The Illusion of Return

by Samir El-Youssef

Published 11 January 2007

After 17 years, the narrator and his friend, Ali, meet at Heathrow and
slowly remember their past in a Palestinian camp in Lebanon. Their memories are concentrated on one fatal night when they were with two other friends for the last time, before tragedy struck. But for the narrator, a personal tragedy had occurred much earlier¿

Like many other Palestinians, both Ali and the narrator had to leave Lebanon in the mid-1980s, when it became a battleground for local armies - Ali to America, the narrator to London.

But this is not just a story about suffering, it is also about absurd politics
and violence - about a world where tragedy and comedy co-exist.

A poignant story that lingers long after one has finished it.