The People of Lake Tiberias

Yahya Yakhlif's novel, A Lake Beyond the Wind, depicts Palestinian life in 1948 during the rise of Israeli power within Palestine. The Palestinian townspeople that this novel focuses on still believe that the Arab Liberation Army will succeed in defeating the Israelis, whose new settlements begin to neighbor their villages.

Yakhlif effectively characterizes Samakh, a Palestinian village on the banks of Lake Tiberias through the intricate lives of many of its residents. Radi, a boy coming of age works in his uncle's shop, a gathering place for the townspeople. When a British soldier sells Radi a bulletproof vest, Radi believes that the wearer of such a powerful vest must be a courageous warrior. Radi happily sells the vest to Ahmad Bey, an officer in the Arab Liberation Army, who has come to Samakh to recruit soldiers. The unpopular Najib readily volunteers and the story follows Najib and the vest to Beisan, the training camp.

At Beisan, the situations of several characters become more dire than they had seemed to the hopeful residents of Samakh. Though the first battle fought by the Arab Liberation Army (at Tirat-Zevi) results in bloody defeat, Ahmad Bey tells his superiors it was a success. Najib finds that Bey is a liar and a coward. Najib, however, turns out to be a strong character and friend to his fellow soldiers, such as Abd al-Rahman, an Iraqi volunteer.

As the novel progresses, perspectives change and the intimate thoughts of characters like Abd al-Rahman and his friend Asad al-Shahba, a young man forced to part from his potential bride, are revealed. Readers find out what characters in the town were up to during the battle at Tirat-Zevi. Radi and his aunt Fatima (Najib's ex-wife) were washing a tent in Lake Tiberias, a town gathering place and life force. While Najib is at Beisan he imagines the lake, wishing he can return there. Najib's feelings express the wish of all the characters to return to the peaceful lake of the past, undisturbed and unthreatened.

When Ahmad Bey returns to Samakh to relay a tip that Israeli forces are planning to attack the village itself, residents realize that they are no longer separated from the battlefield. Their hopes dwindle and many men want to purchase rifles, including Radi's uncle and father. This planned attack on civilians becomes personal through the scope of Yakhlif's well developed characters. His novel celebrates the lives of Samakh's former residents by demonstrating their passions, weaknesses, and humanity. His is a fiction that tells many truths.