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identity is more than a passport

by nadia barhoum

How often do you think about your American passport? Or how much does that passport mean to you? It is commonplace for Americans to overlook the importance of this valuable document until put in a situation where it is used to undermine their rights and prevent them from moving freely beyond US borders. During my time abroad in Birzeit, Palestine, it became apparent to me that identity is not a simple concept. On the contrary, I realized that in our world of nation-states and occupied territories, identity is like a currency. It can take us as far as we want to go, or it can prevent us from performing even the simplest tasks.

In the occupied West Bank of Palestine, the Israeli military controls the movement of the Palestinian people both within and outside of the territory. In this environment, those who possess Palestinian documentation are denied the power to move freely within the territory of their ancestors, a restriction that stifles their daily lives and has caused an intense situation of social, political, and economic paralysis. Those living in the West Bank cannot travel without being stopped at a checkpoint or roadblock every few miles. Since my passport is blue and has the powerful seal of the US branded on its jacket, I travel freely in their, the Palestinians’ land, while they, the Palestinians, are restricted from having the same mobility.

illustration by saleh hijazi

Imagine if the borders of your city, state, or country were controlled by a foreign presence, such that you could not go to work, visit a family member, or go to the hospital without being thoroughly inspected or detained. Now imagine if a traveler holding a foreign passport were to visit you under these conditions and was able to move about freely in these same areas, practically without question.

It felt cruel, telling my family living in the West Bank, that I was going to visit the old city of Jerusalem, knowing that the Israeli military would not allow them to make that same trip to the holy city simply because of their Palestinian documentation. Every time I made the trip from Ramallah to Jerusalem, my aunt would tell me to wave at the Al Aqsa mosque for her. She has not been able to visit her village in West Jerusalem since 1967. In this respect, our legal identities can control how we lead our daily lives, and one of my experiences at a checkpoint between Ramallah and Jerusalem highlighted this reality for me.

The light clicked green and the people immediately began shoving and clawing and shouting in fallen voices. I was sure that the IDF soldiers behind the plexi-glass loved to watch the internal fighting and angst among the Palestinians. After all, more fighting between Palestinians meant less work for the soldiers.

The barren, prison-like turnstile at the Qalandiyya checkpoint was meant to turn one person at a time, but the people were too impatient and exhausted to wait their turn—they shoved 2, 3, 4 people in at once hoping to end the abrupt stops in their daily life, and the teenage soldiers routinely responded with shouts in sorely broken Arabic,


“Wahed! Wahed!” to straighten out the orderly chaos of occupation.

The soldiers then ordered three young girls to return to Ramallah; heads tilted downwards in humiliation, tears searing their cheeks, they squeezed their way back through the turnstile with another day lost. Paralysis.

“Please God have mercy on you, let the girls go,” my cousin asked of a young boy pressed tightly against us.

“My brother, I have a final exam in Jerusalem that I’m already late for. I have to get through,” the boy replied indignantly.

“May God grant you success on your exam my friend,” my cousin tried again, “but these are two ladies…”

With that, the boy threw up his arms in surrender and my dear cousin Khadouj and I were able to pass through the human knots created by exhausted bodies.

I emptied my pockets, placed my bag on the x-ray machine, walked through a metal detector, and somewhat bashfully took out my US passport. I did not want the others in line to see my passport and know my secret. I wanted them to believe I was Palestinian like them, but it was already too late. The soldier waved me through, and at that moment I could imagine the resentment I would feel if I were still standing in line watching a foreigner pass through my land without question.

It is these instances that subtly and superficially divide Palestinians from one another. The legal hierarchy in the occupied territories is such that a US passport carries more weight and thus more political power than a Palestinian identity. But my Palestinian identity is so much richer than a legal document, and my moments in Palestine revealed its many nuances. My identity is defined by my experience, by the narratives of others who have crossed into my life, by the events of past and present, by simple words filled with memory. It is an organic creation of my consciousness, regenerating with every thought and minute and constantly resisting those constructions which attempt to contain its meaning.


Nadia Barhoum is a fourth year student at UC Berkeley.