Introduction

The introduction illustrates how this book rejects and breaks the paradigmatic normativity that is presented to us by Israeli settler-colonial logic, especially as it permeates liberal psychoanalytic engagements, analysis, diagnoses, and pronouncements. By prioritizing the experience of Palestinian clinicians across historic Palestine, we focus on the lived material reality of clinicians and explore how Palestinian clinical engagement with psychoanalysis forges a decolonial psychosocial theory appropriate to the realities and structures of Zionist settler-colonialism. The introduction also frames how psychoanalysis is used by Palestinian clinicians not only to navigate the occupation, but also to imagine new possibilities for Palestinian unity, activism, and liberation.