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25th of March, 2025.
It was a Tuesday morning, I was preparing to log onto my zoom lecture, I heard a ding. I checked my phone to see a text message.
“Uncle Ismail was at Nasser hospital when they bombed it”
It was from my mother. My heart stopped. I couldn’t breathe. I started sobbing. I called my mum straight away.
“Tell me what happened! Is he alive? Is Uncle Ismail alive?!”
“I don’t know yet, I’m sorry I didn’t mean to scare you – “
“Mum I have class, how can I sit through class after this?”
“You’ll be okay, just go wash your face. Our family in Gaza need you to continue your studies”
This is my story, a privileged story. Written from the comfort of my home, and the comfort of my bed. A basic human right my family in Gaza do not have…
Us, Palestinians, have endured colonisation and occupation long before this genocide. We have been exposed to displacement, apartheid, massacres… consistent bloodshed and death. We are witnessing a televised genocide! I used to believe “The Revolution Will Not be Televised”. But today, we are closer to it than ever.
As a Palestinian, you see your family starve. You see their dismembered body parts. You see them murdered before your eyes. Now what is the result of this? We would call this PTSD, but is it really? It’s not post traumatic, because the trauma hasn’t ended and Palestine still isn’t free.
But years later, when Palestine is free and the children who survive this genocide grow, do you think they will not have to live with these violently induced disabilities?
I see myself, I see my family in diaspora, refugees from the 1948 nakba. I see how intergenerational trauma impedes our neurological systems. I see how my sister is affected by our intergenerational trauma.
Our trauma is epigenetically inherited, cruelly molded by violent colonial entities. I see my family members being diagnosed with ADHD and I know why. Because of prolonged traumatic experiences. Because of chronic and complex traumas which have altered our brain’s emotional and chemical functions. Our brains are forced to change, to help us survive these traumatic experiences.
Now imagine you’re a 4 year old Palestinian Gazawi girl, from the beautiful town of Jabalia. A town that was once full of laughing families, each with their own histories and stories, is now reduced to nothing but rubble. You’ve seen people burn, babies die from malnutrition and your own family cruelly killed. You are one of the 54% of children in Gaza with PTSD. One of the 41% of children with comorbid depression and one of the 34% of children with anxiety. What will your future hold? You will become one of the 20% of neurodivergent people in the global population.
Is my disability enough for you to care now?
Or will you wait until it affects my generations to come, the inheritors of Palestine.
Free Palestine.
Written by BDS Youth Magandjin member, Malaak Seleem
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