Mornings in Jenin by Susan Abulhawa

Mornings in Jenin hauntingly captures the poignant realities of war and displacement through the lens of a Palestinian family. Dare I say, you are not ready for this book. I wasn’t. Putting everything into words is going to be difficult, but I’ll try. It is haunting and heart-wrenching.

It’s a shame that it took reading this book for me to realize and understand the gravity of the Israel-Palestine war. I have been trying to stay aware of the current affairs between Israel and Palestine but none covers the horror, pain, anger the way Susan Abulhawa did in Mornings in Jenin.

The book is split into eight parts. Each section narrates a different part of a family’s story in Ein Hod during times of struggle and war. In the first part, called “El Nakba” (The Catastrophe), you learn about Amal’s family leaving their home and heading to Jenin because of Israel’s takeover. 

In the second part, “El Naksa” (The Disaster), you see the brutal side of war where children suffer because of land disputes. In the third part, “The Scar of David,” Basima’s lost son, now an Israeli soldier named David, this is his story. The remaining five parts follow Amal’s journey to the United States and back to her homeland.

With exquisite prose, the narrative is full of raw emotion, delving unflinchingly into the brutal truths of war. It talks about how bad wars are without leave out any of the scary details. There was a point where I almost believed that the bad things are over and only good things are in store for Amal. But god how I wish it to be true. Things went horribly wrong when I was rooting for the good days.