KUFFIYA KRAZE: You May Be ___ If Your Kuffiya Is ___

You may be Fatah, if your Kuffiya is black and white.

Socialist/Marxist (PFLP/DFLP) if your Kuffiya is red.

Hamas, if your Kuffiya is red.

Yemeni, if your Kuffiya is blue or green.

Shot by the Israelis, if your Kuffiya is blood-soaked.

Annoying as hell, if your Kuffiya is yellow with smiley faces on it.

Disoriented, if your Kuffiya is being rocked by Mary Kate Olsen.

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Sikh, if your Kuffyia is actually a turban when seen by other than racist fucks.

Zionist thief, if your Kuffiya is blue with little stars David on it.

Homosexual, if your Kuffiya is in pride colours.

Metrosexual, if your Kuffiya is a mere print on a t-shirt.

From KABOBtionary…

Metrosexual: /-“ me-tr&-'sek-sh-w&l/ n & adj., Informal. A heterosexual male who employs elements of a gay lifestyle and symbols of Palestinian defiance and resistance, especially fashion icons, in order to pick up chicks.

If you are confused about the origin and significance of the Kuffiya join the club. If you care to learn, here is a superficially researched history of the Kuffiya’s colour evolution. Don’t complain, it still has more journalistic integrity than an entire day’s production by Bill O’Reilly, Rush Limbaugh, and Sean Hannity combined.

The story started long ago, well before Buddha met Eve on the Arafeh Mountain in Western Saudi Arabia and the two embarked on a peaceful-ever after project of procreation and meditation. Originally, there are four different Kuffiyas. Five, if you want to count the plain, uncheckered one. One, if you’re colour blind. The plain Kuffiya, referred to as Shemagh or Hattah in Arabic but not Kuffiya, is predominant in Saudi Arabia and other gulf states, and is widely used in the Levantine during the hot summer months, as it is far lighter than the checkered Kuffiya.

Now back to the colours, I’m freaking ADD today. There are the Red, Black, Green, and Blue, all on white backdrop. The green and blue where often used in Yemen, and southern Saudi Arabia, and rarely used elsewhere. The black and red were used up north. Both colour were very common in Palestine, so much so, that many Palestinians referred to them as the Iraqi (black) and the Jordanian (red) Kuffiyas, a testament to the disproportionate use of each of these colours in the perspective countries.

The black Kuffiya traditionally had a far wider base in Palestine than the red one, but the latter was present in its own right. The black Kuffiya quickly became associated with the struggle for Palestinian liberation, mainly because those who led and carried the successive Palestinian revolutions against British occupation, Zionist immigration, and Israel were farmers who almost uniformly wore the black Kuffiya.

In the decades following the ethnic cleaning of Palestinians (Nakba) and the creation of Israel, the black Kuffiya lost grounds to the red one, for two main reasons. Wearing a black Kuffiya became a crime punishable by Israeli occupation forces and was given up by those who wished not to be tortured, jailed, or shot. Secondly, as the West Bank fell under Jordanian administration, the red Kuffiya became more common as it was adopted by those who wished proximity to or perks from the Jordanian royal family, as well as those who still wished to cover their heads yet not get prosecuted for it.

In the 60’s and 70s, following the creation of the PLO through the convergence of politically and ideologically diverse factions, the two main currents chose to differentiate their supporters through colour-based segregation. Fatah, the leader of the nationalist current, and the largest party, continued its monopoly on the black Kuffiya, and took it to international prominence by sending Yasser Arafat to every corner of the planet. I swear, that dude logged more miles than a hooker at a dentist convention. Anyway, he’s not flying anymore. On the other hand, the leftist current, led by Marxist-leaning Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP), chose the convenient and obvious option demonstrate their loyalty to both Palestine, and the hammer and sickle.

Over the past two decades of Intifadas, Palestinian society has transformed from mainly nationalist and leftist to nationalist and Islamist (right-wing is you will). As the numbers of DFLP/PFLP supported dwindled on the streets, red Kuffiyas were rarely visible, until they made a recent resurgence, correlated with Hamas’ enduring rise. Though Hamas’ traditional colour is green, when it came to the Kuffiya, red was the smart choice. Green not Palestinian enough, risky political move, red is Palestinian, not as much as black, but a lot less Fatah.

For the current century’s Kuffiya colour evolution, go back to the KABOBarchive. But remember, the important question is: What Kuffiya would Jesus rock?

[Tarboush Tip: Catholic Sunni Shia, QuiQui, Hanaanity, Swedenburg, and Sitti Latifeh]