Hasan Muhammad Abd al-Latif, aged 67 from Battir discussing the Ottoman period and World War I

He discusses the following: economic situation in Battir which was dependent on farming and the whole family working together; how they used to live in those days including the use of gas lamps to light the houses and how people used to dress; only education received was learning the Quran; military conscription started from age 16; it became more common for men from the village to marry women from other villages and towns; when World War I started most of the men from the village were taken away to military conscription; when somebody in the village died there were no men to bury the body; locust plague; agriculture was severely affected by the war; Ottoman army diverted the village springs for their war effort; when the war ended the British built houses for the employees of the train station.

Original audio recording: cassette tape.

Transcript: word for word.

In the original collection at Bethlehem University this cassette tape was categorised as File 1 of Box 13.

This fileset exists as part of the Ottoman Empire and World War I collection within the Bethlehem University Oral History project of the Planet Bethlehem Archive.