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Kafr Bir'im was a Maronite Christian village that today lies on the geopolitical lines of Israel right on the border with Lebanon. The line between these two places did not exist for most of its history, until the French and British decided it did in 1923 when creating the borders of the British Mandate.
In 2008, I found myself living on its ruins, though I did not know the story yet. I was living in Kibbutz Baram, which had been built in Bir'im's fields. Another Israeli village, Dovev, is also built on Bir'im's lands. The village itself is in a national park, and the church is still standing, though in poor shape.
The village was depopulated relatively late in the war and Nakba in October of 1948, after Israel was established. The army expelled them, citing security reasons and saying it would be temporary. They were never allowed to return, despite a high court order in the early 1950s explicitly stating that both the residents of Bir'im and Iqrit, a nearby village that was also expelled, should be allowed to return.
The state never allowed them to go back and rebuild, and then turned around a few years later and claimed the land for the state using a legal loophole under the Land Acquisition Law that defined the village of Bir'im as "abandoned." It then nationalized the land. This same practice has now been used many times to nationalize land in the occupied territories.
Kafr Bir'im villagers have never abandoned the village or its plight to return. They have conducted multiple campouts long-term in the village as acts of resistance and return.
Kafr Bir'im is just one example of people who were forced to leave and whom the state never allowed to return. Many of the villagers managed to stay in the country and nearby to Bir'im in a town called Jish and were given Israeli citizenship in the 1950s. Palestinian refugees who live today inside Israel, meaning they have Israeli citizenship but are displaced from their original villages, make up around 20% of today's Palestinian population within Israel.
Not only is the Nakba an open wound, but in many cases, these are places the families can technically go and visit, but cannot return to, and have no say over what happens to the village or its lands.
I once woke up camping with some friends to a man screaming at us. It was 5 AM. He told us, "you are sleeping on a cemetery! Get out now, or I will call the cops."
Now, we did not realize this was where we were sleeping. So I shouted back, "Really? We are in a cemetery? Okay, we will move."
He asked me if we had not seen the obvious sign for the cemetery. But we had not.
Here is the thing: after waking up, we realized that, according to the state, this was just a field, it was public, and you could sleep there. The sign he was referring to was a small piece of wood that was handwritten "cemetery" in Arabic and in Hebrew, that was easy to miss. This was his family's cemetery, and this land, alongside his village was nationalized following the Nakba.
The cops would not have actually done anything, and he knew that. As we were leaving and talking, he told me he comes here every few mornings to check on the graveyard and make sure it is okay. You could feel the burden and responsibility on his facial expressions. From what he told us, most people camping there don’t get up and leave. They just keep sleeping.
It is hard to put what I felt into words, but I could visibly see the hurt and tiredness on his face. He was angry, not at us, not particularly at least. He was angry that he had to work so hard to protect his home which no one recognized anymore.
I would be angry too. I’m embarrassed as I type this to admit that I don’t remember the name of the particular village. Most national parks and public spaces sit on depopulated Palestinian villages.
Back to Baram and Bir'im.
Baram's current fields overlay those of Bir'im's fields. Baram grows apples, amongst other things, and some of the people who work in those fields and in the factory are hired from the local nearby town of Jish. Many of those who work there from Jish are, of course, Bir'im descendants. As in, they work for a salary on the lands that belong to them, but that they no longer own.
I once asked one of the kibbutz members, years after I lived there, what she thought about that. She answered me honestly that she does not think about it.
That is not to say Baram has taken no stance. It has voted in the past in favor of the villagers returning, making that less of an argument the state can use. It has sent representatives to support the villagers during their campaigns and campouts in the village, which they have done as acts of return. Kibbutz residents even tried to stop the demolition of the village in the early 1950s. But practically and at the same time, Bar’am has benefited from this land and its resources above all else.
The story of Kafr Bir'im is just one open wound of the Nakba, and it is not unique—it is one example of displacement that affected around 500 villages and created 750,000 Palestinian refugees. The descendants of Bir'im continue their struggle, working as laborers on land that was once rightfully theirs, while many Jewish Israelis either avoid confronting this reality or, like some in Kibbutz Baram, offer symbolic support without addressing the fundamental injustice.
Many Jewish Israelis fear the right of return would fundamentally alter the country they know. This fear is understandable, but it cannot justify perpetuating injustice. The path to genuine peace cannot circumvent the rights of those displaced in 1948. The question is not whether addressing these historical wrongs would change Israel and Palestine—it would—but whether lasting reconciliation or justice is possible without confronting them. Of course, Bir’im’s return does not mean Bar’am’s expulsion. The idea isn’t to turn back time - it’s to create a just present and future.
The Nakba is not just history; it is a present reality. Every morning a man checks his family's cemetery. Every harvest season, descendants of Bir'im tend orchards they once owned. And every day, the possibility of true peace recedes further as long as we pretend these wounds do not exist or do not matter.
Justice for refugees is not an obstacle to peace—it is a prerequisite.
Read about Bi’rim from the villagers:
Christian residents of two northern Israeli ghost towns renew bid to go home
PHOTOS: On Easter, Palestinians resurrect their destroyed village