a yalies4palestine organizer’s journal entry from October 7th
by Anonymous
Note: Certain names have been changed.
When I was younger I used to put a lot of value on dates. I used to do countdowns to friends' birthdays, holidays and breaks. I would structure my life around having things to look forward to, waiting to hit certain milestones.
I got older, and that emphasis on time slowly dissipated. I stopped counting down to any birthdays, or looking forward to life’s major milestones. Now as an adult, I can’t even bear looking forward to the future. Or even bear witness to the present at that.
It’s been a year of genocide. Today is Oct 7th. I watch everyone around me go on with their days like normal. Life goes on. I should too.
I don’t feel a special weight as I join signal calls planning for the week of Oct 7th. I feel the same frustration I always do, bothered by my fellow organizers' contributions to the programming schedule.
The programming is not enough. NSJP called for a walkout, we’re doing a vigil. We exist in our own context, I remind myself. A day of mourning, not a week of rage. The coalition wants to appeal to an untapped liberal Zionist base. My co-presidents are in society bios, I delete the edits. Journaling, flying kites, it’s all the same I tell myself.
A day of mourning. Other Connecticut chapters are doing the same. We exist in Connecticut's context. Advertising a day of mourning. Taking into account the politics of mourning.
We have not been able to process, or grieve for a whole year. How can we? When it only ever gets worse. We brace for impact all the time.
I reflect on who I used to be a year ago today. I feel the weight of time as a standard measure of life. I try to remember what I used to think, and how I used to feel. I mourn that person.
The type of person who would get physically sick at the sight of bodies crushed under a bulldozer. The person who cried at the sight of beheaded children.
I brace for impact as I have been conditioned to. Things only get worse. Al Shifa was the worst. They bomb tents because there are no more buildings left. No hospitals, or schools left to bomb. I envy my friends who are still able to feel something. Anger is good, ambivalence is not. Israel is changing me more than I am changing Yale.
We’re flying kites tomorrow. In the Muslim healing circle, Yasser said that’s all he wants to do after a year of genocide, fly a kite.
The children of Gaza don’t get to fly kites under bombs. They don’t get healing circles. Do we deserve these luxuries?
Hamas launched an attack at the exact time to the second exactly a year later. They will not stop nor rest. But we do. We think about creating spaces to mourn the loss of life over the last year. Is it helpful-no. Is it a walkout helpful- also no. What we do is for us, nothing is helpful in stopping the death machine.
Palestinians aren’t stopping or grieving. So NSJP calls for a walkout, but we are not Palestinian. The coalition wants to tap into a liberal Zionist base. Y4Ps anger is counterproductive to that.
I think about my friends, Lebanese and Palestinian, who have changed even more than me. They had dreams of going into politics.
Celine sends me a video of her 18 year old cousin getting dragged out of bed in the middle of the night by 15 soldiers for his social media posts. He’s rubbing his eyes, the soldiers have their guns raised. No one knows where he is now.
I think about Iraq. And our palm trees. And our rivers that grow wheat. I think about my father who survived three wars. I think about the years he lost as a refugee in the Saudi desert. I think about my grandpa's grape vines, and his love for his trees that grew out of the soil he watered from the Euphrates. I think about the Euphrates everyday, and slow violence. Climate violence. It’s not political, or religious, or armed. It’s all encompassing and invisible and existential. It’s the opposite of shock and awe.
Tell me about your day but don’t tell me about your year.
Fall break is coming up, and I want to go home like I always do. This fall won’t be different from the last. But I will be. This fall I will notice the leaves change color. I was mentally detached last October. I was in shock, obsessed with holding things together. I spent fall break arguing with Ana on signal. I opened my eyes in November and all the leaves were gone. So was Ana. This year I will be mentally available as the days turn into months and turn into another year.
Ana is in jail. She sounds exactly the same. Exactly the same as I last spoke to her because she’s still stuck in last year. My soft-spoken indigenous friend is stuck in a remote Texas jail. I don’t know how to tell her everything is different now. She asks me if I forgive her, I don’t remember our fight. She doesn’t know Manny’s dad died. I tell her he passed away recently. She doesn’t know what to say to him. What do you say to someone as good as Manny?
Nadine Jawad’s dad was killed by Israel. He was killed distributing aid in a hospital in southern Lebanon. He was a good man, who loved his people and loved his lord. Israelis don’t have a lord.
My dad’s flight was rerouted the day Nadine’s dad died. He went to Egypt before he got to Jordan. I think about his safety all the time. My throat closes and my heart hurts. It takes me back to covid. He’s even older now, my anxiety grows with the days that pass.
That same Wednesday, Oct 1st, the day that Nadine’s dad died, I joined a coalition meeting. Unaffiliated organizers look at me while they talk about their hatred towards certain organizations. I feel the weight of Lebanon at that moment. I hadn’t processed Lebanon being bombed before this. They resent me, but Lebanon is being bombed. Israel carpet bombed Nadine’s dad. We don’t mention Lebanon, or Palestine, or Oct 7th. We talk about who gets to make decisions. How will the decision making body look? Iran bombed Israel. And my dad is in Egypt, he has never been to Egypt before.
Do we release a statement? A year has gone by and we’re still asking the same questions we asked a year ago today. It's indigenous peoples day. Unidad Latina en Accion organized last year's Oct 7 rally and we had counterprotestors. Right now, Columbia is dealing with counter protestors at their rally. We are not Columbia, I remind myself. We exist in Yale's very specific conservative context. A day like any other day. People killed like any other Arabs. We will never learn, and the cycle continues. I pray for Lebanon now. there is no end to the violence, I brace myself. we are not doing the right things, this isn't about mourning. i am unable to hold things together. when will i let go. will i care the same way this time next year, it only gets worse, we cant think in the long-term. we just have to brace for impact, dates dont matter. time doesn’t belong to us, it belongs to the bombings. al shifa was a milestone, so was rafah, i cant look at jabalia now. i turn away from beirut. i remember how i used to be able to look. i remember how i used to be a kid, who counted down time, looking forward to the future.