It is so hard to switch the radio off and forget about the developments on the ground, especially since I was there years ago, and am now struggling to imagine the level of destruction. Each hour, each event counts in the tragedy of Gaza. Each piece of writing in Western and Arab magazines deserves a look at, in the hope of detecting the coming of an interlude of silence in the skies, or of a ceasefire on the ground. There is none, though.
The only news I cannot read any longer are those in my language, as most of them are a simple translation of someone else’s investigative work, many others are dispatches of the Israeli authorities, and very few are attempting to qualify things for what they are. My country, once in love with Palestinian people, has become a sounding board for empty slogans celebrating the saga of the new Crusaders, the heralds of God’s revenge against the brutal terrorism threatening all of us. My country is populated of opinion-makers, journalists and politicians who never put their feet in any Palestinian enclave, and despite that they pretend to know everything. They are ghosts talking about ghosts. In a parade of disguised antisemitic feelings against Arabs or Islamophobic verdicts on Muslims, they hail the war.
Loneliness, Palestinian loneliness: I could not name it differently. And when this war will end – and it will probably be when the casualties will have reached a 30 :1 ratio, or when there won’t be any single building left standing for the next bomb – Palestinian loneliness on the global stage will mutate into something else, bearing a significance of removal, dislodgement, a feeling of being a nuisance for the rest of the world.
Italy’s Palestinian loneliness manifests best in the absence of flags; they say, it is not an appropriate thing to flaunt flags of a nation guilty of terror acts. No national flags, no keffiyehs, not even at political rallies of progressive parties like the Partito Democratico. Only peace flags, that’s all there is. The peace of the West: we from above and you from down below, like those West Bank’s Palestinian villages located at the lowest bottom of narrow valleys, and overlooked by Israeli settlements on hilltops. Our peace, we from above and you from down below. And woe to those who dare defy us.
Loneliness in the West, loneliness in the Middle East. Among Arab monarchs and Muslim heads of State condemning the Israeli crimes but unable to stop the war, powerless eunuchs, illegitimate representatives of their nations, authoritarian oppressors, or self-declared Prophet’s envoys on earth. Privileged riffraff good at oppressing their people, at repressing home dissent and freedom of thought, in Syria, Egypt or Saudi Arabia, but useless at making a difference for stateless Palestinians. Themselves, kings and presidents, have surrendered to the new ideology of « all is terrorism », which serves as well their own interests and purposes.
Egyptian writer and activist Mahmoud Hadhoud writes : « Nowadays, any form of resistance, especially within the frame of national liberation struggles, constitutes an act of “terrorism”. That is the charge imposed by the new international order to blackmail its resistors and justify their crushing. If that said order claims to base its legitimacy on international law and human rights, then “terrorism” would be the appropriate accusation to brand its opponents as violators of international law and human rights. »
Loneliness, everywhere. In the West, in Arab neighbouring countries, in Israel itself, where Jews who confront fascism and struggle for decolonisation and self-determination for Palestinians are demonised. Their voice is powerful, but they are isolated: their governors are using arrest to silence domestic dissent over Gaza’s war. The loneliness of the righteous, so denounced by Haaretz newspaper.
At least, we can still find solace among those who protest on the public street, defying unilateral criticism and dodging police batons. Protestors demanding an end to this war have the sympathy of many people in the secrecy of their hearts, but not the one of the palaces of power. Unfortunately, this is how it is. When you are alone, when you have no friends in governmental circles, TV studios or mainstream happenings, and you are marching in the street, you might be perceived as suspicious supporters of disorder, melding with « the terrorists ». Oh, terrorism, as if it were a candid and innocent methodology of classification of nations and entities. Italian champion of Mediterranean dialogue Andrea Amato writes: « After October 7, the public and the media seem to have unanimously recognized the terrorist nature of Hamas’ aggression mainly because of the heinousness and cruelty of the crimes they committed. But from an ethical and humanitarian point of view, what is the difference between the children slaughtered by Hamas and those who died, often burned alive, under Israel’s bombs. We have arrived at the paradox that, in the collective feeling, war crimes and crimes against humanity are less serious than those of terrorism. »
Loneliness, because you, Palestinians, will not even be given the opportunity to repair; you are not fit for democracy, nor for stability, nor for a state. You represent all what is unfit to the modern human being. However…
However, the ‘inadequacy’ you are burdened with is perhaps your salvation. Your imperfection is our salvation. Your demonization is our dehumanisation. Your daily death is our inescapable grave. You are alone, we are lost. Lost in ethnocentrism, selfishness, and blindness. Lost in translation, Lost in humanity.
It is so hard to feel helpless, unable to do anything meaningful to stop this war, not even to talk about it with our own fellow citizens because they do not understand, they only see Eastern terror and Western supremacy. Myself, I feel even misjudged when I take out my keffiyeh from the closet and walk the road, observed by secret eyes, and pointed at by our opinion-makers.
You are dying in hospitals hit by our weapons while we are losing our souls in gibberish discourses void of truthfulness. You are threatened by the rolling out of a new Nakba, a new massive displacement, while we are kindly inviting your occupiers to humiliate you gently.
Palestinian loneliness, oh, yes… But rest assured that loneliness does not necessarily mean defeat, because you the loneliest still hold the keys to redemption. Only the oppressed can “liberate” his oppressor from guilt and ostracism. Only reconciliation based on the recognition of the Palestinian suffering can deliver peace to Israeli society. There is no greater victory than the bereaved’s power of delivering the truth and restoring compassion in communities traversed by hatred and resentment.
Others are those who will remain unredeemed: those around, like us Europeans, distant and distracted spectators of this war, of this long-lasting struggle during which you have been stripped of everything, but your souls. Alone with our houses of cards, here are we instead, instructing our Arab neighbours on what they are entitled to, and what they are not. Immoral moralists and masters of double standards. We are lost. Lost in translation, lost in humanity.
Unless we’ll raise our voice, against the war, against violence, against impunity. The impunity of Israel today, of others tomorrow.
Loneliness is not an incurable disease. This is what Palestinians are teaching us.
Image: Rawan Anani, «Pray for Peace… Pray for Gaza», 2023, Water Colours, 45.7x61cm
November 15, 2023.
Gianluca Solera 