The Irish artist Jim Fitzpatrick of Che Guevara black and red portrait fame has done it again: He has painted a minimalist
poster of another iconic leader of her people and of a worldwide liberation
movement, this time of an oppressed child who had slapped power with her bare truth. When I read his rationale for painting
the new portrait I cried. The man’s pacifism, sincerity, and especially his
concern for Ahed Tamimi’s life touched me.
Like Jim Fitzpatrick, I am apprehensive about Ahed’s life. No
one really denies the real reason for incarcerating her: to teach a lesson to
other Palestinians, especially the children among them. Fitzpatrick is taking
the essence of the lesson, regardless in which direction it will be resolved,
to its ultimate conclusion. He is saying this is a model for every native and
underclass oppressed child in the world. And he knows how meaningful and
dangerous that can be:
“Ahed Tamimi, to me, signifies nobility in the
face of oppression. This is a kid, a child,” said Fitzpatrick. “When I was 15,
I think I would have been petrified. Wherever she’s getting her courage from,
there’s a resonance of it echoing across the world. I’m just a part of it.
There are organizations doing more than I could do, but I do think the pen—in
my case, the brush—is mightier than the sword.”
Remember, Che Guevara didn’t live to celebrate his portrait.
Ahed’s arrest was in direct and clear response to the Israeli public outrage at seeing the iconic Palestinian
teenager giving physical expression to her anger with occupation and the
occupiers. They had shot at close range and severely injured her cousin and
friend, Mohammed
Tamimi, and then had come to physically stress their frightening infringement
of the rights and freedom of all Palestinians right there at her family’s front
yard. She gave expression to her loathing of the occupation by attacking the
soldiers with her bare hands.
What moves me most is the realization that right there and
then, but for the grace of God, we could have lost Ahed. Members of the Israeli
occupying armed forces have killed Palestinian children younger than Ahed for
lesser offences or for no offense at all. Tens, hundreds, if not thousands of
times. It is not unknown, even in living memory, for settler colonialists, say
in Australia, to have organized native-hunting parties for the fun of it. And
Palestinian lives are cheap, we all know. Remember Mohammed Abu Khdeir and the
Dawabsheh family? That is why I want to give kudos to those two soldiers who
resisted the temptation to put their deadly weapons to use against Ahed and her mother and cousin. Their
death would have hardly registered a bleb on the rising statistical
curve of the occupation’s Palestinian victims. But then those soldiers
shouldn’t have been there in the first place. Kudos are reserved for the scores
of young Israeli conscientious objectors who resist serving the occupation.
There are those in Israel, you know!
What makes my heart sink is the fear of Israel’s lynch mobs:
The same crowd that had successfully agitated for her lockup and compelled
their occupation army and the entire governmental system behind it to invade
the Tamimi’s peaceful home in the dark of night to snatch Ahed and her mother
from their bed will be driven crazy by the inspiring image Fitzpatrick has
artfully drawn and made available for all to download freely. Israeli
crowds had lynched presumed enemies before. That is what scares me about
the world class image my fellow pacifist artist has just released. The same
fascist agitators who demanded Ahed’s arrest may not shy away from staging a
lynch. Perhaps her military
judge has a point in claiming that he is banning the media from his
military court for Ahed’s sake. Stretch that just a little and you can imagine
him justifying her imprisonment for life for her own safety.
“This girl is memorable, her
face is memorable, she seems a courageous, dignified girl—she captured my
imagination. And I think she’s capturing the imagination of the world. She
symbolizes resistance.”
How fully I agree with you, my friend! You dub her “the real Wonder
Woman.” She is a symbol of a wonder generation or even wonder generations. You
remember all those improbable images from the First Intifada, the image of the
child, stone in hand, facing a tank its tracks twice his
height and its gun turret four times that. And the children held in place by
soldiers while other soldiers swung bricks at their arms to break their bones
on orders of their high commander. And the Tamimi boy, Ahed’s brother with one
arm in a cast being freed from a soldier’s stranglehold “tooth and nail” by his
mother and sister. Then again, the same boy demonstrating with the second arm
in a cast. That was enough to make one of the sanest politicians in Israel go
crazy, why wouldn’t the daring of his sister whip up the masses into a frenzy
demanding her blond head? No wonder you want the whole world focusing its
attention on Ahed as a protective measure. This is the microcosm rendition of
the oft repeated human rights axiom that, across the globe, one’s stand on
Palestine is the true measure of their humanity. Indeed, sumoud—steadfastness—and
their instinctive holding onto their homes, land and olives, renders the
Palestinians a wonder nation.
That is a worthy note to end on. But please, everyone, keep
our Ahed Tamimi in your thoughts and keep her and all the hundreds of
imprisoned Palestinian children at the focus of your actions till Israel comes
to its senses.
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