Donuts before Eid

and why we must keep talking about Palestine

Dear Comrade,

Ali had been working on a building site in Israel for four months. Staying in a dormitory. Labouring while he fasted these last weeks. It’s not worth trying to cross back and forth through the checkpoints any more. And there’s no work in the west bank. But even still it’s never been worse for a Palestinian to work in Israel. The racism, the anger. The knowledge that you’re building the homes of the killers.

Waad, his wife, was back in Tammun. Tammun means quiet. It’s a sleepy town in the shape of a teardrop, the oldest houses are from the 16th century. Ali and Waad’s house looks out at the hills between the village and Nablus. Hills that are like desert in summer, but become lush green slopes in the winter. Now in the spring the wild flowers were starting to open up.

Four months is a long time to be on your own raising four boys. Mohammed the youngest was five. Othman was seven. Mustafa was eight and Khaled twelve. Waad really was knackered by the time Ali got home. But the boys were desperate to all go to Nablus. They wanted sweets for breaking the fast, new clothes for Eid. Mohammed would usually have to stay home, it was passed his bedtime. But he begged to join the trip. His grandmother said he should be allowed to go. He was thrilled, he asked his grandpa to comb his hair and let him wear some of the old man’s cologne.

The boys all piled into the car. It was dark out and they were excited to be driving with their mum and dad. They stopped in Tubas for doughnuts. The boys wanted them right there but Waad said they had to wait, they’d go clothes shopping then share the doughnuts when they got home. The box filled the car with the smell of dough and hot sugar. When they got to Nablus the shops were closed. That’s the trouble these days. Since the war started everything is closed, if you can even get through the checkpoints and into the city the shops might not be open. They turned the car around and headed home. The clothes didn’t matter anyway. They were all together again, and the doughnuts were what the boys really wanted anyway.

The boys’ grandma told her husband to phone their son and check on him. Why? He said. He’s in the car with the kids. Nothing will happen to them. Even if the soldiers stop them he’s fluent in Hebrew, he’s go a ‘48 work permit. He’s never been in any trouble.

Ali was driving, Waad was in the passenger seat. She had Othman on her lap. Othman was blind and couldn’t walk. He was always close to her though. The other three boys were in the back, chatting away. As they pulled back into Tammun, a few streets from home, Waad asked Ali to pull over and take Othman a minute so she could get something from her bag. They rolled into a layby, lights catching the dust that the car kicked up. It was late. After midnight. But time is like that in Ramadan. Everything gets a little upside down.

As Waad passed Othman over the gear stick to her husband laser pointers suddenly lit up the car from all directions. Red dots on the leather car seats, on the face of Ali on the faces of the kids. Waad started screaming. Screaming and screaming. Othman started screaming too. Ali began reciting the Shahada. ‘There is no god but god and mohammed is his messenger. there is no god but god and mohamed is his messenger.’ Waad’s screaming was suddenly drowned out as bullets tore through the windows, through the fibre glass and steel of the car.

For three minutes bullets hit the car.

Ali’s head was split open with gunfire. Waad died from bullets to the face. Othman bled to death in her lap. In the back seat Mohammed died too, another gunshot to the head. He slumped onto his older brother, pouring his blood out on to him. Shrapnel tore into the hands, face and chest of Khaled and Mustafa.

After three minutes the gunfire stopped.

Israeli soldiers walked forwards out of the darkness. Khaled pushed the car door open and screamed “please help me.” Soldiers dragged him from the car by his hair. They stamped on his back and kicked him. One of the soldiers spoke to him in Arabic: ‘habibi we killed some dogs.’ His younger brother was beaten too. After thirty minutes they let Khaled and his wee brother walk to an ambulance. The soldiers opened the doors of the car as the boys passed, showing them the mutilated bodies of their parents and brothers. In the ambulance the palestinian paramedics bandaged the boys and shrouded their dead family. Khaled had glass in his face and will need an operation to get it out.

The IDF reported that a car accelerated towards them and the threat was neutralised.

***

This is not even the latest tragedy in the West Bank. A few days have past now since Ali, Waad, Othman and Mohamed died. Last night an Israeli missile fell on a salon outside Hebron and killed four women.

This morning I walked passed a barber on Albert Drive. It was full of boys queuing to get their hair done. Wanting their fades sharp and their beards trimmed for Eid tomorrow.

I thought about those women in the salon. Just getting ready for Eid. Ali Bani Odeh and his family buying clothes and sweets. Everyone in Beirut and Tehran currently having their homes, their lives, their bodies torn apart because of what.

Because of fascists like the soldiers of Israel.

***

I want to not stop thinking about these lives. I don’t know what good it can do. Perhaps it can make sure that we never lose our humanity like that soldier dragging Khaled out of the car by his hair.

Because a person who does that has lost everything.

How does it happen?

With love,

Henry