The photograph almost looks like a test shot, its subjects assembling, not quite yet ready for the camera. A group of Palestinian women stand in front of train carriages, preparing to depart. They are the Palestinian delegation to the First Conference of Arab Women in Cairo, and it is mid-October, 1938. Over four days, these twenty-seven delegates will join women from Syria, Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, and Iraq in discussing support for Palestine — the conference’s central theme.

The photograph here shows the delegation departing from Lydda. Some wear sunglasses, others squint into the sunlight. Most wear heels and carry handbags and papers. Some look at the camera while others look behind them to the left, perhaps calling to a latecomer to join. The conference they are bound for eventually resulted in support for Palestinian demands for the cancellation of the Balfour Declaration, and condemnation of the British police’s brutal repression of the Palestinian population.

The image represents one glimpse of life in Palestine before the Nakba, appearing in Against Erasure: A Photographic Memory of Palestine Before the Nakba (recently published by Haymarket). Comprising nearly 230 photographs, with the majority dating between 1898 and 1946, the book’s images show several facets of life in Palestine sourced from a range of collections, including personal family photographs, studio portraiture, and the archives of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).