JABALIYA, Gaza — Saeed al-Ashkar has spent 20 years interviewing elderly members of various Palestinian families who emigrated to the Gaza Strip from the villages that Israel occupied in 1948, villages that are now inside the Green Line.
Through these interviews, Ashkar collects information about each family’s origins and what its members remember about their original villages. In early 2000, Ashkar used the elderly’s memories to make maps of 20 Palestinian villages located beyond the Green Line. He is still roaming neighborhoods and towns and meeting elderly in the Gaza Strip.