Photos: In Tampa, activists commemorate 77th anniversary of the Nakba

The last two years have been especially hard on Palestinians, but many who’ve fled the country remembered another difficult period in their history last Sunday during a Nakba commemoration at Tampa’s Copeland Park.

It’s been 77 years since the British vacated Palestine, and while Israel declared independence on May 14, 1948, Palestinians see May 15 as the day when their society was nearly destroyed.

As previously reported, on paper, “Al Nakba,” or “the catastrophe,” happened 75 years ago during the 1948 Palestine war and creation of the Israeli state. Others believe that the occupation of Palestinian territory started much earlier and continues to this day via the annexation of land, attacks on homes in Gaza and continued U.S. support for Israel.

At last Sunday’s gathering organized in part by local activist groups, mourners visited a scroll with the names of more than 50,000 Palestinians killed since October 2024 when Hamas attacked Israel igniting the latest, still-ongoing, war.

Palestinian Author Younes Freajah also read from his book “Echoes of Exile” while others celebrated their culture by painting and practicing tatreez needle work.