy Tolan’s writing is full of vivid and imaginative touches. He enables us to picture everything for ourselves, as here, writing on Ramzi Aburedwan at eighteen years of age: ‘No longer was he sneaking through the camp, hurling rocks at soldiers and dashing from rooftop to rooftop.’
Children of the Stone: The power of music in a hard land by Sandy Tolan is published by Bloomsbury at £12.99. ISBN: 9781632863416.
