in response to Democracy Now, September 20: U.N. Panel Accuses Israel of Unprecedented Violations of Children’s Rights in War on Palestine
A U.N. committee on Thursday accused Israel of engaging in unprecedented violations of the Convention on the Rights of the Child over the past 11 months.
Ann Skelton, South African jurist and Chair of UN Committee on the Rights of the Child:
More children have died in this war than men or women. That is massive. And I think when we think about it and we know that under international humanitarian law, that Israel admits it is bound by, killing of civilian targets on this scale is unacceptable in international humanitarian law and international human rights law, as well. And children are always civilians.
Below are my poems, selected entries of Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, a writing project about the Israel-Hamas War, for your reflection:
between blood of birth
and blood of death
a new life
on the hospital floor ...
a Gazan mother's last look
almost, with eyes closed
to this shrapnel-filled world ...
a Gazan newborn
|
a settler aims his gun | a child throws his rock
|
aid
out of reach air ops
dr
and a dead child’s stare
a mural
on the separation wall
of the West Bank:
in midair a girl grasps
a bunch of rainbow balloons
slanted moonlight
on a half-collapsed school wall
chalk poppies bloom
FYI: "The Palestinian poppy (Anemone coronaria) is a non-official but more recognizable national symbol of Palestine. It's red, with black center and green leaves, evoking the primary colors of the Palestinian flag. And it symbolizes the relationship between Palestinians and their land, the bloodshed they have endured, as well as their resistance against Israeli occupation."
a cacophony
of sirens, shouting and screams ...
a girl curls up
next to the wheels of a stretcher
that holds her bloodied siblings
hazy twilight ...
rain washing a mother's blood
into her children's blood
in memory of Palestinian poet, literature professor, and activist Refaat Alareer
who was killed on December 6, around 6 PM local time in Gaza, in a targeted Israeli airstrike that also killed his brother, his sister, and four of her children.
calm between fireballs
a child, somewhere, in Gaza
looks up to heaven
FYI: Watch the Scottish actor Brian Cox read Refaat Alareer's poem, “If I Must Die,” posted on December 1 on Twitter/X, a heartbreakingly prophetic farewell poem that has now been translated into more than 40 languages.
“If I Must Die” by Refaat Alareer
If I must die,
you must live
to tell my story
to sell my things
to buy a piece of cloth
and some strings,
(make it white with a long tail)
so that a child, somewhere in Gaza
while looking heaven in the eye
awaiting his dad who left in a blaze –
and bid no one farewell
not even to his flesh
not even to himself –
sees the kite, my kite you made, flying up
above
and thinks for a moment an angel is there
bringing back love
If I must die
let it bring hope
let it be a tale.
To conclude today's post, I would like share with you the following latest entry:
Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, XCIX: "somewhere out there"
Somewhere Out There
a girl stares long
at the the borderless sky
Rafah crossing
the great beyond
of fire
a pillar
ladders
a boy
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