I have no place
I have no country
I have no homeland
With my finger I make fire
and with my heart I sing for you
my heartstrings weep
I was born in Palestine
I was born in Palestine
I have no place
I have no country
I have no homeland
Amel Mathlouthi, born in Tunis, is a singer-songwriter based in Paris. Visit her MySpace page: <www.myspace.com/amelmathlouthi>. Video by Lina Ben Mhenni. The song “Nací en Palestina” is based on “Nací en Alamo” (lyrics by Tony Gatlif, music by Dionisis Tsaknis, Gritos de Guerra, and Tony Gatlif), which was performed by Remedios Silva Pisa for the film Vengo (Dir. Tony Gatlif, 2000). “Nací en Alamo,” by the way, has also been performed by Jerusalem-born singer Yasmin Levy, whose father Isaac Levy, an ethnomusicologist from Turkey, had collected 14 volumes of Judaeo-Spanish (Ladino) songs before his death, lovingly preserving the cultural heritage from the times before nationalisms and nation-states.