The other side of Gaza Palestinians want you to see | The Stream

when I say Gaza what do you see what images come to mind for many people it'll be the death and destruction of the last few months but there is another side to Gaza which its residents a Keem to highlight its beauty and remembering that now is its own form of resistance I'm Miriam fra and this is the stream the most beautiful sunsets families picnicking on the beach teenagers riding horses through cobbled streets the destruction of a people genocide comes through the destruction of its culture with over 60% of all homes in Gaza in Ruins what is truly lost beyond the bricks and mortar and as the icj examines the case against Israel how are young Palestinians resisting this attempt at eraser photographer Su nasar takes us through the streets of his home City and the memories which will forever live there one of my habit memories ever like when I walk down the the the way to the sea I remember uh it was uh beside the cafe of gahna in the same street there was a flower and Landscaping Center to my friend fatty which is completely destroyed right now unfortunately all the places that we had de memories in are gone now except the sea because they would never destroy the sea it will remain forever here we are in the beach of Gaza City specifically in their balah City 2 million people that lives in Gaza they can't they can't travel easily they can't go anywhere so the the the only the only breathe for them is the is the Gaza Beach like 80% of my photographs on the my Instagram page you see it it contains at it contains Gaza Beach [Music] for us as photographers it's uh important to document uh the daily life the daily scenes the Landscapes of the city it's a sign of rolance that we exist and we do have a beautiful beautiful country beautiful city uh and we wish that we we we we can one day rebuild it and I'm I'm so glad glad that I had the opportunity to to photograph these uh like glimpses of of Hope and before War I kept looking for Hope as as every everyone else hope of getting a better life hope of securing my family's life uh hope for uh bigger opportunities H but now our hope is the freedom of Palestine [Music] thank you soale for sharing that with us my next guest is a social media Legend who runs the iconic why I love Gaza series an award-winning writer and artist human rights Advocate born to Palestinian refugees from Gaza he joins us today from Washington DC welcome nahas thank you so much for joining us thank you for being here um nahed tell us why you started the I love Gaza series and what kind of reaction you've had to it so far so why I loveza was actually started two months before this genocide and the last time that I visited my native uh city of kazza me personally I've been there I would say five six times uh and every time it just blew me away the kind of misconceptions uh surrounding it as being this place that's you know this this uh this backwards uh undeveloped when in reality it's really it was just such a high functioning uh Rich society and continues to be because of the you know the the resilience and the steadfastness creativity of its people um they're able to create this beauty um and so I just wanted to explore that and what kind of reactions have you had to it I can imagine maybe a mix there has been a mix and it's been very interesting uh there have been essentially mostly a very positive reaction a lot of there's there's three genres that I'll go through quickly there's the there's the category of of Palestinians Ina who are very always happy to be dignified and uplifted and to have their beauty shown um and then there's the side of uh people in the west who you know have not necessarily seen this kind of uh beauty or history and are stunned by it uh and then the third category are a lot of troll comments uh who are offended by the prospect of Gaza being a beautiful place or a place that uh elicits joy for people and think that that somehow negates the fact that RZA is under seizure occupation well to Echo that this comment under one of Sir Hal's posts suggests many people had no idea what life was like in Gaza before October the 7th even if life was incredibly hard under the blockade then too this person says I didn't even know it looked like that this is my first time seeing the before pick I feel like the media does this intentionally to make you think Gaza always looked that way um nah do you feel a responsibility to remind people that these images of War uh can be dehumanizing in their own way uh even if it is of course important to see them you know It's Tricky and on these things I always take cue from Palestinians who live in Gazza uh I have no right whatsoever to dictate um you know what's what's right or wrong for for the narrative uh to be you know in terms of what images should go out um but I think maybe both are important I think that it's important to show images of War it's important to show the destruction um but people should have a sense of the before they should have a sense of the potential OFA which is huge so tell us about that what is it that we are missing out when we only see the images of Destruction tell us about the other side the beauty there's the beauty that would have existed regardless of the war and in that I would include the role regardless of the genocide in the colonization and that I would include the uh thousands of year history I would include the smiles I would include the um the culture the art the hospitality um and of course the sea uh but then there's also the other kind of beauty which I think is when all of these things are destroyed um or most of them are are uh you know decimated there's then the beauty of the Gazza that that bounces back I think my mom put it best she said the the beauty of Gazza is the way that life Finds Its cracks um between the shadow of the Shadows Of Darkness so I think that that's the case for people who live there well and you've kindly done an intergenerational interview for us with your mother and your grandfather um before we get into that can you tell us about the first time you visited Gaza and how compared maybe to any perceptions you might have had of it as someone born in Exile oh wow uh the first time I visited Gazza doesn't count I was I was a baby uh but the the first the second time when I was I think uh you know I was a teenager and I had been I guess brought up in the west with this real sense of Arab identity uh and more specifically Palestinian identity even though my parents told me it was important I always thought of it as um you know I would be lying if I said that a deep part of me didn't feel reluctant to associate with it and didn't feel that hza was a very dangerous place and a place that I should avoid uh at all costs uh and so I was nervous when we went there um and then I was just I was blown away I felt that for the first time and I'm I'm steing for my sister here uh she said everywhere else she feels like she's floating Anda her feet was were touching the ground there was a sense of for the first time there's a place in the world that actually oh you're from here um and I'll never forget that feeling well let's meet nahid's mother samah who is reading a poem she has written about her ancestral home the landscape constantly changes only the sea remains a consistent presence amid the chaos a landmark Untouched by human greed and destruction oblivious to war occupation and aggression defiant to the rules of man it Embraces the shores of a back Ed City it makes a mockery of those who try to break its Spirit those who think they can contain its one and a half million beating Hearts there is no limit to the Sea's audacity it breaks The Siege every day one defiant wave at a time connecting Gaza to the rest of the world and connecting the world to the shet refugee camp the whole world is out there if only you could ride the sea if only your body was bulletproof if only your boat was made of steel if only your dreams were real the landscape will change once more only the sea will remain the same it's sing waves will whisper new Tales of occupiers that have come and gone nahed the sea it breaks The Siege every day there are no limits to its audacity I'm struck by so many elements that your mother raises in that beautiful poem the symbolism of resilience the possibilities of Freedom um the connection to the world is there another story of Gaza that you would like people to hear well the C symbolizes so much the C to me in that poem and I think on some level to all people who live in Gazza is a mark of uh eternity and possibility between barbed wire you know on you have a uh barbed wire on three sides but then on the fourth side what's this you have this unchain changing Sea and the sea is a reminder of your your history as a um as a Mediterranean people but it's also a reminder of your connection to the world your endless Horizon um I mean I we can wax about it forever but it's just so I think that um I strong I strongly believe that like Palestinians in Gaza would not have the resilience that they have today would not have the and again this was forced upon them we have to remember this uh it's not normal for them to be suffering this much but I don't believe that they would have been able to suffer this much and be this this iron WS without the softness of the sea that reminds them that they're human uh reminds them that there's something to live for that's just so Cosmic and so infinite I don't know if that makes sense absolutely makes sense well you o spoke with your grandfather about Gaza and his memories of the sea he was forced to flee Gaza in 1967 let's take a listen [Music] will for um N I want to ask you what's the most important part of your grandfather's message that you will carry through as the next generation of Palestinians well it's worth noting that my grandpa he was exiled from Gazza in 1967 and everywhere he looked uh for a home overseas it was always next to the Sea he always looked for a beach uh at which he could kind of stare at the Horizon and dream about kza and I think that the beach and that's where he writes a lot of his poetry um and that's where I get a lot of inspiration and my mom gets a lot of inspiration so I think that goes to show you that in the same way that the SE uh inspires gazis to uh you know to think of their freedom and I hate to separate from Palestinians um but specifically this idea that it traps they feel trapped from the world and the Sea reminds them OFA of the world for us outside of Kaza we also feel trapped we feel trapped from our place our only home in the world and so that's the sea reminds us also like we stare at the same Horizon and the Sea connects us so I think that's another just really speaks to the significance of the sea and um and my uh yeah my my grandpa you know bless him uh I I don't know what uh what his PO would look like if it weren't for the sea well I I want to bring in our other guest today Andrew McConnell is a photographer and Surfer from Northern Ireland who went to Gaza in 2010 to discover the surf culture and returned to make a film Andrew welcome to the show uh what Drew you from the west coast of Ireland to the surfing community in Gaza hi well thanks for having me um yeah I grew up surfing on the west coast of Ireland and um but I also grew up in the north of Ireland and you know from a very early age we were exposed to Palestine uh situation I grew up with Palestinian flags flying above my neighborhood and um so I was curious from a very early age about what this was what it meant and um I later became a photographer but I still at that point hadn't any idea of really visiting Palestine or Gaza um because it's a story that had been so well covered over the decades that I didn't really see what I could bring to it um and it wasn't until I read a short story about this group of Surfers in Gaza that uh you know it was like a a lightning really there's very few moments in an artist life where you get hit by something so powerful that you think well I I have to go and cover this um this story it captivated me because I felt I understood Palestine and the situation there and of course I had no idea um all we're exposed to in the west is conflict especially from Gaza all you know are images of rubble and destruction and you know the question which occurred to me which you know should really occur to everybody doesn't seem to is who are these people who live there and so within a few months I was in Gaza and I met the Surfers I first paddled out with the Surfers in 2010 at Elina down by the port in Gaza City and then they welcomed me into this little community and there wasn't many of them um but what they represented was a different sort of resistance sort of paddling out into the sea and leaving Gaza those brief moments to me it was just a profound profoundly beautiful way of resisting essentially um their confinment and everything they've had to endure there are some images that have caused a stir among some Israelis that of Palestinians enjoying some rest bite on the beach in Gaza this is what Israeli journalist Yehuda Scherzinger had to say on channel 12 the most watched TV channel in Israel these people there in Gaza deserve death a hard death an agonizing death and instead we see them enjoying on the beach having fun there are no innocent people there in the Gaza Strip they are now enjoying on the beach nahad why do you think this picture has provoked so much anger I mean how dare they how dare the people of Gazza find one thing that makes them happy uh how dare they claim to be under a genocide and yet have access to a body of water can you can you imagine that um I I think that for the minds in the minds of uh zionists and there's a reason why I let them comment on all of my stuff I think that their their words are so incredibly telling in the minds of zionists there are two categories of Palestinian there's the there's the miserable backward Savage uh who's incapable of enjoying any of the pleasures or any of the things that makes a human enjoy their lives anything that adds meaning to your life um and then there's the spoiled liar uh you know the like Palestinians who oh look they're having fun oh therefore they're not uh suffering enough to be able to claim to be a colonized people an occupied people a besieged or genocided people so I leave these comments on because I cannot imagine anything more uh Sinister than to be angry at a people for enjoying the beach I mean what more even needs to be said right I mean uh Andrew Palestinians in Gaza were living under occupation and a blockade prior to October so it was wasn't exactly Rosy for them then how do you capture the balance in your work between the truth of suffering and the resilience and the humanity of the people enduring it well you know I wanted really to make a film about what unites us and you what is more simple than going down to the beach and enjoying the sea big part of the problem is you know that many people have been subjected to this misconception of what Gaza is and who the Palestinians are for decades you know I mean before we had social media you know you had to listen to an Israeli spokesperson you took them at face value and and nobody really heard from the Palestinian side so you went away thinking this is what the situation is and this is my understanding of it of course now we have po voices being heard more and more and it's making a big difference and but I think when I made this film back in you know we started in 2012 um there was less and less voices ways for Palestinians to have their voice heard and so the premise was very simple it was let's show normal lives and we didn't want to focus on politics or conflict but just in the way that a Palestinian in Gaza tries to live a normal life we tried to make a film about normal life but we couldn't because if you spend any amount of time in Gaza you're going to face conflict and we I was there during 2014 when the war broke out I stayed for the duration and So within the film um it's we see quite a bit of that conflict but it was important to get the balance right because what's much more interesting is hearing from the people themselves and letting them tell their own story and that's quite simply what we try to do with the film nah um given the amount of ey that pictures of Palestinians enjoying a little downtime on the beach seems to cause is there perhaps an argument for saying that Joy itself is a form of resistance in the struggle the Palestinians are facing and how do you cultivate that in any way during periods of such intense suffering yeah it's a tricky question uh I think that Joy can be a form of resistance in terms of allowing Palestinians to have like but I think Palestinians will will have joy regardless if that makes sense uh like regardless of whether their the occupation existed or not regardless of whether it's a form of resistance or not I think it's important for us to be viewing Palestinians as humans who exist separate to their condition separate to the occation separate to uh being a colonized people and when they are showing Joy um I think in many cases they're doing it consciously as an act of resistance but in other cases what they're doing is they're trying to hold on to their Humanity to the things that remind them that they're human especially the sea uh and so I think it's the answer is it's a little bit of both it's uh Joy is a form of resistance but the very Act of existing as a Palestinian in Gazza still being alive still uh still being there I mean that's that's resistance in and of itself of them just doing the things that make them human well on that note I want to say a thank you to our guests nahid and Andrew and a special thanks to samah and Abdul Karim also and thank you all for watching did you enjoy the show talk to us on social media use the hash or the handle AJ stream and let us know what you're thinking take care and I'll see you soon [Music]

Channel: Al Jazeera English

Views: 70,192

Keywords: Gaza, Al Jazeera English, Palestine, Al Jazeera, Benjamin Netanyahu, Biden Gaza ceasefire deal, Biden Gaza ceasefire proposal, Biden ceasefire plan, Hamas, Israel, Israel War on Gaza, Israel gaza war, Israel hamas war, Israel war cabinet, Israel war on hamas, Israel-Palestine conflict, Israeli cabinet meets on ceasefire, Israeli captives, Israeli hostages, Joe Biden, calls for Gaza ceasefire deal, gaza war, The Stream, Myriam Francois, Palestinians, Rafah

Id: F2yek_Suq30

Length: 25min 14sec (1514 seconds)

Published: Fri Jun 07 2024