Six gallant steeds seated in a schoolhouse: The first Bedouin protest poem during Israel’s military rule in the Negev

This article explores early expressions of poetic protest voiced by Negev Bedouin against their political disempowerment following the 1948 war, the sternness of the military rule imposed on them by Israel, and the feebleness of those sheikhs who agreed to cooperate with it. To this end, the article examines a poem composed in 1949 by a talented poet of the Tarābīn confederation, the first critical poem from that period available to us. The first part of the article places the poem in its historical and poetic contexts, the second part analyses it through a close reading aimed at understanding the poet’s intention, and between these two parts appears the poem itself, translated into English alongside a phonemic transcription. The article delves into the poem’s unique combination of courage and caution, of subtle scorn and words of praise for the tribal leaders who remained (for a while) in the Western Negev in the year following the war.