Manufacturing memory: Deconstructing the Nakba narrative of 1948 as a political myth in Palestinian historiography
Author(s): Yamin Mohammad Munshi
Abstract: This research critically examines the narrative of the Nakba (“catastrophe”) of 1948, a cornerstone of modern Palestinian national identity. Contrary to popular depictions in contemporary academic and political discourse, the Nakba is argued here not as an objective, self-contained historical trauma but as a retroactively constructed myth an ideologically loaded narrative forged through selective memory, strategic omissions, and retrospective victimhood politics. Drawing on a comprehensive range of archival sources, diplomatic correspondence, testimonies from Arab leaders, and internal Palestinian discourse from the mid-20
th century, this paper contends that the Nakba operates primarily as a symbolic device engineered to provide cohesion, legitimize political claims, and obfuscate the internal failures of Arab leadership during the 1948 war. The thesis challenges the presumed linearity between displacement and Israeli aggression, redirecting scrutiny toward Arab belligerence, internal class conflicts, and broader geopolitical dynamics deliberately ignored in mainstream historiography. In doing so, it interrogates the processes of historical myth-making, exposing the Nakba as less a moment of history than a malleable narrative that has served competing ideological projects since the mid-20th century.
DOI: 10.22271/27069109.2025.v7.i6b.451Pages: 106-112 | Views: 69 | Downloads: 41Download Full Article: Click Here
How to cite this article:
Yamin Mohammad Munshi.
Manufacturing memory: Deconstructing the Nakba narrative of 1948 as a political myth in Palestinian historiography. Int J Hist 2025;7(6):106-112. DOI:
10.22271/27069109.2025.v7.i6b.451
