# PALESTINE /// Representation of the Otherness for a Gaza kid

Published

IDF Soldiers in front of a ‘flock’ of militarized Bulldozers Caterpillar D9

I apologize to those of my readers who would like to come back to a bigger diversity of articles but, to be honest, I can not yet feel comfortable writing about something else than the situation in Gaza right now, as upset and infuriated I am. Again, I don’t want to count those who died, neither publishing pictures of wounded kids, we all have access to information that insist on the ‘spectacular’ aspect of this tragedy. On the contrary, I would like to balance my anger with a deeper analysis of the daily situation in Gaza for the last decade.

After my map of the Manhattan strip (see previous post), I would like to ask my readers for another imaginative effort to put their eyes in the ones of a Gaza kid who have never been able to leave the 140 square mile piece of territory (approximately half of the area of New York City) that he lives in. What is the representation of the otherness that (s)he might have from this situation. Of course, there is always her (his) brief encounter with various foreigners working for NGOs or other aid/activist organizations; but this representation is extremely likely to be mostly influenced by the various Israeli killing machines that obviously trigger an absolute terror in this kid’s imaginary. Nothing that (s)he has seen in books or on television about other people and countries can surpass the reality of these extremely violent intrusions of deshumanized machines that vowed to destroy her (his) direct environment. In “normal” times, these are the remote controlled machine guns towers that prevent any movement in a 1,500 meter zone from the territory’s border (see previous article), there are also the frightening sound of the F-16 aircrafts and other drones over the Gaza sky, every now and then and on a regular basis, the bulldozers caterpillar D9 (see previous article) that have been so ‘efficiently’ customized by the IDF that even the US army feels obliged to buy some ‘back’ (caterpillar is an American brand) for their own use. Of course, in times of heavy conflict like the ones we powerlessly observe those days, those weapons are complemented by tanks and battleships and they all participate to bomb the Gaza strip from the outside.

Living in fear of the otherness and, in the impossibility to escape from it is extremely unlikely to participate to an optimistic vision of the future. In order to reach the “peace” that so many people are talking about, but that so few people actually actively work for, the State of Israel will have to adopt a series of extremely strong policies for the reconciliation, hoping that the Palestinians could ever forgive them in a similar way than the end of the apartheid in South Africa (read about the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to know more about it). Only in that case, a future like the one depicted by Raja Shehadeh in his book 2037 (see previous article) would possibly happen. Of course, such future will also carries its difficulties as Raja introduces, but it will be born from absolute new bases and actors.

No Go Zone in Gaza

Remote Controlled machine gun tower

IDF F16 aircraft

IDF Drone

Militarized Bulldozers Caterpillar D9

IDF tanks at the Gaza border

IDF navy ship