My fight about Gaza

I got in a fight with a loved one about Gaza yesterday.

It turned ugly. This person played devil’s advocate, explaining Israel’s right to defend itself from Arab nations in the region. He said there are other conflicts in the world. In Haiti, people are eating each other. In Sudan, children are starving too. Why is this one so important? Why is the UN focusing on this? It’s just a ploy. The UN is full of communists.

I screamed that there is no justification for what’s happening. Yes, there are conflicts all over the world, and every starving child deserves attention — but we’re talking about this one. So stop changing the subject. There is never a justification for starving children. Never a justification for blocking emergency aid meant to save them.

I yelled. I said spiteful things. I cried. Then I stormed out of the room.

I’m not very good with conflict sometimes.

……………………

As I lay in bed a few hours later, my mind churned and I started to analyze the situation. The why of it all. The how of it all.

How can the world let this happen? Why am I so emotional about this? Why can’t others see how terrible it is? Where is all the humanity? What the fuck is humanity anyway? Equality? Human rights?

Why does this bother me so much? I’m a nearly 40-year-old mother living safely in far-off Argentina — healthy, comfortable, spending my days writing from cafés, sipping cappuccinos, eating pastries. So why is this ripping at me?

…………

At night I’ve been reading Homo Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari. Its main theory is that Homo Sapiens came to dominate because of our ability to believe in imagined things — non-tangible, unprovable, collective ideas. We believe in the concept of religion, in the afterlife. And that makes us different from animals.

And we believe in the imagined idea called human rights. Equality. That all of us are created equal.

But this is false. We are not — and will never, can never — be equal. I was born with good health and well-off parents. The children in Gaza were born in a territory that would later be bombed by their occupying government, who would later starve them to death. I can’t do anything about it. It’s in another part of the world.

Why the fuck do I care?

Because of the fallacy of equality that Homo Sapiens possess. It is a falseness. But without it, we could not have communities. We could not have states. Churches. Systems. If we don’t believe in some sort of togetherness, why would we care for another in the first place?

…………

Then I got to thinking about this conflict. Why this conflict? Why Gaza? Why do I care so much? Why is my mind going there?

I’ve worked in humanitarian aid for the past 15 years. It should be based on data — on where the most vulnerable children in the world are.

But we all have our biases. Even UN workers.

Mine comes from a dear Arab friend. One who taught me to love the Arab world. Who exposed me to the beauty, colors, food, and culture that burst out of it. Of course there is some ugly. A lot of it. But he also taught me the ugliness of what Israel has done over the years. How it continues to bomb his country and all the surrounding countries. Justifying its existence by manning up against its neighbors.

Then my analytical thinking cap came on and I needed hard data.

At UNICEF, data drives decisions. Year after year, they gather extensive statistics to determine where it is worst to be a child — based on indicators like child mortality, maternal and newborn health, nutrition, education, and violence. The goal is to put funding where it’s needed most — to reduce suffering, not amplify politics.

In 2025, it’s not hard to see where help is most desperately needed. Gaza has become the epicenter of catastrophe. Over 55,000 Palestinians have been confirmed killed. More than 130,000 have been injured — many severely wounded and clinging to life. 95% of schools are damaged or destroyed. Over half of all children are malnourished. Access to food, water, electricity, and medicine is nearly non-existent.

This is not due to a climate disaster, nor economic collapse. It is not a failed state or an internal civil war. This is one powerful, heavily armed nation — with billions in U.S. support — systematically annihilating another.

And that is why my fragile, justice-driven humanitarian heart is screaming.

.……………………

And what about Israel’s right to exist and defend itself?

Sure. In war, you can defend yourself. You can strike if there’s a threat.

But killing tens of thousands of civilians — many of them children — is not defense. Bombing hospitals, bakeries, refugee camps? Not defense. Killing aid workers. Starving an entire population on purpose. Not defense. That is something else entirely.

No. That is never justified.

You can exist. But you cannot do this. I may not grasp every political angle — but here, I’m drawing the line.

The 1,200 Israeli hostages taken by Hamas do not justify the 55,000 Palestinians killed since. The horror of October 7th does not justify months of blockade and starvation.

No. Fuck no.

.……………………

Deep down — in my gut — I’m not just speaking to this loved one. I’m speaking to the many conservative friends I grew up with in the U.S. I’m justifying my need to fight for this ridiculous, imagined, impossible concept called “human rights.” The right for this Arab population — in a place I’ve never even visited — to simply exist.

I’ve started following Palestinian reporters and journalists. Many of them are now dead. My social feed is filled with mothers wailing over their dead babies, fathers weeping as they cradle the arms of their dismembered children.

This is real.

Humanitarianism is based on the understanding that some people were given more and others less — and we try to balance that, just a bit.

That’s why I got into it in the first place. When I was a kid, I knew there were conflicts in the world. Children were dying in Chechnya. I watched the Iraq War play out on cable news. Later, I saw Afghanistan. I remember hearing about Darfur.

It was sad, yes. But it didn’t hit me.

It wasn’t until I left the U.S. and lived among others that I learned how deeply my country was involved. How, in the quest to become a global superpower, we had ripped other countries of the opportunity to grow on their own.

And we did it smartly. Are still doing it smartly. Through trade deals. Through pressure. Through diplomacy. Through debt. We push open economies to strip their lands for our phones, chips, batteries, and servers.

And if a country dares to say no — to protect their own people, their own resources? Well, the CIA’s got something to say about that. It may not be as dramatic as drugging dissidents and throwing them from planes into the sea — like what happened to thousands across Argentina in the 70s — but it’s no less real.

To build a rich country, you gotta take from a poor one. That’s the ugly math of empire.

……………………

Humanitarianism is about the knowledge that you are gifted, and others are not.

There’s a sort of guilt that builds in your chest. And I gotta be honest — it drifts when you have kids. Because your kids are your life.

So why do I care about children starving in Gaza?

Maybe I should just shut out the guilt, shut up, and live my happy little life with my healthy little family and fancy café culture in beautiful Buenos Aires.

Or maybe…

I write about it. Keep advocating for this ridiculous, imagined, impossible fallacy we call human rights.

Photo: UNICEF