As Beautiful As The Sun ( A Letter for the Children of Palestine)

I write this for the little girl who after a bomb was dropped on her asked the man picking her up from under the rubble if he was taking her to the graveyard. His response was “No my dearest, you are alive and as beautiful as the moon”. These words will stick with me for the rest of my life.

There’s so many different emotions I and the rest of the world are currently feeling and I feel at the root of it all the main emotion is pain. It’s horror. It’s disgust. It’s sorrow. It’s heartbreak. It’s mourning for people you will never know and who will never know you. And you mourn cause it is fucking human to do in the face of genocide.

Let me be clear I am not writing this out of pity for the Palestinian people. I have no pity for any oppressed people cause pity will never be the thing that saves us. Solidarity is the only thing that will do that. Intersectionality. I have an overwhelming respect, love and admiration for the Palestinian people. And I cannot imagine what they are going through. We are watching the world debate if it’s genocide if the victims of said genocide are brown.

I want to address some of the contradictions of me writing whatever the fuck this is. I’m horrified but my horror is nothing compared to the Palestinian lives lost. And in some ways it’s everything because it’s the opposite of apathy. And apathy is the tool of the enemy. The United States government has been used to it’s people being apathetic and feeling they cannot do anything in moments of death and destruction.

“ I wish I knew how it would feel to be free” — Nina Simone

Apathy is the devil’s tool. Making you feel hopeless and powerless. And one of the most beautiful things about the Palestinians is how they continue to persevere in the face of unbelievable evil. And let’s be fucking clear this is evil not “complicated”, not a “both sides issue” but fucking evil. And how they persevere in the face of unimaginable evil is not only incredibly brave & admirable but as a black person something I connect to deeply. Something every oppressed person in the world should connect to.

As a black person I am a descendant of genocide and a (current anyway) survivor of the genocide going on against black people in America. And I still cannot fucking fathom having to bury my entire fucking bloodline, and their tombstones being a pile of rubble.

My uncle was killed by the negligence of Rikers in February and as painful and heartbreaking as that has been and still is. This was a man who helped raise me and even still I can’t imagine the feeling of every member of your bloodline ceasing to exist and having the world powers and the media go “well do you condemn Hamas?”.

And let me be clear loss of life is loss of life and no one knows that better than the oppressed. You are not tricking anyone with this performative ass pretending to care shit that liberals love to do. The oppressed are genocided, erased, demonized and somehow every step of the way have to prove to the world their humanity.

You know another interesting fact about the oppressed and the oppressor ?

The oppressor determines when history starts.

If you let Israel & The U.S. tell it history began on October 7th. In an event Joe Biden described as 15 9/11s which is an interesting comparison because just like after 9/11 The U.S. used what happened as an excuse to invade Iraq, Israel is using the massacre on October 7th as an excuse to kill everyone in Gaza.

And the justification is “we’re trying to defeat Hamas” which is bullshit. They are ethnically cleansing Palestine and have been since the Nakba in 1948. If American citizens had to pay for every crime the U.S. has done in the last 100 years alone everyone in this motherfucker would be dead multiple times over. We are watching the word “Complicated” be scapegoated and exploited.

Whenever these days I hear the word “Complicated” it’s usually cause the person saying it is leaving out whatever it is that makes it so complicated. When in reality it is simple. Slavery was also sold to us as a “complicated” issue. Just like the murders of black people in the media over the past 10 years.

I just saw Obama say that “no one’s hands are clean” which considering Flint, Michigan still does not have clean water and the bombing that HIS administration did in the middle east he should be the last one talking. So much of liberalism is talking in this defeatist “everyone is guilty” nonsense so people feel they have no right to take a hard stance on this. Fuck that.

Liberalism lives in the abstract. In the idea that progress is slow, that nothing can be done overnight. Which is a lie. This could all end right now if a ceasefire is called. There is not blood on the American people’s hands, there’s blood on the U.S. government’s. Obama says we can’t look forward if “We are confining ourselves to our outrage” And while that is completely gaslighting let’s break that statement down.

No one is confining themselves to their outrage. We are tying ourselves to our humanity. Nothing is more liberal than telling people seeing the sight of dead children “ Don’t get too angry”. Outrage is what is moving this forward. It’s the reason we are seeing mass mobilizations that haven’t been seen in the same way since 2020. Because the people have something to mobilize around.

I saw a clip of a video where a Palestinian mother whose children had been killed by bombs dropped by Israel was crying with her children’s blood still on her hands saying she’ll never wash her hands again cause “how else will she be close to her children again”.

So fuck you Obama. I will be outraged. Children are writing their names on their arms so if they’re blown up by bombs the U.S. government is paying for they can be identified. Our outrage can help save a population.

Aretha Franklin is currently singing “one step ahead is a step too far away from you” in my ears and I’m trying to not break down sobbing in Blue Stockings. We have a duty to each other not to be silent and let these lies be sold as truth. And it’s incredible watching the government’s lies fail in real time. It’s wild to see the democratic party now become the face of war and death.

As I said before we have not seen mobilizations like this since 2020 and that’s because we can do something. We can do something. We can stop this genocide and every politician not calling for a ceasefire is a fucking coward and we will remember everyone who was silent as a people died.

I’ve said so much yet it also feels like I’ll never be able to say enough to convey my disgust. My rage. But in honor of the Palestinian people I also want to make space for the hope I feel seeing not only their resilience but the world’s. The protests across the world are sending a clear message that we do not stand with zionism and genocide. We are seeing in real time how disconnected the government is from it’s people.

It was beautiful in DC yesterday hearing imperialism be called out over and over again for what it is. To see the democratic party be shown for what it is. And in this moment we must talk about abolition because that is the only way that we can achieve liberation. There are also genocides going on in Sudan and the Congo right now and we cannot forget about our siblings there either, Including the genocide happening in Artsakh.

I just want to see black and brown children grow up yo. Last week Kamari Hughes was hit by a tow truck being driven by a cop on her phone and his body was dragged for 3 blocks. In high school I read a book called “Slaughterhouse Five or The Children’s Crusade” which in a genocide where half the victims are children I keep going back to that book.

I don’t even know if the girl who inspired me writing this is still alive. I pray that she is. I’m torn on if what I’m writing will even matter. But as I cry one thing I do know is the job of artists is to say the truth. No matter what. We are cultural workers. And most importantly we are fucking human beings and human beings should stand up to evil wherever they see it.

It is not lost on me the sacrifices and people who died for me to be here and just like I don’t know all the circumstances of my people’s genocide, I don’t need to know every detail of what happened in the history of Palestine to know this is a genocide.

Endless love to Palestine, Gaza, the Congo, Sudan, Artsakh and oppressed people everywhere. And we will achieve a ceasefire. Gaza will survive as it always has. Palestine will survive as it always has because even in immense death Palestine is alive and as beautiful as the moon.

FROM THE RIVER
TO THE SEA
PALESTINE
WILL BE FREE