"I would like to think that they could turn trauma into triumph but instead they have turned trauma into summud (resilience and resistance). Their feelings of helplessness have, as with any wounded people, turned into aggression."
January 6, 2024
In reflection on Dr Gratch’s helpful psychological insights into the Israeli overreaction to loss and grief from that tragic Oct 7 day, I couldn’t help but think about how, over the past 75 years, Palestinians have been dealing with their decades of loss and grief. Dispossession of their lands and villages, demolition of their homes and businesses, arbitrary detention of their next generation, deadly massacres of Deir Yassin, Balad al-Sheikh and Lyyda, the IDF killing and wounding hundreds of non-violent protesters during the 2017 Gaza March of Return, are but some of the Palestinian losses that the world blindly ignores.
I would like to think that they could turn trauma into triumph but instead they have turned trauma into summud (resilience and resistance). Their feelings of helplessness have, as with any wounded people, turned into aggression. Perhaps Hamas in an overreaction to their decades of loss and helplessness.
The tragedy to me, as has been said, is that the Palestinians are the paying the price for the Holocaust. Why can’t Dr Gratch, the Israeli government and the Toronto Star understand this historical trauma. We need to give voice to the dispossessed and not endless media coverage to the narratives of the US/Israeli war machine.
The Rev’d William Roberts