On This Has Been A Different Kind of Ramadan
Ramy Youssef's SNL monologue, white noise and Free Palestine (duh)
But first, charities to support this Ramadan
A friend is running a marathon this week inshallah for Palestine via Muslim Hands
Nejma Collective Ramadan Fundraiser — a collective that “wants to help our brothers and sisters in prison who need money to buy food, clothing and phone credit to speak to their loved ones”.
Muslim Sisterhood’s Ramadan 2024 Fundraiser for African Relief Fund
Any paid subscriptions in April will go to MAP
I came to write a love letter of sorts. Then I read how Al-Shifa Hospital was torched down today. A hospital that grants 30% of the health system in Gaza. How do I write about love and joy and blessings during the Holy Month when at the same time, watching what is happening to Palestinians is a dystopian horror in real time?
On a phone call to a loved one today, we spoke about how we underestimated this Ramdan. Just because the days were getting shorter, the presumption was that this would be easier. But how can it be easier when we’re watching the dehumanisation of people unfold before our eyes? When it is largely those who are your siblings in faith too? How can that not be taking a toll on our souls?
We often talk about representation. What it looks like, the authenticity of what’s on our screens and in the spine of our books. Words like ‘gatekeeper’s have become buzzwords and in all honesty, all the conversation around Palestine feels like white noise right now.
But representation naturally does matter. It must do something to us, as people, as Muslims and Christians, as those from the Middle East and those who are indigenous to stolen land, therefore the majority of the world, to witness the attempted extermination of a group. It has to weigh heavy. Is that why so many of us have been in a state of functional freeze these last few months?
Last night, comedian Ramy Youssef delivered his debut monologue on SNL. He wrapped up his joke about praying alongside the statement ‘Free Palestine’.
It wasn’t Youssef’s funniest writing but it was perhaps his bravest.
As a writer who writes for some of the largest magazine and newspaper conglomerates around the world, it’s not easy to be in a writer’s room where you can palpably feel the lack of diversity in narratives.
It’s not easy to push ideas that people view as ‘controversial’, especially if controversy also appears different when it comes to the lives of Muslims and those who are not white. On a basic level, there’s usually a bunch of paperwork, lawyers and bureaucracy — which arguably in the end, is simply (white) noise to get to the point of what Youssef is trying to say.
If I have to watch children drown in the sea to access aid then I want to hear a comedian and actor say on American live TV, in which 5 million people tune in to watch, say the words ‘'Free Palestine’.
And what we cannot forget is that Youssef did not have to. None of us have to but how can we not? What is the cost of us not speaking out — to our souls, to our community, both familiar and external and simply to human life, if we do not? The art should reflect the times. Or else, it’s simply tone-deaf.
Next Sunday, it will be six months and 75 days since the racist occupation of what is an apartheid under human rights laws and the stripping of the Palestinian people. But what does that really mean?
Do we simply hear numbers and forget the countless stories behind those figures? Such as the displaced mother, who asked in Ramadan, if it was permissible to chop off her hand to be able to feed it to her children. What about those who can only find grass to eat (Subhanallah) or how ‘safe spaces’ for those who are now refugees are being bombed?
I believe that the real consequence of watching a genocide happen in front of your eyes is to make you feel helpless. To make you feel as though you cannot do anything. That our duas are not being heard.
My good friend
was recently in Egypt and helped deliver aid.She noted in her newsletter ‘Helplessness as a tool of the oppressor’ that “It’s for precisely this reason that helplessness and division are weaponised by the oppressor, in hopes of paralysing us agents of potential change. Because when we feel it, it means that instead of doing something, doing anything, we are collapsed. And the truth is, all throughout history, no one won their rights, their dignity, by lying sobbing on the floor.”
But if you are Muslim, you’ll know that another name for Allah is As-Sami, the All-Hearer. Surely, our collective prayers are being answered even if we can’t figure it out? On one hand, you have an illegal state that has the best technology in the world and another helpless country, that doesn’t even have a government or airport anymore and one is struggling to wipe out the other.
It’s been a different Ramadan this year. One that I cannot put my finger on but have observed enough to say: maybe that’s the test of this Ramadan. To compartmentalize and be grateful for all we have while we watch before our eyes the worst things human beings can do to each other. I guess the question remains, what will we do? In what small yet consistent, therefore, loving ways will we show up with the energy we have with all that we have been given?
To want change is to love it enough to care.
I guess it’s up to us now.
With revolution and love,
Tahmina
This newsletter is dedicated to all those in Palestine. Any paid subscriptions in April will go to MAP.
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this was very well-written, thank you for sharing this insight. may Allah show His mercy to the people of Palestine, ameen
Lovely piece! Glad for the reminder of Allah’s name Al-Sami. May He hear our duaas and grant victory and ease to our Palestinian brothers and sisters ❤️