It’s a stark contrast. Born in a Palestinian refugee camp in Nablus on the West Bank (“if you can imagine, two kilometres-square, 20,000 people living in there”) and now living in Tubbercurry, Co Sligo, surrounded by fields and nature.
Amir Sabra says “there’s so much to understand and appreciate when you live with such space and nature. To walk, not to see blocks and cement, to see lovely green fields and sheep everywhere you turn your eyes. It’s a different experience. You could feel healthy, even just walking the streets.”
Sabra doesn’t miss cities, as he mostly works away: in Dublin, Brussels, sometimes Palestine. “I’m not isolated.” The dancer and choreographer has lived in Ireland for three years, building his career since a master’s in dance and performance at University of Limerick (UL). He’s performing his solo Within This Party, inspired by dabke (Palestinian traditional dance) and hip-hop as part of First Fortnight mental health art and culture festival. Challenging mental health stigma through storytelling and connectivity, First Fortnight will host more than 65 events (theatre, music, poetry, visual art, discussion and more) across Ireland in January (4th to 18th).
Sabra’s grandfather came from Lod (now part of Israel) but in 1940 was moved to a West Bank refugee camp. Sabra and his father were born in Askar refugee camp. His parents’ marriage was arranged and they didn’t meet until the wedding.
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“I did dancing all my life, really.” Everyone did dabke at weeklong wedding parties on the street in Askar. “Everybody lived very close to each other” so weddings were “like an open concert”.
Samer Samahneh came to Askar from Jordan and mixed hip-hop with dabke. “We started to copy him. Samahneh started Hawayhe” (meaning identity), a hip-hop/breakdance/dabke group, which Sabra joined aged 15, practising after school in the street or the camp’s arts and cultural centre. They learned from YouTube, taught each other moves, did shows and weddings. Around 2010-2011, after the second Intifada, international dancers taught on cultural exchange projects, and Hawayhe visited Denmark. “We were just dancing around, just enjoying. We were little children.”
In 2015, high-profile Belgian les ballets C de la B auditioned locally, choosing 10 Palestinian dancers to perform Badke, a contemporary dance-theatre show drawing on dabke. Sabra toured the world with the show for two years. It was a career milestone, and a huge leap. “We started really big. Normally, to get to that level as a professional dancer, it takes years and years.”
At home in between he studied media and communications at college, then got a job “but my heart was not there. I wanted to do dance”. He cofounded Palestinian breakdance group Stereo48. Ironically, Covid was “a peaceful year for Palestinians, because there was no invasions from the Israelis to the West Bank. Everyone stayed at home. It was very calm politically”. “People had more interest in culture and arts. They wanted something to make them feel more. Cultural organisations in Palestine had to cancel international guests, and give the money to local guests.”
He’d always wanted to study dance. Salma Ataya, a friend from les ballets C de la B living in Ireland, told him about UL’s dance programme, and grant-aid. Thus he fetched up in Limerick in 2021.
Knowing little about Ireland beyond a large Bobby Sands image in Palestine, “we always heard the Irish had the same struggle as the Palestinians. They stand with us because they had the same experience as Palestinians.”
The master’s had contemporary and ballet classes, but also “a lot of space for conceptual work, and individual creative practice, experimentation. It was brilliant.” It was well connected with the Irish dance scene, making it easier to work afterwards. He’s worked with several Irish dance companies and also creates his own pieces. He has more opportunities, and making a living from dance is “hard, but possible, in Ireland. I couldn’t really be a professional dancer in Palestine”, He continues to work in Palestine, mostly voluntarily “for the passion”, organising summer dance schools for Palestinian dancers.
Of his own dance style, while the form and movement are contemporary, “the energy comes really from hip-hop and dabke” He uses Palestinian traditional music, and in a performance Luail, Ireland’s new national dance company, commissioned him to create for its launch, he worked with Irish band Kíla.
He’s in Tubbercurry because of his girlfriend. They met at UL; she’s a traditional Irish dancer and works here and at her Irish dance school in The Hague. Irish traditional dance may have “somehow” seeped into his own dance practice. “Irish dance and Palestinian dance, they are both step dance.But they are very different in rhythms and sound. The Irish dance is very quick and jump, and our dance is slower pace, and then you step to the floor. You don’t leave the floor in your step. It opened my eyes to a new way of how could you use that step differently.”
Sabra’s family still live in Nablus in the West Bank, and they talk daily. He’s been back a few times. While it’s not like Gaza or Lebanon, Israel has bombed the West Bank recently. Daily life continues, but “no one is safe. At any moment, things happen. We grew up in that situation.”
Nablus is surrounded by Israeli settlers, he says. “It’s a military occupation, with an Israeli army protecting the settlers. They attack every day the villages. There is more taking from the farmers nowadays, because the focus is in Gaza so they can do more in the West Bank.”
He worries for his mother and siblings (their father died). His two sisters are married. His two brothers work as journalists, and being targeted has become so normalised that they rarely mention it, he says. He misses home; “you grow up there, you have memories”.
Back home, we live in a situation. But we are not tricked. We know we’re not free. I feel here, you think you’re free, but you’re not. Freedom, as long as it is given, it’s not freedom
At the same time, Sabra is aware “a lot of oppression in the world that is hidden. Even in Ireland, you can see there is people oppressed, but it’s hidden. There, oppression is very clear, in front of you.”
More mundanely, “I find Irish humour very similar to the Palestinian. I can get along with Irish people easily. There is a deeper understanding” of things that can’t be explained logically, but “sometimes the Irish, they get it on an experience level. I don’t have to give so much information.” People are similarly family-oriented, with respect for older people.”
He’s currently on a graduate visa here, and would like “to be able to do what I want, to go, to stay”, but to be either here or in Palestine requires documents.
Sabra muses on the nature of freedom, how people perceive it differently in both cultures. Whereas people here feel free to do something, “in our culture, you feel freedom if you have freedom from something. We have internal freedom. We grew up with an idea, you can control my freedom to do things, but you cannot control my freedom to think.” His experience in the West is people think they’re free until they clash with power. “Back home, we live in a situation. But we are not tricked. We know we’re not free. I feel here, you think you’re free, but you’re not. Freedom, as long as it is given, it’s not freedom.”
His Irish experience is “very, very positive. I was embraced very nicely by the art and dance scene. People accepted me as an artist for who I am.” In Tubbercurry “everyone in the street is very nice. My girlfriend and her family are very welcoming. I get enough attention. I get enough care. The Irish people are my favourite people.” After the Palestinians, presumably. “Oh, the Palestinians are a big hassle!” Sabra says with a laugh. “Experiencing extraordinary situations creates extraordinary personalities!”
firstfortnight.ie takes place from January 4th to January 18th
