The Nakba is not simply an historical event but an ongoing system of displacement, erasure and resistance that continues to shape Palestinian identity and political life generations later.

The Nakba, in its deep sociological and political meaning, is not merely an historical event that took place in 1948 and ended. It is ongoing and evolving colonial structure. Since its displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their cities and villages, attempts to uproot them from geography, history, and consciousness have never stopped, through integrated system of laws, policies, and narratives that sought to erase Palestinian people and replace their story with an alternative narrative.

Understanding this project requires deconstructing narratives on which it was founded, and examining the major contradiction that shaped conduct of its leaders from beginning: how a movement with a secular nationalist character used religious narrative to justify the modern settler colonial project.

The Zionist movement emerged in Europe in late 19th century, influenced by the western nationalist and colonial model. Ironically its most prominent leaders, such as Theodor Herzl, David Ben Gurion, and Vladimir Jabotinsky, ranged between secularism and atheism in their personal beliefs. Yet they understood early on the power of........

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