Palestinians Build an "Unlootable" Digital Archive to Safeguard Their Erased History

Palestinian culture has faced decades of systematic looting, destruction, and displacement. However, the period since October 2023 has witnessed an alarming acceleration in the destruction of Gaza’s cultural institutions. In response, a dedicated team in the occupied West Bank has embarked on an ambitious project: building a digital archive of Palestinian memory, designed to be impervious to seizure or erasure. Amer Shomali, a prominent visual artist and general director of the Palestinian Museum, starkly highlights the urgency: "Within a week, Israel bombed two art galleries, seven museums, two main archives in Gaza, and hundreds of archaeological sites. This battle of trying to erase the Palestinian culture and Palestinian memory—it’s not something theoretical." Shomali estimates that approximately 80 percent of the country’s national collections have been looted, destroyed, or remain under Israeli control. This backdrop underscores the critical role of the Palestinian Museum in Birzeit, which serves as both a physical repository for Palestinian heritage and the nexus of an increasingly sophisticated digital preservation effort. Reports further cement this grim reality: the Applied Research Institute-Jerusalem's 2025 report indicates at least 2,400 archaeological sites in the West Bank have been taken over by Israel, while UNESCO verified damage to 164 cultural sites in Gaza since October 7, 2023. Moreover, proposed Israeli legislation aims to place ancient sites in occupied territories under the Israeli Ministry of Heritage, a move widely condemned as de facto annexation. The magnificent Palestinian Museum building, designed by Heneghan Peng architects (known for Egypt’s Grand Egyptian Museum), houses numerous invaluable collections, including photographs by Khalil Raad and murals by Vera Tamari. Yet, despite its physical grandeur, Shomali notes that its location between various checkpoints severely restricts access for many Palestinians. Recognizing the limitations and vulnerabilities of physical archives in a context of continuous aggression—a "continuous battle" since 1948 where "we document, they loot; but every time we document, we document with less vivid memory"—the museum turned to technology as a strategic solution. In 2018, the museum team initiated the creation of what Shomali aptly terms an "unlootable archive"—the Palestine Museum Digital Archive. This open-source repository was conceived to safeguard Palestinian history beyond the confines of any single physical institution. The project began with a grassroots approach: team members meticulously visited families across the West Bank, seeking permission to scan and digitize their cherished old photographs, letters, and documents. This diligent effort has blossomed into one of the region's most ambitious digital preservation initiatives. Today, the archive boasts over 500,000 digitized items, encompassing a rich tapestry of photographs, identification papers, diaries, maps, films, and letters. Many of these invaluable records were directly collected from Palestinian families, representing personal histories that might otherwise have been irrevocably lost. The museum's mission is dual: not only to preserve this vital history but also to ensure its accessibility to Palestinians globally, especially those unable to visit Palestine. The project is supported by a dedicated team of three full-time staff, a network of volunteers, and funding from diaspora donations, the University of California, and the Gerda Henkel Foundation. It involves extensive cataloging, translations, linguistic proofreading, and even explores advanced solutions like a bot for reading Ottoman Arabic. Crucially, the archive is engineered for resilience against both digital and physical threats. Multiple copies are strategically stored across the globe, establishing a distributed system designed to prevent the complete disappearance of the collections, even in the face of cyberattacks, which Shomali confirms occur almost monthly. "We can’t protect it from being hacked, but we can protect it from disappearing," he asserts. This distributed nature ensures that Palestinian history is no longer confined to a single building or server. Furthermore, the "exhibition in a box" initiative allows users worldwide to download, print, and stage their own exhibitions on Palestine, democratizing access and sharing this rich heritage globally, having been showcased over 260 times in five languages. This innovative approach allows Palestinians to reclaim ownership over their history, building a "bottom-up" narrative that resists erasure.