Reading Group Week 6
Hello, I want to thank you for being here.
Standard Stuff
Get the book
If you haven't bought If I Must Die: Poetry and Prose by Refaat Alareer yet, you can buy it from the Open Poems bookstore. You can also buy Perfect Victims by Mohammed El-Kurd and save some money on shipping.
Donate
Please consider donating to The Sameer Project directly if you can. If you have extra capacity to donate, you could also donate to Sudan Funds, a project to get money to Sudanese people surviving genocide, forced displacement, and extreme violence.
Support the reading group
You can also support the reading group if you have a few dollars to spare per month. Don't worry if you can't.
Reading
This week, I'd like to read the following pieces:
- Israel's Killer Bureaucracy
- And We Live On...
- No Justice for Gaza Youth Killed in Viral Video
- When I Stoop
- Haunted by the Horrors of Cast Lead
- Mom
- "Every Palestinian Was a Target"
Reflections
As usual, I'll offer some reflections from this week's reading to get conversations going, but I'd really like to hear what you think about this week's readings. I'll link to Bluesky, Mastodon, and Twitter threads where you can comment or share if you have thoughts.
Israel's Killer Bureaucracy
I don't have specific excerpts to share from "Israel's Killer Bureaucracy"; more so, I was thinking about the arbitrary, cruel nature of the Israeli system that manufactured hurdles and stumbling blocks for Awad to have to overcome, repeatedly both for himself and for loved ones to accompany him in getting care for what would otherwise have been a treatable condition. The tumor, the prosthetic, the cancer, which spread to his lungs.
I'm re-reading now, and I'm realizing this all transpired against a backdrop that I almost forgot about until now - a lifetime of IOF soldiers coming to his uncle Tayseer's farm to ask for chickpeas and corn, before killing him one day while he was working the farm. That backdrop, the ongoing pain in his leg that painkillers wouldn't dull, and very possibly, as the piece points out, the possibility that Israeli forces wanted to use Awad's cancer and need for medical care to coerce him into informing for them.
Over the last year or two, I've read about Israeli occupation forces in Unit 8200 eavesdropping on Palestinians' communications to extort them. They would target gay men, poor families, and anyone in need of medical care. People like Awad, who wanted to be a farmer, who was in love but so apprehensive about his love that he had only ever told his mother who she was.
It's impossible to say whether Awad was deliberately killed because he wouldn't cooperate. I wonder even if anyone in Israel ever cared enough to notice that they were killing Awad, or for that matter thousands of Palestinians.
Maybe the desk workers repeatedly denying Awad's applications for medical treatment were among those Israelis who infamously lined up along the shoreline with popcorn to watch as their occupation forces bombed his school and killed thousands of Palestinians that same year. Do they recall any individual administrative decision they made, or are they all indistinct? Is that not the point?
No Justice for Gaza Youth Killed in Viral Video
At the age of twenty-two, Salem had finished one year of a two-year college program and started his own business, selling children's clothes.
Salem was not very political, his family say. He was always absorbed in family issues or running errands for relatives. Salem's only problem, his mother said, was that he wanted to help people.
I should note that I'm juxtaposing two paragraphs that are nowhere near each other, but I want to make a point
When I read this, I immediately wanted to write down
No, actually. Salem was very political. He sold children's clothes. He dressed Palestinian youths so that they could feel good about themselves, maybe even feel dignified. Israel has demonstrated an avowed antipathy to children perhaps more than any other regime in living memory; certainly they have killed and mutilated more children, their soldiers have stolen more children's clothing, and they've bombed more children's schools, than any in recent history.
Just a few days ago, Israel killed a 12-year-old and a 13-year-old in the West Bank. Numerous reports from the BBC and The Guardian have documented this damning pattern of Israeli snipers repeatedly shooting children. Twelve years ago, Palestinian journalists were pointing out Instagram posts by Israeli occupation snipers targeting children.
None of this is to "correct" Dr. Alareer; he obviously knew this, and I truly don't mean to imply that he or that Salem's family didn't. It's more like an instinctive reaction of revulsion on my part, to remind me of something that was so obvious to Refaat and to Salem's family that none of them needed to say it: Salem was politically active in the same way that Refaat was politically active. They both saw a future in themselves and in the youth of Palestine, and they lived as if there would be a free Palestine, who would present themselves with dignity to the world. And so Israel murdered them both.
One last thought: I've been noticing that many of the titles of the pieces we've read have named an individual who was martyred by Israel's occupation forces. In this case, Salem goes unnamed in the title. I've been thinking about this for a while. If someone has an insight into the rhetorical or literary thinking here, or even a theory, I'd really like to hear it. I don't really have a criticism; it's more like it's something that I've been thinking on for a few days.
"Every Palestinian Was a Target"
I'm not saying this to demonize the armed Palestinian resistance. The armed Palestinian resistance is legitimate, it's moral, it's something Palestinians have to do sometimes to defend their very existence.
But it's very significant to look at those people who are well-trained, militarily speaking, and to see them unarmed, participating, and being shot by Israel. They're trying to see what other scenarios, what other means of resistance they can be involved in.
I just found this entire piece, and this section in particular, to really carefully draw out this balance of defending the obvious legitimacy of resistance to occupation (in various forms), while also observing the extraordinary moment where armed resistance fighters eagerly turned to non-violence. The fact that Dr. Alareer even seemed surprised, and what it could have meant... if Israel had not responded - as they always do - with snipers shooting at unarmed Palestinians.
Share your reflections
I'd like to know what you're thinking about with this week's readings. Please feel free to let me know, or tell me about one of the pieces you read that I didn't comment on here.
If you're not interested in commenting on social media, I'd be keen to read your thoughts in the Signal group chat, if you're interested in joining.
Otherwise, I'll hopefully hear or read from you on Saturday at 12pm ET, during our regular video chat.
Other things
You should really place an order for Perfect Victims by Mohammed El-Kurd if you haven't placed an order already.
Ramadan
Ramadan is starting this week (if you didn't want to think about it looming on the horizon, I'm sorry!)
I was taught to spend this month reflecting on those without the security of food in the fridge or kitchen, and to try to think about what I can do to support people who are not fasting out of choice but hungry by necessity. If you're in a position to support people who are food insecure, I'm certain there are people around you who could benefit from a donation to a local food pantry or something. I'd love to hear what you find you can contribute to.
Wow, thanks for reading to the end. I hope you have a good week.