As you are very likely aware, a catastrophic level of violence erupted in Israel/Palestine this weekend. A group of Hamas militants breached the fences at the Gaza border and launched a series of brutal attacks on Israelis, many of them civilians; Israel responded with even more violence, and has been waging a major assault on Gaza — an occupied territory that is, in effect, an open air prison crammed tightly with two million people living in extreme poverty.
What you are less likely to be aware of is how this affects me, personally. Although I am very very American (painfully, embarrassingly so!), I was, in fact, born in Israel, at the tail end of my parents’ seven year stay there. Hebrew was one of my sister’s first languages; my brother went through adolescence in the country. Currently, I have a fair amount of extended family in the country: second cousins who grew up on a moshav that their grandparents — my great aunt and uncle — moved to after surviving the Holocaust. An uncle by marriage who recently moved back to the country of his birth. An uncle by blood who relocated to Israel several years ago. One of my work colleagues is based in Israel; right before the attacks we were putting together details for an event she may now be unable to attend. An American friend who was visiting woke up to bombings over the weekend; she was lucky enough to quickly escape and make her way to safety — an option many people in the region do not have.
All of which is to say: the violence in Israel and Palestine has been very much top of mind for me. I am heartbroken over the violence that has already unfolded and scared for the violence that is still to come. I am anxious about the way this escalation of violence — and it was an escalation, as Palestinians have endured routine violence from the Israeli military for decades now — is being used to justify genocidal rage and military strikes.
And while it feels weird to mention it in this newsletter that is, as we all know, about bisexuality, I also can’t not mention it. Bombs fell on the town where I was a baby — and the deaths that have resulted are being used to justify bombs falling on other babies and destroying other people’s lives. It’s hard and it’s heavy and it breaks my heart. And I am thousands of miles away, completely safe from the horrors of living in a war zone.
It also feels hacky to attempt to connect something so big, so brutal, as mass murder and war crimes to the subject at hand here. What does the violence in Israel-Palestine tell us about bisexuality? I don't fucking know. But I do know that so much violence is waged in the name of trivial distinctions that do not really matter; that so many people find their entire lives upended over hatreds rooted in little save for the desire to exclude and dominate and be on top.
And I know that it would be nice if we were all allowed to just be, and yet so many forces conspire to prevent us from having the simple, basic freedom that is a fundamental human right.
I don’t know. Consider this to be me shouting from the void. There’s a Refinery 29 article on bisexual women and long nails (sigh) that is sitting in my open tabs. Maybe tomorrow I will have the energy to write about that.
> I know that it would be nice if we were all allowed to just be, and yet so many forces conspire to prevent us from having the simple, basic freedom that is a fundamental human right.
This succinctly sums up so many of the world’s problems.
Likewise born in Israel (Haifa since were talking hospitals) and raised in Canada. It’s hard. I hope you have who to talk with. 🫂