Powell's City of Books

Spent the morning in Powell’s, where I went in search of Clint Smith’s brilliant How the Word Is Passed (2021). If you have 23 minutes to watch this interview with him on Democracy Now, you will see why I had to have it. I have it now, thanks to the generosity of Sue’s sister and brother-in-law, who sent me e-credit at Powell’s for Christmas last year. The photo: two women surrounded by books, absorbed in their phones. (Extra is the Strawberry moon over Portland, with con trails.)

While I was in Powell’s, I slogged up to the third floor to glance at photography, of course, and there I found Testimony: Photographs by Gillian Laub (2007, started in 2002). It’s a collection of photographs of Israeli Jews, Israeli Arabs, displaced Lebanese, and Palestinians. Laub had the respect and wisdom to collect “testimony” from each person she photographed. As I sat on a bench studying the photographs and reading the testimonies, I was moved to tears. I determined to come home and copy out lines of these testimonies, to hold them, to see them again, to honor the words, the lives, without saying who is Israeli, who is Palestinian (though sometimes it is part of the testimony). The price of being born on this contested ground is (so far) unending.

Excerpts from Testimony 

One minute you are living your regular life 
and the next you are called and told 
to be ready in twenty-four hours
to go to war.

I lost consciousness and also my left leg. 
There are many organizations that help victims of terror,
but when they hear I’m an Arab, they stop helping me.

This very real encounter with death has changed my views….
I used to be very far to the right. Now I just want peace 
and am willing to give up a lot for it. The pain war causes
is just not worth it. Our children should not have to live like this.

Our children have lost their childhood.
Even their toys and games are connected
to the occupation. 

We’re sisters and we both want to learn English
and become doctors so we can help our cousin Noor.
He doesn’t have any legs because of an explosion set by the Jews.

My legs were  amputated below my knees. I feel lucky to be alive.
I do not feel any animosity toward the other side. I understand
the suffering they are going through. After all, we are really brothers.

I blame the loss of my foot on the occupation. 
Once we have our own state, with no occupation,
then there will be a possibility for peace with the Israelis.
It all depends on this. 

But I am thinking now about my daughter’s future.
How is she going to live with a deformity?
I try to give my children a normal life. I do not
want to teach them to hate Jews.

I am hoping to be able to stand on my own with
my prosthetic legs. I don’t think the fact that I was
in a suicide attack makes my opinions more relevant.
Actually I am not interested in politics at all.
The only thing I can tell you is I want this fire to stop
and this war to end. I don’t care how.

My son lost one-third of his brain. He lost
his ability to talk and move. He was an innocent boy.
I face the reality of my wounded son in front of me
every day. In war, everyone pays a price.

We were told that it was a homemade bomb
planted by the Settlers. What did we do wrong
as students in a schoolyard? We are a people
wishing for freedom and independence.

[Since the suicide bombing] I am blind and deaf,
but not dumb. The reporters used to bombard me in the hospital—
they just wanted me to say that I hated the Arabs. I just want
to live a normal peaceful life. That’s why my family
came here from Russia.

—Gathered by Gillian Laub.