On Maternal Thinking from Gaza

To think as a mother in Gaza is to be thought of, too often, as merely surviving. This realization came to me in the dim light of our apartment during yet another power outage, where I stood with my four-year-old daughter Leila and her simple request for water that could not be easily fulfilled. The old generator hummed outside, providing just enough electricity for the small water pump to extract the brackish supply from our rooftop tank. My father-in-law watched as I negotiated the delicate terrain between Leila’s thirst and our dwindling reserves, as I knelt and explained why we must conserve what little remained until the municipal supply returned, as I balanced the dual imperatives of compassion and necessary limitation. “Mashallah,” he said when the moment had passed, “how beautifully you guide her understanding.”

I did not expect these words to split me open like a ripe fig. I did not expect to stand there, plastic cup suspended midair, while something warm and unnamable spread beneath my ribs. What was it about this simple acknowledgment that left me speechless, that followed me out onto the balcony where I performed wudu with the precious saved water, and into the evening when I sat on our worn prayer mat, watching the last light fade over Gaza’s crowded skyline? Perhaps it was the recognition of the mind at work in a mother’s actions — that someone had seen beyond the expected nurturance to the intellectual framework supporting it.

We live in a world that insists upon the incompatibility of intellectual life and maternal…