The covenant
The Majlis
المجلس
A majlis is the room where a family receives its guests — where the coffee is poured, the stories are told, and nothing is rushed. It is a room with no ticket, where the person who arrived last is seated first.
This site keeps one. What follows is not terms of service — it is the set of promises the archive makes to the people in it, and the small set of things it asks of you in return.
What this archive promises
- الذاكرة
Memory before argument
The archive begins with what happened — documents, testimony, verse — not with what people say about what happened. Sources first, always.
In practice — Every page opens with the record and closes with where to check it.
- الكرامة
Dignity is non-negotiable
Palestinians are written here as they are: a whole people — poets, farmers, doctors, engineers — not a headline, not a statistic, not a prop in someone else’s debate.
In practice — No image of a body. No grief used as an argument. Names before numbers.
- الدقّة
Accuracy over convenience
Every claim carries a source. Where the record is contested, we say so and show who says what. If we err, we correct openly.
In practice — Corrections are made in public, and the change is noted, not quietly swapped.
- لا للبيع
Nothing is for sale
No advertising, no sponsors, no paywalls, no data harvesting. This is a public trust, not a product.
In practice — There is no account to buy, no tier to unlock, and nothing to sell about you.
- أهلاً وسهلاً
Everyone is welcome who comes in good faith
Researcher, student, journalist, elder, or someone hearing the word Falasteen for the first time — the majlis is open. Debate is welcome; dehumanisation is not.
In practice — Disagreement is answered with sources. Contempt for a people is not answered at all.
- الحكاية لصاحبها
The teller owns the story
Stories and photographs shared here remain the property of those who shared them. Withdrawal is honoured immediately, without question.
In practice — One message removes a story. No reason is asked for, and none is needed.
What the room asks of you
Argue with the record, not the people
Every claim in this archive is checkable, and every one of them is open to challenge — with a source. What is not open is the question of whether Palestinians are people. That one is settled.
Bring what you can verify
A name, a photograph, a village your family came from, a report we have missed. If it can be traced to something we can check, it can join the record. If it cannot, say so plainly and it will be held as testimony, labelled as testimony.
Handle grief carefully
Much of what is here was written by people in the middle of losing everything. Read it that way. Quote it that way. Never press an elder for the part of the story they have chosen not to tell.
Take it and use it
Teach from it, cite it, print it out, read a poem at a meeting. Nothing here is protected from being useful. The only thing asked in return is that you attribute what you did not write.
Take a seat
There is no membership, no account to create, and nothing to pay. There are four seats in this room, and every one of them is real work the archive genuinely needs.
Costs nothing but attention
Read, slowly
Reading carefully is participation. Start where the archive starts — one village, one name, one poem — and let the record accumulate.
82 villages · 30 poems
Take a reading pathCosts a few minutes
Leave a word on the wall
A word of solidarity, a source we are missing, a name to remember. Every message is read before it joins the public wall.
Moderated · no account needed
Enter the community wallCosts an afternoon
Record an elder
The most valuable thing anyone can give this archive. A phone, a quiet room, and someone who remembers. We publish it with their name on it, or without — their choice.
27 testimonies held
Open the recording deskCosts the work of verifying
Bring a documented name
If you carry a name the record has not yet caught — with a source we can check — it belongs in the registry. Bring it and it joins the record.
72,835 documented · 45 told in full
See the registryتفضّل، القهوة جاهزة
“Come in — the coffee is ready.”
The room is open whether you have an hour or a decade, whether you have known this history all your life or heard the word Falasteen for the first time this week. Nothing here asks you to have arrived already convinced.
No account is sold, shared, or monetised — ever. Read the full privacy note and the editorial standards.