Rehab Eldalil’s launches her new book, The Longing of the Stranger Whose Path Has Been Broken

Rehab Eldalil

Rehab Eldalil announces her new book The Longing Of The Stranger Whose Path Has Been Broken, winner of the FotoEvidence Award 2022 and now available for preorder from FotoEvidence. Eldalil’s photographic series is a personal project in which she reconnects to herroots, working collaboratively with the Bedouin community to explore the notion of belonging and the interconnectedness of people and land.

Eldalil’s photographic series focuses on the process of finding and seeking the meaning of belonging cited through the Bedouin community of South Sinai, Egypt. The community are participants in the creative process. Eldalil combines their commentary of embroidery, poetry, sound and storytelling to link her photographic work with topics of representation and social injustice. The series is a complementary collection of photographs, embroidery, artifacts, poetry and multimedia.

The Longing Of The Stranger Whose Path Has Been Broken, attempts to understand the layers of an identity and the interconnectedness between people and land which defines the notion of belonging. Eldalil believe it’s a common human emotion to seek a definition of one’s identity, yet its complexity is often ignored, creating flattened labels and othering. With this dialogue, she isbuilding a bridge between the voices of the Bedouin community and the western audiences who have long seen the Bedouins and many other indigenous communities through a romanticized gaze.

Bedouins of Sinai survived wars, colonialism, drought, and pandemics. But like many indigenous communities, they are commonly misrepresented in the media, portrayed as isolated from, and a threat to, modern society. And struggling to secure civil rights. Throughout it all, they remain the keepers of the land, protecting it from harm as it provides them with blessings in return. This interconnectedness, forged over the centuries, accounts for the community’s resilience in the face of challenges. And it’s this interconnectedness which survived in Eldalil’s blood and drew her back to find her roots and way home. Creating this series has been Eldalil’s  opportunity to process her estranged Bedouin ancestry.