From the day the war broke out, they destroyed what was inside us. They demolished my house and my room, which held all my memories. They took everything that helped me to live, like my devices, my boot, and my wheelchair. How can I go back to how I was without all this?
Ghazal, a 14-year-old girl with cerebral palsy in Gaza, to Human Rights Watch (HRW)
A year has passed since October 7, 2023, but the news pouring out of Gaza is only becoming darker and more heartbreaking. One year of Israel’s ‘moral war’ on the strip has seen an estimated death toll in the hundreds of thousands, the revival of polio among children, and the relentless destruction of hospitals, homes and schools. But despite Israel’s best efforts to make Gaza inhospitable for human life, the steadfast Palestinian spirit lives on.
It only takes one glance at a television screen, one scroll on social media, or even one walk through our campus to hear of Israel’s latest campaigns of destruction in Gaza. On this day, we grieve for the children whose futures were stolen by the occupying forces. We weep for the families who were torn apart by the Zionist genocide. And we mourn those who were murdered simply for staying on their own land.
It would be impossible to convey the full scope of the destruction carried out by the Israeli military in Gaza in a single article. One article for every life stolen wouldn’t be enough to express what has been taken from the people of Gaza. The Zionist occupation has destroyed centuries of history, tens of thousands of acres of land, hundreds of thousands of futures. As we write this article, we struggle for words—writing from the other side of the world, how can we begin to verbalize the horrors that this genocide has brought? How can we even imagine them?
Turning to the news does little help. Over the past year, one couldn’t help but notice the differences in rhetoric and the passive voice used when it comes to describing Israel’s atrocities committed in Palestine. The headlines will state “children killed in airstrike on Gaza school,” but fail to mention who committed the airstrike. “Polio sees a resurgence in Gaza,” but what led to the poor conditions of water quality and healthcare that allowed for disease to run rampant? Even as the war on Gaza continues to be one of history’s most well-documented genocides, news outlets and sources continue to harness the power of their rhetoric to tone down the overwhelming cruelty of Israel’s bombardment of the strip.
We cannot be complicit in the media’s whitewashing or the erasure of Palestine and its people; the world must keep confronting the extent of Israel’s atrocities in order to resist them. And even among the ever-present human rights abuses in Gaza, some inconceivable horrors from the past year have stood out. The summer’s massacres of displaced Palestinians in refugee camps designated as ‘safe humanitarian zones’ by Israel itself, burning refugees alive in Khan Younis and leaving 30-foot craters in the ground in al-Mawasi. The systematic abuse, sexual violence, and rape committed in Israel’s prisons, better described as torture camps. The targeting of mosques and cultural sites, murdering those who did nothing but gather to pray. It is clear that Israel’s genocide in Gaza is a campaign of ethnic cleansing and erasure.
But Zionist attempts to erase Palestine did not begin on October 7. While yesterday marked the grim milestone of one year of genocide, we are well into the 76th year of the Nakba (catastrophe), that began in 1948. Palestinians continue to be forcibly displaced, violently dispossessed of their land, and demoted to second-class status at the hands of the Zionist apartheid regime. Israel’s genocide in Gaza is not an isolated tragedy, nor is it the result of an anomalous extremist government as the mainstream Western media would like to disingenuously portray it. This is what Zionism is. It is a colonial ideology that seeks to do one thing: completely remake occupied Palestine for the settlers and settlers alone.
So, as unspeakable as one year of genocide is—and will forever be—the Palestinians remain steadfast and determined. The people will outlive the Zionist occupation. Those who remain on the land still build and nurture communities so that they may persevere in the face of ever-escalating Israeli attacks and settler violence. Those in the diaspora form networks of global resistance and solidarity, including in Los Angeles: a recent example is the Palestinian Youth Movement taking to the streets downtown this past Saturday. Olive trees do not bend, and cedar trees do not break. Palestinians will persevere until they return to their land.
We anticipate this return with hope: A Palestine liberated from the evils of settler-colonialism offers a profound vision for freedom everywhere. In the meantime, Palestine will live on despite hardship, despite terror, despite genocide. While the past year has brought conflict and division, it has also united communities for humanity, peace and justice around Palestinian sumud (steadfast perseverance).
Never forget how our campus coalesced around Royce Quad at the original Palestine Solidarity Encampment, including both Jewish and Muslim communities. No matter how much our administration, media and government attempt to demonize solidarity with Palestine, we will forever draw inspiration from the bridges that have been built across our university, our nation, our world for the common goal of ending this genocide. We must continue to ground this unity in the people of Gaza: within the US war machine, our taxes (and tuition, for that matter) pay for the bombs that kill Palestinians every day. We carry the weight of Gaza’s dead, and we must remember that we resist so that one day Palestinians shall live on their land in peace.
One year on, the world sees and stands united against genocide. One year on, we know that UCLA must divest, that the US must stop supplying the weapons of genocide, that the Zionist occupation must end. And one year on, we know that Palestine will be free. We will not stop, we will not rest.
