I’m grateful and honored to publish the current May issue about al-Nakba which includes powerful articles written by world-class authors.
Allow me some self-flattery, which I think is in order. When an internationally recognized political scientist and historian like Professor Ilan Pappé sends his fourth article to be published in TWiP, when the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories, Ms. Francesca Albanese accepts my personal invitation to write in This Week in Palestine (although humbly apologizes for not being able to contribute to this month’s issue due to her tight schedule), that can only mean that the magazine is credible. It also means that it must be doing something right. Not only is TWiP still coming out even after 27 years, but its unique visitors have jumped from around 50K to a bit over 200K in a year+. This also attests to its credibility.
Having said that, we at TWiP, along with almost all Palestinians, operate and live in dire conditions. Gaza still suffers, and most Gazans still live in tents. West Bank villages and towns bear the yoke of daily settler and army harassment and violence. Mobility is heavily restricted. Our government has no money (to put it mildly!), and employee strikes are starting. I need to add that a big part of our government’s financial situation is the fact that Israel often holds and deducts huge amounts from the tax money it owes the Palestinian Authority. Coupled with a weak economy and high unemployment, the situation is bad! The list is long, actually.
Also, what can you say when you live in a country where nuns are attacked simply because of their faith? Or worse, a country where the wife of Minister Ben Gvir offers her husband a cake decorated with the symbol of a noose, to “celebrate” the law that authorizes the execution of Palestinian prisoners.
More than one article in this issue refers to the Nakba as an ongoing reality, and I couldn’t agree more. In fact, in his article, Tawfiq Al-Ghussein adds: “What presents itself as crisis is, in fact, structure. The central claim is not that Palestinians have suffered a sequence of tragedies. It is that they have been made to endure a system.”
Will all this end? Will the Palestinians ever get the chance to end a 78-year-old occupation? In my humble opinion, the answer is an unequivocal yes! It is going to take a few years though. The Western Empire that connived in implanting a foreign political entity east of Mediterranean is beyond waning and a new sun is rising from the East. I have no idea exactly how this will affect us Palestinians, but I’m certain that it will. When the life-support mechanism fails, the patient dies. That’s how it goes. In the meantime, we simply need to remain steadfast and resilient while we continue to support each other.
Long Live Palestine.
Publisher
Sani Meo
