Article 2 by another participant of the Tough Options Moving Forward Project. Oceans of Sorrow, Drowned in Guilt

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I don’t know how you’re doing but I’m so heartbroken and distraught by what’s going on. I’ve been researching to verify various claims. I’ve seen [many, many graphic] videos and pictures. My Lord. I want to do nothing but cry. We are too weak to do anything about it.” 

 

A WhatsApp message I sent to a close friend on the night of October 11th 2023. 

 

Let’s rewind.  

 

I had reached out to my UK Jewish friends in the aftermath of Operation Al Aqsa Flood, what in history will be remembered as October 7th. I know how social media works; I know we live in information silos. I asked them if their families were alright; I asked them to share what they were seeing on their screens. They sent me sickening scenes of what they were witnessing unfold. I began to dive into them until I couldn’t breathe.  

 

In the immediate days afterwards, once Israel began its response in Gaza, my feed – dominated, as expected, by pro-Palestine content – was flooded with death and destruction. And nearly 10 months in, it hasn’t stopped. I don’t need to dive anymore. I am drowned daily. 

 

Bloodied brown bodies are now the norm. Dismembered children’s corpses – what would have once been our worst nightmare – have become ordinary. We’ve become desensitised – I’ve become desensitised. And I feel ashamed saying that out loud.  

 

In October 2023, hardly 10 days into Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip, we witnessed something else that now, in July 2024, doesn’t cause anyone to bat an eyelid. Dismembered bodies drowned in blood, encircled by fire – in a hospital.  

 

War in a house of healing.  

 

I remember coming home late from work that night, exhausted and about to fall asleep. It had only been a few days into the war. We didn’t know what was about to unfold.  We had no idea how long this would stretch out – or the extent of death and destruction we would see in the months to come.  

 

I hadn’t opened social media on my phone at all that day, but I had begun to receive messages and missed calls. “Have you seen what happened?” Al Ahli Hospital. The images I saw, the severed and bloodied bodies lying on the floor – I couldn’t sleep all night. There have been nights I cried myself to sleep; this night I cried myself awake. 

 

Yet I feel guilty. What right do I have to lose sleep? I am safe, thousands of miles from bombs and blockades. It’s a strange form of survivor’s guilt that so many of us are experiencing. 

 

Before October, we thought there were limits to depravity, but Al Ahli Hospital opened the floodgates. We would see worse in Al-Shifaa and beyond in the months to come. I am fighting feelings of powerlessness and despair every day. My prayers have not been the same since.  

 

“My God! The calamity was tremendous, evil has become manifest, the veils have been lifted, hope has been cut off! The earth has become narrow, the sky’s blessings forbidden – yet You are the One whose aid we seek! You are the One to whom we complain! You are the One in whom we hope in ease and in difficulty!”  

 

Translation of a prayer that I learnt when I was younger, but one I have never called out like this before. 

 

The sickening, sinking despair in my heart on one side, the explosion at Al Ahli unleashed for me another ocean: an ocean of anger. Hypocrisy. Everywhere. In the immediate aftermath, there was uncertainty about who was to blame – there still is. But this section isn’t about who was responsible for the strike. If you, dear reader, when you started reading this section about Al Ahli Hospital felt yourself instinctively reflexing, preparing to absolve the IDF or Hamas from a crime before I even accused anyone – then there’s something for you to reflect on here. 

 

I found people around me swift to blame ‘the other’, adamant it couldn’t have been ‘their side’, hasty to absolve ‘their people’ while the evidence (on this instance) was ambiguous. This is not to discount other war crimes (preceding or succeeding) that are much more clearly documented, but the fallout in my various circles after the Al Ahli explosion was a case study of what I call “people morality.” 

 

I think back to the famous saying of the cousin of the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), and who as a Shi’a Muslim I consider to be his first true, Imam Ali ibn Abi Talib (as). Famed contemporaneously for his spirituality, battle-prowess and wisdom, Imam Ali famously said during a civil war, “Know the Truth and you will know its people.”  

 

No one is interested, it seems, in knowing the truth. It seems people come first, allegiances take priority, and morals follow based on who does it rather than what is done. What a broken world. I expect this from politicians, but to see it from friends across political, faith and cultural lines… I feel a sickness in my throat, a black hole in my chest.  

 

Let’s give them a pass though on this occasion – fair enough, I accept that the evidence on this occasion wasn’t clear; it could be interpreted either way. There were compelling arguments for both. (“This isn’t a GCSE essay,” I think to myself writing this, “These are dead humans.”) But are those friends of mine (I use that term loosely these days…) even seeking out evidence or information that might paint a more nuanced picture in the long run? (Spoilers: I’m still angry and my hope in common decency, or even a pinch of humanity, decreases day by day).  

 

I’m in a unique position where I work with and am surrounded by people from across religious and political spectrums – through FODIP, my day job at the crossroads of Interfaith and Politics, and through my friend circles. But even then, I had to make a conscious effort to try to be fair over the past few months. At the very least, even if I disagree in the end, I want to be able to engage with people I disagree with while having seen what they are seeing. I want to see the world through their eyes so I can help them see it through mine.  

 

At some point early on I decided to follow the IDF on Instagram, alongside other pro-Israeli pages, and a range of generic Jewish channels. On these channels what I see – starkly, but not surprisingly – is that October 7th is on replay.  

 

There is very little on display from Gaza beyond the odd tank moving through deserted streets – military images only. Not even one of the thousands of bloody images from Gaza that have flooded the internet. Information silos. I will save my fury and condemnations for another time – because it will achieve little – and I choose to be pragmatic. At the very least, now, I really get what others are seeing and, more importantly, what they aren’t seeing. Now, I can work with it. 

 

I have spoken directly with those friends, Jews and Muslims, about this – some who have drastically different views to me, some closer to mine. One hadn’t heard about the widespread news of the 400:1 civilian to target casualty ratio at Jabalia Camp in November – something that mainstream anchors likes Piers Morgan covered and criticised. Credit to him though, even though he hadn’t heard about it, he didn’t try to make excuses when I showed him the evidence.  

 

It goes back to something I said recently in Parliament: I have spoken with Muslims and Jews, Gazans and Israelis, and, at least in the UK, communities are uncomfortable with killing innocents. Everyone I speak to here across faith communities refuses to believe that their movement of affinity intentionally hurts the blameless.  

 

It’s a low bar, but perhaps that can be a common foundation. 

 

What’s important about that conversation about Jabalia wasn’t that I had a “gotch” moment. That’s not my goal. The way I approach dialogue, we got to a point where he openly accepted that he’s dealing with trauma – and it’s acting as a blocker. October 7th and the way he has experienced it through his social media has awoken intergenerational triggers and inherited tales from centuries of persecution – there’s a reason the Jewish community feels so scared. There’s a reason interfaith dialogue is near impossible right now.  

 

Knowing this, understanding this, and trying my best to feel what he is feeling, means I won’t just throw information and facts at him. I have to be conscious of the blockers: If I want to help him understand, I must navigate that landscape in which he lives. People are emotional creatures as much as we are rational ones. I am doing my best to be more compassionate.  

 

Another Jewish friend recently told me “I don’t follow Palestinian journalism,” yet for many months he posted the Israeli flag every few days unconscious of what that flag is coming to represent day by day. I don’t think many of my Muslim friends follow Jewish pages either for the record – some think antisemitism is made up, I’ve heard claims ‘it’s exaggerated,’ and some make statements I must hope are jokes – and when it’s clear they’re not, I must put myself in the firing line and say something about it.  

 

I am tired of people not trying. I need people to take steps. We all do. I am tired of us defaulting to vile tribalism and neglecting everything that makes us human. 

A lot of my frustration comes back to this – perhaps overly simplified – question. It’s not that challenging to become conscious of what other people are thinking, feeling and experiencing these days: is it really that hard to click a follow button?  

 

Maybe it’s just easy for me: “you’re an empath,” I’ve been told. Maybe, but I also decided to try. I’m simultaneously heartbroken and angry and a thousand other feelings. I want to cry sometimes because I am banging my head against brick walls all round. 

 

The social media pages I consciously decided to follow – and multiple conversations with Jewish friends – have made me deeply aware of how hypervigilant and terrified the UK Jewish community is right now.  

 

The only reason I’ve been able to have meaningful dialogue with any of them is because I understand what they are feeling: I can chart pathways around the blockers and the trauma triggers better than most to reach a point of empathy.  

 

God tests us in different ways. Geographically distant from Gaza, ours today is a test of patience, wisdom, compassion, empathy – and emotional resilience. 

 

The blessed day more of us reach that fabled land of human understanding, that impossible dream of empathy, we can open the door to hearing and feeling Palestinian/Jewish suffering – which our talk partner likely isn’t seeing or hearing as much as us – without shutting the door on Jewish/Palestinian humanity, pain or dignity.  

 

I know it’s not comfortable, be you Muslim or Jewish, to seek out these pieces of information or to have those conversations. Yet it’s the only way. We collectively must find the courage to challenge falsehoods, Antisemitism, Islamophobia and all forms of dehumanisation in our circles – it’s the only way. The first step is to learn. The first step is to make ourselves uncomfortable.  

 

So that is my plea. Start. Read something discomforting. Have an uncomfortable conversation. Put yourself in someone else’s shoes.  

 

What will the result be? Let me tell you. 

 

It was a Sunday afternoon. I was in a conflict resolution workshop organised by FODIP, learning the essentials of mediation from a seasoned expert. I roleplayed as a Jewish-Israeli professor in a UK university. My Jewish friend was the professor’s Palestinian student.  

 

I begin to dive deeper into the role. I have spoken with people from the Jewish community a lot over recent years – and particularly since October. I draw on their stories and experiences to make my character as real as I possibly I can. I think of my close Jewish friend who has been assaulted on more than one occasion. I echo words about what October 7th meant to ‘me and my family as a Jew.’ And very quickly, I can hear my voice cracking. I must hold back tears. 

 

I’m not Jewish, I’m not Israeli. My political outlook is distinct from the person I’m pretending to be in this exercise. Yet I can feel her emotion – and it brings out mine; emotion that is so close to the surface, so close to bursting. I’ve been pressing it down for nearly a year, in guilt and pragmatism and weakness. It doesn’t take much to force it out.  

 

There will come a day when we cry together, a day we mourn and rebuild, but if we wish to build that tomorrow, we need to feel what the other is feeling today.