Tag: #genocide

Behind You Is The Sea

The book is a collection of stories by Palestinian Americans living in Baltimore. Each chapter is dedicated to a different character and as you read along, you realise all of these characters and their families are interconnected. 

With this book, the author, Susan Muaddi Darraj, has tried to reflect upon the intergenerational chasm that exists inevitably and yet how the various generations are inextricably linked. Though Palestinian heritage is the commonality, the newer generations are more American than Palestinian in their personalities and perspectives. This remains the bone of contention among the older folks who are unable to make peace with their diasporic status and are torn living a life that oscillates between reminiscences and resentments. 

The book also tackles some serious issues that plague the Palestinian society such as honour killing, patriarchy, chauvinism, domestic violence and misogyny. Women are expected to be subservient to men, regardless of their achievements. The chapter in which a father is disgruntled and disowns his daughter for having an abortion sans marriage and having a Black boyfriend is unnerving. The chapter wherein a mother constantly chastises one of her professionally successful daughters for being divorced and not having children in comparison to her other daughter who is married and has numerous children, speaks highly about internalised patriarchy. Only the last chapter takes place in Palestine, when one of the characters is forced to bring his father’s corpse to Palestine for burial as per his last wish. What was supposed to be a solemn event, turns into an emotionally frustrating exercise when the son learns the benevolent side to his father’s personality, especially when not even an iota of that benevolence was ever bestowed upon him or his sister. 

Susan Muaddi Darraj is a Palestinian American writer who has authored several collections of fiction, young adult and children’s books. She is the recipient of various awards; winning the Arab American Book award in 2021 and 2016 for Farah Rocks and A Curious Land, respectively. A Curious Land was also shortlisted for Palestine Book Award. 

Behind You Is The Sea, my pick for Arablit April, was a unique reading experience for me because this was the first Palestinian book that I have read, (and I have read a few!) that spoke about Palestinian Christian families compared to the majority of Palestinian literature that is about Palestinian Arabs. Palestinian Christians form a sizeable minority in Palestine and the book helped me understand the inseparability and intertwining of Christian and Arab cultures. 

Now, almost all of the social ills highlighted in this book are inherently prevalent in our Indian society. This goes to show that Indians and Palestinians are not very different because we were all colonised people and carry the repercussions of the British colonisation and occupation through generations. Having said that, it doesn’t mean we continue to have these colonial hangovers till today. Yet somehow, the general Indian population now supports Israel, a current day coloniser, who has mercilessly and relentlessly continued the genocide in Gaza since October 7, 2023. Have we forgotten our own history or has the prevailing Islamophobic jingoism made us all intellectually bankrupt commentators?

~ JUST A GAY BOY. 🍉

Daybreak in Gaza: Stories of Palestinian Lives and Culture

📍 Gaza 🇵🇸 

Gaza, a city having history spanning thousands of years, that once celebrated life and laughter has now become synonymous with death and destruction since the Israeli occupation began. It’s become a graveyard of lost lives, homes and hopes. The book, Daybreak in Gaza, is an anthology of essays and short stories by Palestinians from Gaza, West Bank and the diaspora who recount an erstwhile Gaza, a Gaza of their dreams, a Gaza of their grandparents and great grandparents and a present day Gaza that is witnessing a relentless genocide from the 7th October, 2023. Many of the writers give first hand accounts of the bombing and devastation that has happened mercilessly in front of their eyes. Some of the stories are diary entries as bombs go off in the background, buildings collapse and cries of despair echo constantly. Some of these writers have been killed in the ongoing war. 

Gaza has been reduced to a rubble, Gazans as a statistic. This book, has allowed a different version of Gaza to be seen, albeit the grave circumstances currently. We see Gaza as a thriving center of trade, culture, education and living prior to the Nakba of 1948. Through the various stories we are introduced to the rich history of the city and Palestine even after the Nakba and all that followed with the Egyptian occupation to the First and Second Intifada and the Oslo Accords which turned out to be criminally counterproductive to the Palestinians. And then there are the horrifying, heart wrenching, soul shattering stories of the ongoing genocide replete with unimaginable sorrow that makes this book such a necessity.

Daybreak in Gaza is a difficult read. But to think about it, can this difficulty even come close to the horrendous atrocities being meted out to Gazans since forever and especially now since October 7th, 2023? After every chapter I had to pause. Because every chapter, every page, every word is imbued with the hurt and anger that the Gazans are facing. This book is drenched in their tears and wails that the world has turned a deaf ear to. This book is a testament to their rightful hatred towards all of us for our cowardice and consent for the genocide. 

Daybreak in Gaza has been edited by Mahmoud Muna and Matthew Teller with Juliette Touma and Jayyab Abusafia. Mahmoud is a writer, publisher and bookseller from Jerusalem. Matthew is a UK-based writer and broadcaster. Juliette works for the UNRWA and Jayyab is a London-based journalist from Jabalia refugee camp in the north of Gaza.

As of 5th November, 2024, 200,000+ Palestinians are projected to have been killed by Israel and the USA in Gaza since 7th October, 2023. Two thirds of the buildings have been damaged or destroyed by the Israeli occupation forces. The $3.8 billion in annual U.S. military aid to Israel, which is part of a $38 billion, 10 year deal signed by the Obama administration (2018-2028), has supported the occupation and the ethnic cleansing. Since October 2023, at least another $17.9 billion have been funnelled into Israel’s military. 

How have we let this happen? Is this the world we are a part of wherein a certain population can be ethnically cleansed while no one bats an eyelid? Is this the world where we still call America the greatest country and completely ignore its acts of terrorism? I think we certainly are. 

I shall end my review with these quotes from the book;

From the chapter, My heart is broken, by Saba Timraz:

“Has our life become a game, controlled by America and the occupier? They kill, destroy and do whatever they can to harm us, and then tell the world that they are the victims, and we are the monsters. We are an occupied people and have been since 1917. Our lands were stolen, our honour was violated, and the building blocks of our lives were destroyed. We want to be liberated and to live in freedom and dignity. We will not surrender our rights, no matter how long it takes.”

From the chapter, History will not lie, by Susan Abulhawa:

“But history will not lie. It will record that Israel perpetrated a holocaust in the twenty-first century.”

~ JUST A GAY BOY. 🍉

Gaza Weddings

Life in Gaza is unpredictable. Hope and desire is fickle too. So what does it take to plan a wedding in Gaza then? Ibrahim Nasrallah’s book talks about the irony of having a wedding in the midst of bombs and death. He uses dark humour, sarcasm and stark realism to convey the misery and hopelessness that abound life for Gazans. Through the two protagonists, Amna and Randa, the book provides a cataclysmic account of Palestinians in Gaza under the Israeli occupation.

Randa, is an aspiring journalist, who’s identical twin sister, Lamis is in a courtship with Amna’s son Saleh. In the book, Amna keeps talking to her husband who’s in hiding while Randa talks to the readers directly. Death is so commonplace in Gaza that no family is unknown to its horrors and the brutality of the occupation. Amna is bereft after she hears about the suspected death of her husband but is unable to identify him since it’s so badly disfigured. Saleh is unable to process his father’s martyrdom and becomes emotionally unstable. Towards the end, the story depicts the death of one of the twin sisters. We never know who is dead.

Ibrahim’s writing is part lyrical, part biting. Death, tears and sadness form the canvas on which he paints the precarious lives of Palestinians. Bittersweet reminiscences and pervasive foreboding become everyday nuances for Amna and Randa. Joy and laughter feel misplaced and unnatural when there’s grief lurking at every turn. Ibrahim Nasrallah is a Palestinian writer, poet, artist and photographer with an extensive body of work and has been the winner of the Arabic Booker Prize in 2018. The book has been translated into English by Nancy Roberts who is known for her translations of Arabic literature.

As of 13th March, 2024, 31,200 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza and more than 72,800 have been injured since Israel began the genocide on October 7th, 2023. There’s no life in Gaza literally. Those who have survived the bombs and Israel’s ethnic cleansing, are now starving to death. The current day Holocaust is going unchecked and unabated as the world continues to look the other way. How are we ever going to face ourselves in the future? For how many years will Israel and its comrades, especially the United States, will have to beg for forgiveness? Should they ever be forgiven then?

~ JUST A GAY BOY. 😞

Minor Detail

📍 Palestine 🇵🇸

This novel has two parts. The first one is set in the year 1949, just after the Nakba of 1948. An Israeli officer is scouring the Negev desert for any remaining Arabs or Arab settlements. The blistering heat, a festering infection, dust, sweat do not deter him from going about his day in a regimented way. His single handed determination to find Arabs does lead him to a Palestinian girl, who is forcibly brought back to the Israeli military camp, where she is gangraped by the soldiers, later killed and buried in the sand. The second part, begins in the city of Ramallah, where a young Palestinian woman sets out to investigate this crime that happened 25 years ago. As she juggles her way through the innumerable military checkpoints in the West Bank and on her journey to the desert, she is also juggling anxiety and panic that have become ubiquitous in her life due to the Israeli occupation. Her single handed determination to find details about the gruesome incident despite the unforgiving heat through the lonesome desert unfortunately leads to a tragic penultimate moment.

The book is an uncomfortably simple yet unflinchingly honest prose on Palestine and Palestinian people living under the occupation and an apartheid regime. The first half focusses on the daily mundane activities of the officer over and over again, so much so that the brutality that occurs becomes a part of the same mundane. In the second half, the author literally places us in the passenger seat of the woman as she takes on the perilous journey, and we get to experience first-hand her anxiety, fear and trauma muddled in her determination and longing to unearth the truth. The author deftly shifts the narrative perspective from the Israeli officer whose intention and purpose is annihilation of Palestinians, to the Palestinian woman whose reality is obscured and dependent on the military occupation. Freedom is villainous in one while it’s the prisoner in another. Life is precious in one while for the other, death is a close ally.

Adania Shibli is a Palestinian author and essayist, born in Palestine, who has written three novels and lives between Jerusalem and Berlin. Minor Detail, translated from Arabic to English, by Elisabeth Jaquette, was longlisted for the International Booker Prize in 2021 and was also nominated for National Book Award for Translated Literature in 2020.

As of December 11th, 2023, over 17997 civilians which include 7729 children have been massacred in Gaza since the genocide began on October 7th, 2023. The dehumanisation of the Palestinian people by the entire world has never been more stark and atrocious. The global silence on the oppressed and the selective empathy towards the oppressors is a new abysmal low for our collective humanity. The total disregard towards the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians, the absolute subservience towards the Israeli propaganda of self defence, the failure to distinguish between antisemitism and zionism is a telling of the dark times we are in. The next time when the world’s so called superpowers call for peace and human rights, you can gawk at the irony of it.

~ JUST A GAY BOY. 🇵🇸

A stone is most precious where it belongs

This book is a compelling narrative on Uyghurs; their life, culture, geography and the strife unleashed upon them by the Chinese government or the CCP (Chinese Communist Party). The Uyghurs are a Turkic ethnic group from the autonomous region of Northwest China known as East Turkestan, which has been renamed as Xinjiang by the CCP. Modern Uyghurs are primarily Muslims and they are the second largest predominantly Muslim ethnicity in China after the Hui. The modern Uyghur language is classified under the Turkic language family and has an Arabic script. Gulchehra Hoja, author of this book, has written a memoir and through that, has encapsulated the trials and tribulations of her people and the ongoing modern day genocide.

Hoja, born and raised in Ürümchi, the capital of the then erstwhile East Turkestan, comes from a lineage of musicians and artists. Her family was known for their contributions towards the Uyghurs’ cultural landscape, and she had a very liberal upbringing. Gulchehra, upon completing her studies was chosen to be the face of Xinjiang Television’s children’s show. Whilst the show initially started off as a celebration of Uyghur culture and traditions, it gradually morphed into a CCP propaganda piece. Soon she realised how little to no control she had in the proceedings of the show and that, that she was becoming a puppet at the hands of the Han authorities running the channel. Now, the Chinese government had always wanted complete control of the Uyghur region and had started asserting their supremacy by sending Han Chinese civilians to live and work there. Chinese language was forcibly introduced in schools and other governmental establishments. Uyghur civilians were finding it more and more difficult to be themselves or practice their faith. The more Gulchehra understood the threats to her freedom and her Uyghur people, the more uncomfortable she got. One fine day, when she got an opportunity to go to Europe, she learnt starker truths and gory details of the Chinese government in the programmed oppression of the Uyghur, thanks to the free internet available in Europe. This prompted her to make a life changing decision to go America and work for Radio Free Asia (RFA), which simultaneously meant that, she could never come back to her land and her family.

As a journalist at RFA, Hoja gave the Uyghurs a voice that could be heard all across the globe. She brought to light the brutality and racial killing perpetuated by the CCP while promoting their ethnocentric agenda. This bold and fearless reporting only meant trouble for her family back home. She was soon branded as a separatist/ terrorist and her immediate and extended family were imprisoned and treated in the most inhuman way possible. Gulchehra battled immeasurable feelings of guilt and sorrow, but she continued her reporting nonetheless. Her personal life was a complete mess too, with an estranged husband and a budding love interest. However, Gulchehra remained committed to her Uyghur people, never lost focus of her responsibility towards them and through this extremely difficult journey, she portrayed her resilience, compassion and bravado.

What is happening to Uyghurs, is a genocide. The Islamophobia that is rampantly being broadcasted by the CCP is dangerous. There’s genocide happening of the Palestinians by apartheid Israel as well. The world, somehow has turned a blind eye to these genocides and various such Islamophobic propagandas. As I read this book, a chill ran down my spine. The measures taken by the CCP for this ethnic cleansing include detention camps (euphemised as vocational skills education training centers), forced sterilisation, disappearance of dissenting civilians, torture, violation of privacy, hi-tech mass surveillance, religious persecution, unreasonable incarcerations, suppression of free press. Now, only an imbecile or a fanatic should be able to not draw parallels to the situation here at home. Maybe there aren’t any detention camps or forced sterilisations yet, but Islamophobic rhetoric has become mainstream. And if you broaden the scope and look beyond the lens of any kind of phobia, you shall note that this is signalling of a rise in autocracy and complete totalitarianism. Let’s not shun an Uyghur or a Palestine as a localised geopolitical issue. The fanaticism used in this oppression has worldwide ramifications and replications. After the Holocaust, the world vowed that it would never ever allow another humanitarian catastrophe. Yet in 2023, we are not only seeing such events and genocides happening but also becoming widespread. How many more of such massacres would it take for the world, for us to get out of our ignorant slumber?

~ JUST A GAY BOY. 🥺