I've worked in Gaza since 1990. Don't paint all Palestinians with Hamas's brush

I abhor violence, probably because I have spent more than half my life in the world’s most violent places.

I condemn the killing of any civilians, no matter their faith, race, or creed. I mourn all the dead in Palestine and Israel, and the dead do not distinguish whether they are Jewish, Muslim, Christian or atheist.

They are all victims of the actions taken by some politicians, warlords and leaders who put the safety of civilians far behind their own quest for power.

Successive Israeli governments have subjugated the Palestinian people for 75 years, while yet another military operation carried out by Hamas will once again have a tragic blowback on the Palestinians living in Gaza – the very people they are supposed to represent and protect.

I have worked in Gaza since 1990 and continue to work there. I have relationships that stretch back over decades.

I started out as a young journalist who was horrified by the events of the first intifada. Israeli tactics of torture, deportation, incarceration and indiscriminate attacks against civilians led me to do the work I do today – documenting and cataloguing potential war crimes in Ukraine.

While one might be able to hold Israel responsible for certain crimes, I am also aware of the deep fractures in Palestinian political life and their many flaws.

Following its actions on Saturday, Hamas has opened the gates of hell against their own people. So much for Hamas 2.0, the supposedly kinder and gentler face of terrorism, which was their last public diplomacy operation a few years ago.

It is important to remember, however, that all Palestinians should not be painted with Hamas’s violence brush.

The lives of a majority of them are hellish – packed in tightly, subject to blanket Israeli restrictions, and unable to leave for crucial medical treatment

The Israeli government’s collective punishment against all of Gaza for the actions of Hamas – who Israeli officials might say were elected by the people of Gaza, so they all deserve to be punished – is inhumane and a potential war crime.

Gaza, an area that is just 40 kilometres long and 12 kilometres wide, houses as many as two million people. The lives of a majority of them are hellish – packed in tightly, subject to blanket Israeli restrictions, and unable to leave the territory even for crucial medical treatment. The list of those who died because they could not leave for chemotherapy or organ transplants is long – and this includes plenty of children.

My friends in Gaza’s ancient Christian community are forbidden to leave to go to Easter or Christmas in Bethlehem – or one member of the family is permitted, and no one else. The young entrepreneurs – and there are many – are refused exit visas for visits to workshops, scholarships, or conferences in foreign countries.

On my last trip to Gaza, I decided to focus on the extraordinary talent and resilience of the youth – because two-thirds of Gaza’s two million people are under the age of 25.

The people I met – computer geeks, rock musicians, artists, poets and female entrepreneurs promoting empowerment – want peace. They don’t want Hamas. They want to live a life that doesn’t mean hiding from bombs and Israel turning off their water and electricity supplies. They want to fall in love, get married, have children, and build better lives. Now that future is shattered.

What annoys me more than anything is the coverage by the largely American, but also British, TV presenters who have little knowledge of the history of the occupation, or the suffering that has accompanied it. It is too easy to follow the narrative that Hamas are evil while all Israelis are cast as heroes, who want peace.

A coat hangs beside the rubble at the site of the destroyed Al-Watan Tower following Israeli air strikes in Gaza City on Sunday. EPA

Worse is a new geopolitical “theory” linking Palestinians to Russia. Some of the rhetoric I have come across suggests the world is divided between the bad guys – Russia, the Middle East and Iran – on the one side, and the good guys – the western superheroes of Nato, Ukraine and Europe – on the other.

US President Joe Biden and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy do not help by pushing the narrative and unequivocally supporting Israel. In any case, where was Israel when Ukraine needed it? Sitting on the fence.

The background and the future are just more nuanced and complicated, but this is the simple narrative they are running with because it is easy to swallow.

Being under aerial bombardment, as I have, is like being in a doll’s house as one tries to find a place to hide while a giant from up above is constantly throwing boulders at the house. There is nowhere for people to run. I was able to leave the places where I was trapped in bombing, but the people of Gaza have no such escape route.

I write this with the heaviest of hearts, because I think of the summer nights a few years ago, sitting at the edge of the Mediterranean in Gaza City with young Gazan friends who had dreams and real hopes of innovations, businesses and creativity. The only way they could do this was if there was a pathway of peace.

But the Israeli government’s vengeance will destroy Gaza again. It will be rebuilt. Then it will be destroyed again.

What the Israeli government does not understand is that every time it bombs a building with families and innocent people inside, it closes several doors to peace. It kills and crushes the best of these young thinkers – the very people it should be cultivating as a new generation of peacemakers.

While you're here

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The Settlers

Director: Louis Theroux

Starring: Daniella Weiss, Ari Abramowitz

Rating: 5/5

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The specs

Engine: 3-litre twin-turbo V6

Power: 400hp

Torque: 475Nm

Transmission: 9-speed automatic

Price: From Dh215,900

On sale: Now

Some of Darwish's last words

"They see their tomorrows slipping out of their reach. And though it seems to them that everything outside this reality is heaven, yet they do not want to go to that heaven. They stay, because they are afflicted with hope." - Mahmoud Darwish, to attendees of the Palestine Festival of Literature, 2008

His life in brief: Born in a village near Galilee, he lived in exile for most of his life and started writing poetry after high school. He was arrested several times by Israel for what were deemed to be inciteful poems. Most of his work focused on the love and yearning for his homeland, and he was regarded the Palestinian poet of resistance. Over the course of his life, he published more than 30 poetry collections and books of prose, with his work translated into more than 20 languages. Many of his poems were set to music by Arab composers, most significantly Marcel Khalife. Darwish died on August 9, 2008 after undergoing heart surgery in the United States. He was later buried in Ramallah where a shrine was erected in his honour.

The drill

Recharge as needed, says Mat Dryden: “We try to make it a rule that every two to three months, even if it’s for four days, we get away, get some time together, recharge, refresh.” The couple take an hour a day to check into their businesses and that’s it.

Stick to the schedule, says Mike Addo: “We have an entire wall known as ‘The Lab,’ covered with colour-coded Post-it notes dedicated to our joint weekly planner, content board, marketing strategy, trends, ideas and upcoming meetings.”

Be a team, suggests Addo: “When training together, you have to trust in each other’s abilities. Otherwise working out together very quickly becomes one person training the other.”

Pull your weight, says Thuymi Do: “To do what we do, there definitely can be no lazy member of the team.”

In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe

Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010

Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille

Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm

Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year

Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”

Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners

TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013

Specs

Engine: Duel electric motors
Power: 659hp
Torque: 1075Nm
On sale: Available for pre-order now
Price: On request

Libya's Gold

UN Panel of Experts found regime secretly sold a fifth of the country's gold reserves.

The panel’s 2017 report followed a trail to West Africa where large sums of cash and gold were hidden by Abdullah Al Senussi, Qaddafi’s former intelligence chief, in 2011.

Cases filled with cash that was said to amount to $560m in 100 dollar notes, that was kept by a group of Libyans in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso.

A second stash was said to have been held in Accra, Ghana, inside boxes at the local offices of an international human rights organisation based in France.

Prop idols

Girls full-contact rugby may be in its infancy in the Middle East, but there are already a number of role models for players to look up to.

Sophie Shams (Dubai Exiles mini, England sevens international)

An Emirati student who is blazing a trail in rugby. She first learnt the game at Dubai Exiles and captained her JESS Primary school team. After going to study geophysics at university in the UK, she scored a sensational try in a cup final at Twickenham. She has played for England sevens, and is now contracted to top Premiership club Saracens.

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Seren Gough-Walters (Sharjah Wanderers mini, Wales rugby league international)

Few players anywhere will have taken a more circuitous route to playing rugby on Sky Sports. Gough-Walters was born in Al Wasl Hospital in Dubai, raised in Sharjah, did not take up rugby seriously till she was 15, has a master’s in global governance and ethics, and once worked as an immigration officer at the British Embassy in Abu Dhabi. In the summer of 2021 she played for Wales against England in rugby league, in a match that was broadcast live on TV.

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Erin King (Dubai Hurricanes mini, Ireland sevens international)

Aged five, Australia-born King went to Dubai Hurricanes training at The Sevens with her brothers. She immediately struck up a deep affection for rugby. She returned to the city at the end of last year to play at the Dubai Rugby Sevens in the colours of Ireland in the Women’s World Series tournament on Pitch 1.