Palestine and Lebanon are living the same nightmare. We will rise out of it together
Palestinians wave Lebanese flags during a demonstration against Israel’s assassination of Hassan Nasrallah, Ramallah, 28 September 2024
Mohammed R. Mhawish writes in +972 on 29 September 2024:
As I write this, Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon have killed more than 700 people over the past week, including longtime Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. The bombs continue to rain down relentlessly, flattening entire neighborhoods and displacing more than 1 million people from their homes.
I am not in Lebanon, but I can picture the scene vividly. The air is thick with dust, and the deafening roar of explosions is only drowned out by the never-ending wail of sirens. The streets are full of people running for their lives, but there’s nowhere safe to go. Ambulances, overwhelmed and unable to reach the wounded, are helpless as the shelling tears neighborhoods apart. Civil Defense teams scramble to rescue survivors, but the sheer intensity of the bombardment renders their efforts futile.
I can picture this because the scenes unfolding today in Lebanon are heartbreakingly familiar to me as a Palestinian journalist from Gaza. They echo what my hometown has lived through for generations, including the last year of Israeli genocide. I know the terror that grips those streets. I know what it’s like to wake up to the sound of bombs, to scramble for safety with nowhere to go, to hold your child close and wonder if you’ll live to see tomorrow.
But amid the devastation, something extraordinary has attracted my attention. Even as they flee for their lives and bury their dead, people in Lebanon are still expressing unwavering solidarity with Palestine. They speak of Gaza, amplifying the voices of those enduring the same terror across the border, and declaring that their bond is stronger than the fear that is gripping them under Israeli bombardment.
Despite the bombs, the pain of displacement, and the pervasive threat of death, they remain unshaken in their calls to end the war in Gaza. This is a solidarity beyond words — a unity forged in blood and shared suffering.
A Lebanese friend of mine, who had just escaped with her two children after a missile obliterated their home, told me: “We are with you. We will always be with you. No matter what they do to us, our hearts are in Gaza.” Her voice cracked with exhaustion and grief, but there was also a defiant, unwavering strength.
For the people of Lebanon, Gaza is not a distant cause; it is a mirror of their own suffering. They understand too well the feeling of being abandoned by the world, the endless waiting for help that never comes. They know the pain of watching their children grow up under the shadow of war, of raising a family in the ruins of what once was. And even now, with bombs exploding around them, they stand with us, just as they always have.
In the chaos, I received more messages from friends there. They spoke of terror and helplessness, of watching their homes collapse and their neighbors disappear under the rubble. “There’s nowhere left to run,” one wrote to me, his words heavy with despair. “But we will not be silent. We are with Gaza as much as we are with our own country. We are with you.”
I heard from another friend, a father of three, who spoke to me through broken breaths, his voice shaking as he described the panic. “We’ve been running all morning. We tried to get to a shelter, but it was already full. Now we’re hiding in the basement of a destroyed building, but I don’t know how long we can stay here. The bombs are too close.” His children, he told me, were crying, asking if they would die today.