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RAMALLAH, West Bank — Ihab Bseiso's job may be every bibliophile’s dream: The former minister of culture is charged with creating the Palestinian National Library in a palace that stretches over 40 dunams, or 9 acres, of land near Ramallah.
Despite the enthusiasm of Bseiso — a journalist, poet and advocate of culture as a tool of political resistance — the establishment of the national library has been anything but quick. Two years ago, President Mahmoud Abbas issued a decision to turn the presidential palace in Sarda, north of Ramallah, into a national library. It took another two years to appoint Bseiso, who was one of the brains behind the project to gather Palestine's scattered archives.
