Context

Elizabeth Laird’s book, “A Little Piece of Ground,” is written from the point of view of a young Palestinian boy named Karim living in Isreali occupied Palestine. The Israel-Palestine conflict has been ongoing since the late 1940s after the Isreal state was created by reapportioning Palestinian lands following WWII. Canada’s largest bookseller, Phyillis Simon of Vancouver’s Kidsbooks, challenged this novel in 2003 claiming that it was a “racist, inflammatory, and a totally one-sided piece” (A Little). Jewish Book World critic Lina Silver believed that it painted Israelis as “mindless killing machines” (Palestinian). Phyillis Simon pushed for publishers to reconsider printing this novel and refused to sell it at her store. It was, however, ultimately published by Macmillan Children’s Books and reached a sale rank of 161 on Amazon in the UK. Although it faced controversy, the book has been available on paperback and online since 2003. I believe that this book was challenged because the bookseller wanted to silence Palestinian voices. In an interview with NPR, Laird shared that she has written an array of books about the lives of children in various precarious living situations. For example, she wrote a story about a Kurdish family who, while living in an Iranian refugee camp, faced many hardships and terrible treatment. She notes that nobody criticized her for not adding a sympathetic Iranian character or telling the “Iranian side” as she was criticized for A Little Piece of Ground. She adds that there is “no point in making a half truth when the whole truth is there in front of me” (Palestinian).