A Gateway Revolutionary Text — Wisam Rafeedie's Novel “The Trinity of Fundamentals”
Praise
"an exhilarating experience" — George Habash, founder of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
What it is:
A "fictionalized-narrative-of-life-in-hiding novel… belongs to the revolutionary realist school which does not stop at diagnosis, but seeks to agitate and bring about change."— Ahmad Qatamesh[i]
"The existence of this novel, both in Arabic and in English, it's the result of collective work and struggle… a labor of love." [ii]
The Production:
Written in 1993 and completed in four months at al-Naqab prison, two years into Rafeedie's prison sentence. [iii]
Exclusively written at night, into the break of dawn under floodlights to avoid the daytime inspections that left nothing unscrutinized. iii
When the danger of discovery was near, the contents in question were wrapped in dough, then in plastic, and thrown to a nearby section, where they would be picked up by a comrade and concealed until the inspection was over. iii
If the contents fell in between sections, which they sometimes did, comrades would retrieve them with long curved wires to prevent guards from reaching them first—leading to the popularization of the phrase "no white paper in the hands of the administration." iii
A system was developed where an assigned monitor responsible for sounding a warning to notify of a raid would alert "it's getting cloudy" to announce when multiple raids happened in various sections at once. That alert would signal comrades to throw the contents even further. iii
Upon its completion, word got around, and the whole prison learned of the novel's existence. As the news spread, everyone wanted to read it, and all the guards set out to confiscate it. iii
The singular copy of The Trinity of Fundamentals was read amongst prisoners, being transferred through sections by throwing it around, but eventually fell into the hands of prison guards. iii
Convinced that "inspiration could not be duplicated," Rafeedie refused a rewrite. iii
The Escape:
For four years, the novel was thought to have been lost.
A comrade from al-Naqab prison, impressed by the text, made an identical copy and took it upon himself to smuggle it through his transfer to a different prison, thereby beginning the circulation of the novel “throughout most of Palestine's prisons." [iv]
In 1997, Prisoner Movement representative Walid Daqqa (may he rest in peace), one of the most prominent and longtime Palestinian prisoners in Israeli custody (from 1986 until his death on April 7, 2024), asked Rafeedie for his opinion of the organization's educational program. The course material included books from Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Jose Amado, and others, including one titled The Trinity of Fundamentals, which Rafeedie immediately recognized as his work. iii iv [v]
Asking how the existence of the novel was possible, he learned of his al-Naqab prison comrade’s copy.
Reluctant to believe it was an unaltered version of his original, Rafeedie asked to have the contents returned to him. Finally, in Asqalan prison, he received the copy via 52 capsules smuggled in four comrades’ intestines and confirmed that, indeed, not even a comma had been missed when duplicated. ii iv
Facing a prison transfer, Rafeedie hid the capsules in pockets between his underwear and thigh. Still, during the inspection of his body, he almost had the contents confiscated. iii
After almost losing his work again, he became convinced to make the novel public and seek publication.
Since visitations at Tel Mond prison only required passing through a metal detector, Rafeedie copied the contents of the capsules onto three booklets and slipped them to a visitor through a crack in the wall barely big enough to fit one at a time. iii
"A year later [1998], when Rafeedie's prison sentence ended, the book was finally printed in Ramallah, a work of collective resistance made permanent." iv
The Trinity of Fundamentals was published by 1804 Books on January 1, 2024, making it one of the best and most important Palestinian books of 2024.
Significance:
"By disseminating this text to an English-reading audience for the first time, the publication of the novel carries on the tradition of defying Israeli attempts to intercept, destroy, loot, and criminalize Palestinian knowledge production." [vi]
The fictionalized account of Wisam Rafeedie's real experiences of spending nine years in hiding, evading arrest by the occupation forces in Palestine, and subsequently surviving occupational prisons and the well-documented torture and deprivation methods is a first of its kind. It is a feat of translation efforts by the Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM) and its political education committee, Popular University. Not only was it effectively translated to English, but members of the PYM held untiring discussions to ensure it maintained the authenticity of the original Arabic text's political spirit. ii
Further, from a writer's perspective, learning about the lack of revisions and rewrites of The Trinity of Fundamentals only added to the impossibility and marvel of the existence of this text. I hope it is the first of many more original Arabic-translated-to-English texts to become accessible to the Western world, for it has been an invaluable aid in my and many Westerners' pursuit to finally begin to understand the almost century-long depths of our Palestinian brothers and sisters' struggle.
When I first learned English at eight years old and became aware of the immensity of the world locked behind the walls of language fluency, bursting with a multitude of stories, my world doubled in terms of cultural and educational experiences. Even as an adult, few life experiences can compare in magnitude to the profound impact that unmonitored access to another language and the knowledge it unveils can have on a lifetime. Laying hands on The Trinity of Fundamentals and reading how the protagonist, Kan'an, forgoes the most fundamental aspects of life to serve the revolution rewarded admittance to the Palestinian gateway to revolutionary ideology.
I'll be honest; maybe if I had read this book two years ago, when I can admit I was ignorant to the experiences of the Palestinian people, both in occupied Palestine and the diaspora, it might not have had the effect it has today. I'm still coming to terms with the complexity and truth of that statement. One thing is obvious: literature and video footage coming from Palestine have changed the world. We've seen enough never to sleep, eat, or live the same.
Reading Palestinian stories and authors is how I’m attempting to make up for the years I lived without scratching the surface of Western propaganda’s effects on Middle Eastern affairs. In my efforts, I've discovered similarly impactful books and compiled a list of some of the best books on Palestine, such as Ahed Tamimi's memoir, They Called Me A Lioness by Tamimi and Takruri, and Linda Sarsour's We Are Not Here to Be Bystanders — stories of women with contrary experiences — one living in occupied Palestine and the other living as a Palestinian-American in Brooklyn, most notably post 911. The Qur’an is another read I'm realizing is a must if we are to grasp the immense impact faith has on the Palestinian liberation struggle, but that's a conversation for another time.
ABOUT THE BOOK:
Title: The Trinity of Fundamentals
Author: Wisam Rafeedie
Publisher: 1804 Books
ISBN: 979-8-9882602-1-9
The Trinity of Fundamentals follows the story of 22-year-old Kan'an during his nine years of hiding from the occupation between 1982 and 1991. Driven by an unshakable commitment to the Palestinian cause, Kan'an takes the reader through his compelling journey filled with sacrifice and struggle, love and pain, isolation and liberation. All the while, major political and historical transformations unfold across international, regional, and local contexts, including the First Intifada. Throughout all this, Kan'an maintains a spirit of revolutionary optimism so strong that the reader is bound to be transformed. It is all the more moving to know that Kan'an's story is inspired by the real-life experience of Rafeedie as he organized and struggled against the Zionist oppression of his people.
Love, revolution, and life—these are the "Trinity of Fundamentals" that pave Kan'an's path of struggle. Although the novel is set in the past, it holds many lessons that resonate with our current political moment, mobilizing us into collective action.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Wisam Rafeedie is a former Palestinian political prisoner, full-time researcher, and lecturer at the Department of Social Sciences at Bethlehem University – Palestine. He previously worked part-time Sociology and Cultural Studies lecturer at Birzeit University. He holds two master’s degrees from Birzeit University, one in sociology for his thesis on the changes in the status of women in contemporary Palestinian literature before and after Oslo and the other in contemporary Arab studies. Rafeedie wrote The Trinity of Fundamentals during his imprisonment at Naqab Prison in 1993.
[i] Rafeedie, W. (2024). The Trinity of Fundamentals (M. Tutunji, Trans., Palestinian Youth Movement, Ed.) (1st ed., pp. v, ix, xxi, xxiii, xxiv, xxv). 1804 Books.
[ii] BOOK LAUNCH: THE TRINITY OF FUNDAMENTALS." YouTube, uploaded by The People's Forum NYC, February 2, 2024, www.youtube.com/watch?v=X64zgv9-c1s
[iii] The Trinity of Fundamentals: A Conversation with Wisam Rafeedie." YouTube, uploaded by The People's Forum NYC, May 6, 2023, www.youtube.com/watch?v=m20caGu4C4M
[iv] R. E. A. (2024, April 19). Bringing a Seminal Palestinian Resistance Novel to the World. The Nation. Retrieved April 20, 2024, from https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/wissam-rafeedie-interview-trinity-of-fundamentals/
[v] Al Jazeera (2024, April 7). Terminally ill Palestinian prisoner Walid Daqqa dies in Israeli custody. Retrieved April 7, 2024, from https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/4/7/terminally-ill-palestinian-prisoner-walid-daqqa-dies-in-israeli-custody
[vi] Al- Saleh, D., & Al- Saleh, S. (2023, May 24). Liberating a Palestinian Novel From Israeli Prison. The Nation. Retrieved April 7, 2024, from https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/trinity-of-fundamentals-palestine-introduction/