Disgust. Horror. Pain. Rage. Exhaustion. I am cycling through these emotions as the Israeli government, with robust funding and support from the United States, commits a genocide against Palestinians. This is a genocide which is being co-signed and funded by the so-called leaders of our world, leaders who are responsible yet clearly incompetent and uninterested in protecting all of us. Let us not conflate this incompetence and disinterest with complacency. No, like other genocides, this one is very much active, deliberate, calculated. On top of this, politicians and the mainstream media continue to grant themselves unchecked power to dehumanize while losing whatever remnants of capacity they had to hold nuance, disrupt binaries and center the humanity and dignity of all. There has been a global outcry at the force of Israel’s response. There have been pleas for a ceasefire to stop the mass murder of children and families which, instead of being listened to, have been used to further fuel Anti-Palestinian, Anti-Muslim, Anti-Arab rhetoric. Instead of using their power to demand a ceasefire, our leaders have discounted the death toll, called for Gaza to be turned into a parking lot and silenced and threatened Rashida Tlaib, one of two Muslim women and the only Palestinian in Congress.
And so here we are. Yet again. Having to witness brown people, Muslim people, women, children, people whose land has been stolen and occupied, pleading for their lives. I feel so tired and so angry that the majority of us on this Earth have to spend so much of our lives shouting, fighting for, protecting our right to live. The right to live, in safety and with dignity, which should be guaranteed. Hamas’ horrendous attack on Israel killed 1,400 people. Israel’s incessant attacks on Palestine have killed more than 11,000 people, majority of whom are children. These numbers continue to grow and don’t account for those kidnapped, missing, injured or those who are trying to deliver food, water, and medical services in the midst of the bombardment. There has been tremendous loss of both Jewish and Palestinian lives over many years; however, what is so deeply troubling and painful is the response (or lack thereof) to the pleas to save Palestinian lives, to save Palestinian children who are being murdered at an unfathomable rate.
I refuse to engage with the narrative being pushed on us that it is anti-semitic to believe Palestinians matter and are not disposable. This narrative, seeping through the pores of many in power who are White and male, to instill fear and silence is sickening. The loss, trauma and the compounding and reverberating impact of sanctioned violence against human beings, regardless of who they are, should haunt us. How dare our leaders ask us to choose who matters more, all in the name of their unchecked and insatiable hunger for greed and dominance. In speaking to the US Congress, Rashida Tlaib said, “the cries of the Palestinian and Israeli children sound no different to me. What I don’t understand is why the cries of Palestinians sound different to you all.” We must sit with this and confront how, time and time again, we deem some lives as less than others, some children as less than others. The roots of what we are witnessing are historic, deep and coated in racism, sexism, classism, colonialism, and Islamophobia.
We can denounce Hamas and be in solidarity with Palestinian communities. We can denounce Israel’s actions and be in solidarity with Jewish communities. We can decouple people and governments, people and terror groups, and invite in some space which lets us both sit with and move through the messiness and discomfort to figure out how we center both humanity and accountability. Let’s question the beliefs that at best give us a false sense of safety and at worst silence our conscience and grant us permission to commit the most obscene and heinous actions. While witnessing state-sanctioned violence of unfathomable proportions, we must actively reject the belief we are being fed by a spoon dripping in white supremacy and colonialism that some of us are more worthy of protecting; some of us are more worthy of saving; some of us are more worthy of living. We must dismantle the ladders of worth that we are so incentivized to construct, contribute to and climb before they cement our collective demise.
Listed below are only some of the incredible resources on the history of Israel and Palestine, the current genocide, and different campaign and movement efforts. While taking care of yourself, I invite you to lean in especially if you can afford to check out. I’ll continue to update this list. Please reach out if you have resources to add. Let us come together and demand a ceasefire and an end to Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories.
*: The title quote is from an open letter co-authored by over 150 feminist scholars.
**: Photo from press conference held by Palestinian children in Gaza