My 3-year-old daughter loves playing what we call the “potato game.” She sits in a blanket, while I lift and swing her, shouting, “Five kilos of potato! Five kilos of potato!” These days, I find this game terrifying. It reminds me of the videos of children in Gaza, gathering their siblings’ body parts into a blanket and carrying them until they can perform a burial. Maybe it’s something in me that wants to prove to my daughter how strong I am, or to make her laugh, that I still agree to play this game with her every time she asks. But I understand why my wife has tried to forbid us from playing it, when she sees me surrender to my traumas.
For Palestinians in Gaza, it has been more than nine months of relentless bombardment. For me, a Palestinian in Israel, it has been more than nine months of constant anxiety about my daughter and her future. I have yet to become desensitized to the horrific videos: every image of a Palestinian father holding the lifeless body of his child reminds me of the danger my daughter faces here. If the war has taught me anything, it is the sad truth that our children’s lives are worthless, not only to Israeli society but to the world at large — a world where they are unwanted, that judges them by their skin color, religion, and nationality, and sees their existence as a “demographic problem.” ….more
