“One day, when it’s safe, when there’s no personal downside to calling a thing what it is, when it’s too late to hold anyone accountable, everyone will have always been against this.” – Omar El Akkad When he posted on October 25, 2023, he also shared video of Gaza, in three weeks of bombardment the devastation was already unfathomable. He condemned what was happening but noted the absence of vocal opposition. Some 21 months later children in Gaza are starving to death, the war and restrictions on aid have had predictable consequences. Children die when they don’t have food and water. Yesterday, as I write (July 28), the AP reported on a 5-month-old girl who was 6.6 pounds when she was born but 4.4 when she died.
They describe a scene that is hard – impossible – to read: “The baby was brought to the pediatric department of Nasser Hospital on Friday. She was already dead. A worker at the morgue carefully removed her Mickey Mouse-printed shirt, pulling it over her sunken, open eyes. He pulled up the hems of her pants to show her knobby knees. His thumb was wider than her ankle. He could count the bones of her chest.”
