This Is About All Of Us, As Human Beings

Children in Gaza Camp, Jordan. June 2023.

I spent hours writing, rewriting, deleting, and trying again. I have written page after page, but eloquence and hope have eluded my writing.

Anger was ever-present.

Which often masquerades as heartbreak for me.

I am watching the ongoing genocide of Palestinians being live-streamed on my phone. Children screaming about how hungry they are. Literally screams as they cry. Pictures of babies starving to death. Babies. Today, the U.N. issued a warning that 14,000 babies will die in 48 hours without immediate aid.

Globally, we are allowing babies to die from a man-made starvation.

This post, this genocide isn’t about my anger or desperation or despair.

This is about the Palestinian people.

This is about all of us as human beings.

This is about the corruption of power.

I remember as a child reading Anne Frank. The book overwhelmed me by learning about the Holocaust. I couldn’t fathom how people could allow this to happen. How could entire groups of people be rounded up and put into concentration camps for extermination in multiple countries?

And yet, here we are in 2025. This isn’t history, this isn’t a movie, this is happening right now.

As an American, I am complicit. Because without my tax dollars, this couldn’t happen.

Years ago, I sat on the floor of a friend’s home in Gaza camp. It was January and freezing. We sat in front of a propane heater on the floor and drank cup after cup of sage tea. During a truly one-of-a-kind camp conversation, we explored the imagery in The Great Gatsby. My very favorite book.

At one point, my friend, an English major, told me I differed from other Americans. Better. “Am I, though?” He responded, “Nam (yes), because you are here with us.”

I told him I was still complicit. I am stuck in the system of oppression because of my country. Someone is being marginalized by country, so I am safe. No matter what I do, I can’t get out of the cycle. I can buy brands that support Palestinian rights. Sometimes I cannot. I can buy an EV to help with fossil fuel emissions. But the sweat and suffering of people in the Congo forced to mine cobalt create that lithium battery. Basically, modern day slavery.

I think my answer shocked him. For me, it was honest and important for me to acknowledge.

Reading Omar El-Akkad’s book, One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This, helped me put language around this. I highly recommend reading it. He is a gifted writer but also deeply profound. It helped me he addresses and struggles with American complicity as well. And how inadequate the language surrounding this genocide actually is.

Maybe the only language is the groans of our souls. The excruciating groan of dehumanizing another soul or watching a child starve to death. Or believing anyone on this planet deserves such a fate.

The Palestinians are not to be pitied, grieved with, yes. But, they are the heroes of our lifetime.

They are the ones showing the world what humanity looks like. What courage and love look like in a slaughterhouse.

Maybe it is us to be pitied for our indifference, immorality, and superiority. Or simply, our ability to look away to stay comfortable.

Force, violence, and hatred never, ever win forever.

Omar was right.

“One day, when it’s safe, when there’s no personal downside to calling a thing what it is, when it’s too late to hold anyone accountable, everyone will have always been against this.”