It might be translated as “comfortably numb” — a phrase that points directly to the title of Francesca Albanese’s book, When the World Sleeps.
“Do not allow lawlessness to become normality,” the UN Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories told an event in Athens, speaking about Israel’s seizure in international waters off Crete of Tiago Ávila and Saif Abu Keshek, the two activists from the Global Sumud Flotilla. “Raise your voices. What happened concerns you and your rights. There is no argument that can justify it.”
At the moment this column is being written, both men are on hunger strike in a maximum-security prison in Israel, facing charges with no legal basis. Adalah, the human rights organisation representing them, describes a daily, systematic pattern of physical and psychological abuse that violates every principle of law. Total isolation. Cells with the lights on around the clock. Blindfolded even when moved from their cells — including for medical examinations.
In a letter of heartbreaking tenderness smuggled out of prison to his daughter Teresa, the Brazilian Tiago Ávila writes that he hopes she will one day understand. That she will come to grasp the reasons keeping him from home — reasons that do not make his love for her any less, because they reach towards something far greater: the right of every child born into this world to safety, to love.
“I am sure you miss me very much, and that all the mothers and fathers of the children of Palestine miss them very much too, and would give everything to live a life full of love, happiness and joy, as every human being deserves, regardless of race, religion or nationality. Your world will be safer because many parents decided to give everything to build that better world for you. […] Please remember your father as the person who sang to you and played guitar to help you sleep. And when you grow up, your mother will tell you that […] he remained firm in his belief in building a better world.”
Because the future of this humanity cannot be left to the comfortably numb. To people who choose not to see. Who chase their own safe harbour on a planet that is falling apart. Without it even crossing their minds — the most important thing of all, the thing Tiago is trying to explain to Teresa when he writes that “there is nothing more dangerous for you and for other children than living in a world where genocide is accepted.” He closes his letter with a final plea: never forget Palestine.
*Roger Waters sent to the Athens event with Francesca Albanese an unreleased new recording of the iconic Pink Floyd song, dedicated to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and framed with Arabic vocals and lyrics.
