a note & recommended readings
In solidarity with the Palestinian call for an international strike from 21st-28th January, 2024, there is no regular newsletter this week.
Instead, a few thought provoking things I have read recently on Gaza, grief, and what it means to watch a genocide via a phone screen:
Palestinians are documenting the war for millions on social media by Harmeet Kaur on CNN.
“The least that I can do, or anybody can do, is to bear witness”
(note: Motaz Azaiza, the journalist discussed at the beginning of the article has since safely evacuated Gaza.)
The Work of the Witness by Sarah Aziza in Jewish Currents
“IN THE MORNINGS, as others stumble toward their coffee, I wake and gather news of the dead.”
A poem: Dear Aleph by Solmaz Sharif, from Customs(as referenced in the previous article)
Empathy means
laying yourself down
in someone else’s chalklinesand snapping a photo
Against Grief as Political Currency by P.E. Moskowitz on Substack
“Political movements that spring into existence in reaction to the spectacular usually have a short shelf life; once the spectacle is gone the solidarity tends to dissipate too.”
The Epidemiological War on Gaza by Maya Rosen in Jewish Currents
“If you can burn people with phosphorus bombs, then of course you can crowd them together and let diseases do the rest. Who will cry now?”
Can the Palestinian Mourn? by Abdaljawad Omar in Rusted Radishes: Beirut Literary and Art Journal
“How can one grieve within a space of relentless revulsion that erects barriers, redefines boundaries, desecrates bodies, and takes lives arbitrarily? …
“To encounter this … is to live on the threshold of death, where loss is not only what “happened” but also what is yet-to-come.”
until Palestine is free,
isobel