Palestine - Day 7

So here we are. Day 7. I skipped day 5 and 6. I guess my idea is this challenge can be sorta like Ramadan (which I successfully completed this year, first time so I gotta brag) any days that I miss I can make up at the end. Sorta. Because I'm just going to keep going at the end. There's no grand celebration at the end of this challenge like there is during Eid. Though I could buy myself new clothes.... Keeping tradition alive.

I also might do some double posts to make up for my missed days. I have lots of things I wrote this summer that I haven't shared anywhere yet. I don't know why I'm so shy about my writing. I'm really not shy about any aspect of myself. But I guess writing opens up a vulnerability that you aren't able to hide behind quick wit, big words and self deprecation.

I thought today I would write about why I haven't written the last 2 days. I touched on it with a very short post the other day but I thought I would go into more depth now.

If you're following the situation in Palestine (and if you are reading this you probably are) you know it's not good. People are being killed every day, especially young men. One was chased by settlers and when he turned to the police for help they shot him dead and let the settlers abuse his body while chanting "We Killed An Arab" A twelve year old boy was killed. A 3 year old arrested for throwing stones (incidentally that carries a penalty of up to 20 in prison, minimum of 10 in prison, so it will be interesting to watch what happens), more children run down by settler cars, house demotions, reporters being shot in the face with tear gas, olive trees burned... The list goes on and on and as I type each offense I can feel my heart breaking a little bit more. I'm holding back tears as I type this because it's just so deeply personal this time.

Some people try to lessen my credibility by saying I don't see the situation objectively. That I'm thinking too much with my emotions and not rationally. I think that's bullshit. I think if you can look at Palestinians suffering at the hands of the IDF, the settlers, the Palestinian Authority, the world and not be affected that you're probably a good portion of what's wrong with the world.

There are so many things that separate us from animals. Thumbs, technology, critical thinking, etc. But even animals can feel empathy. I watched this video where a baby elephant fell into a muddy whole and his mom tried to get him out for hours and then the whole herd (are groups of elephants herds? Why do these herd questions keep coming up for me?) came and eventually freed him.

So elephants can see another elephant suffering and find a solution but we humans with all our fancy thinking and gadgets can't look at what Palestinians have endured for the last 100 years, seen it get exponentially worse, and we still can't come together and say "Fuck this shit, let's find a solution?"

And even worse the world seems so apathetic to any type of suffering, so many problems we have are caused by hate and stereotypes but instead of transcending these arbitrary boundaries we have become so deeply rooted to them that things are worse than ever before in my life.

I think that people have become so conditioned to be distracted so they don't feel the pain of the world that they no longer know how to feel. And to me that feels unbearable