GAZA

When Humanity Fails: Gaza, Israel, and the Weight of Injustice

Silenced by algorithms and shamed by humanity, Gaza continues to be living in hell with the complicity of our Western-rotten world

Photo by 煜翔 肖 on Unsplash

The image of an American student and his T-shirt remains etched in my mind. It read, in bold letters, “Stand with Israel.” I read it as an imperative, almost like a command, rather than a mere declaration of which side he was on.

I felt he wore it provocatively, though perhaps he wore it in that typically American imperialist mode, completely detached from the surrounding reality.

I wanted to tell him that in Portugal, we don’t flaunt our ideologies so blatantly, we don’t put bumper stickers on our cars, and we don’t have license plates that say “ass man.” But, as a good Portuguese, I kept quiet, denying him, perhaps, the satisfaction of an unfruitful argument.

It would have been pointless to argue with someone who has long since switched off the channel of humanity within themselves. We already know that the genocide perpetrated by the terrorist state of Israel is not seen as such by many who choose to humanize some and turn others into beasts.