How a Swedish song from the 70s became a new Palestinian anthem

A 1970s Swedish song ‘Leve Palestina’, which means Long Live Palestine, has become a rallying anthem for protesters taking to streets across Europe against Israel's brutal war on Gaza.

The song by the band Kofia was once attempted to be censured by Swedish authorities, which were close to the Zionists, yet its powerful lyrics endured and have again become a way for Palestinians and their allies to express resistance.

“I started this music group, Kofia, in order to tell the people the story of my country,” says George Totari, 77, the band’s founder in an interview with TRT World.

“When I came here to Sweden in 1967, I realised that I could not criticise Israel as openly as I could in Palestine. And most people, whether on the left or right, knew nothing about Palestine.”

And so came the lyrics.

Rocks and olives

"And we have cultivated the earth
And we have harvested the wheat
We have picked the lemons
And pressed the olives
And the whole world knows our soil"

The Israeli military has killed more than 15,800 Palestinians, many of them women and children, in the two month old war.

In the age of social media, it has become increasingly difficult for the Israeli government to hide the atrocities unfolding on the besieged Palestinian enclave.

But governments from the United States to Germany have been cracking down on people opposing Israel’s disproportionate military campaign.

Totari was born in Nazareth in 1946 two years before Israel was carved out of Palestine. He migrated to Sweden after the 1967 war in which Israel occupied large tracts of Palestinian land.

Sweden was “more Zionist than Israel itself" back then, he says.

The expulsion of Palestinians and occupation of their lands compelled Totari to form the band called Kofia, which translates to keffiyeh in Swedish, in the city of Gothenburg along with other Palestinians and leftist Swedish musicians.

It was a way for them to use musical narrative to show the resilience and determination inherent in the Palestinian struggle.

Around the time the band started making music, prominent Swedish politicians hesitated criticising Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories and in 1971 some of them even extended a welcome to Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir, who Palestinians regard as a fascist.

Totari, who is a Palestinian Christian, says he found inspiration in his memories of hometown of Nazareth, recalling moments of singing at a church and at parties. He channelled those memories to resist Israeli oppression.

A lasting impact

Over the decades, Palestinian diaspora has produced several musicians and artists of renown. But what sets Kofia apart is its embrace of a western language to put across the message.

Writing simple yet powerful bilingual lyrics with repetitive melodic patterns rooted in the maqam musical tradition, the band created something unique, says Dr Louis Brehony, the author of the book Palestinian music in exile.

"At that time, there were many Palestinian bands and musicians around the world, and the vast majority of them, I would say, were singing directly to the Palestinian people."

But Kofia’s unique approach to use music as a tool to educate the Swedish people and convey the message of Palestinian resistance to Europeans in a language of their own made them stand out, he tells TRT World.

Brehony is also the director of the award-winning short documentary A Revolution Through Music, which is centered on the works of Kofia.

"They felt that it was their duty to convey that message in a language that Swedish people could understand too. They sang bilingually in Swedish and Arabic, even teaching Swedish singers to sing in Arabic."

Besides telling the world about the Palestinian struggle with their Swedish songs, Kofia reached out to other oppressed people, making allies.

United in solidarity

"And we have thrown stones at
Soldiers and police
And we have fired missiles
At our enemies"

In the 1970s, when opposition to the Vietnam War and South African apartheid was at its peak, Gothenburg was a focal point for working-class activists who were quick to embrace the Swedish-Palestinian band.

Kofia routinely played at demonstrations.

“Whenever there was a protest on any issue in Gothenburg, Kofia would be there,” says Brehony.

The band’s commitment extended beyond individual causes, he says.

“Whether it was to do with South Africa, whether it was kind of a labour struggle or a socialist demonstration, they will be there singing the message of Palestine.”

​​Through these efforts, they established themselves as a prominent and radical voice advocating not only for the Palestinian cause in Sweden but other movements as well, says Brehony.

And it did all that even without mainstream record industry support.

Kofia and ‘Leve Palestina’

From its formation in 1972 until the start of the Intifada in Palestine in 1987, Kofia independently produced four albums, three vinyl records, and one cassette, without significant label attention.

Across these four independently released albums -"Palestine My Land" (1976), "Earth of My Homeland" (1978), "Mawwal to My Family and Loved Ones" (1984), and "Long Live Palestine" (1988) - Kofia weaves a Palestinian narrative that transcends boundaries.

While each album delves into diverse aspects of the Palestinian cause, tackling issues such as challenging Israel’s Zionist ideology, the fertility of Palestinian lands, the endurance of refugees, endorsement of the armed struggle, the song "Leve Palestina," or its Swedish counterpart "Demonstrationssången" ("Song of Demonstration"), stands out.

When asked about his reflections on a song he wrote almost 50 years ago going viral on platforms like TikTok and Instagram, Totari says, “I'm proud of the song because it's spread all over the world.”

Leve Palestina’s revival also has to do with an enduring message of resisting oppression at all times.

“The Kofia experience is not a thing of the past,” says Totari.

So far, attempts to ban the song under the guise of antisemitism have failed.

On the International Workers Day in 2019, at a demonstration in Malmö, Sweden, pro-Palestinian activitsts sang "Leve Palestina." Despite being part of the annual workers' march, the act was condemned by both right-wing press and the ruling Social Democratic Party (SAP) in the Swedish parliament.

“And the Social Democratic government recommended that this song be banned and censored. And it actively encouraged the police to go out and arrest people that they saw singing this song,” says Brehony.

However, these attempts to silence Palestinian music never amounted to much. Thousands of Swedes have taken part in pro-Palestinian rallies, singing "Leve Palestina" at the top of their lungs.

“And there is no way that the Swedish police would be able to shut up a crowd of ten, twenty, thirty thousand people singing this open song of resistance,”says Brehony.

“And for me, I think that represents a victory over the forces that attempt to silence the message of anti-Zionism.”