posted on 2019-08-21, 07:27authored byFreja Howat-Maxted, Jacob NorrisJacob Norris, Leila Sansour, Bea Brown
Issa al-Araj (92 years old from Bethlehem) is interviewed by Grace al-Ali on 15 April 1995.
Interview
focuses on the great snow of 1920; snow was 2 metres deep and people
could not even go outside; people had to burn wood to keep warm;
everyone was hungry and cold; illness and disease quickly spread; the
snow lasted for a whole month; people used to work together to clear the
snow; the snowfall severely damaged the houses in Bethlehem and
especially the souq; poor people were the worst affected.
Original audio recording: cassette tape. Transcript: summary.
In the original collection at Bethlehem University this cassette tape was categorised as File 20 of Box 21.
This
fileset exists as part of the 1920 Great Snow & 1927 Earthquake
collection within the Bethlehem University Oral History project of the
Planet Bethlehem Archive.