Sitting at my favorite hairstylist, I kept dozing on and off. During one of the moments when I was ‘awake’ I feared that my reputation with the other ladies was seriously compromised and decided to watch what there was on the complimentary TV available in the waiting area.
What drew my attention was the blood and scenes of people crying. The sound was not on which is why I had not noticed the programme in the first place. I upped the volume and drowned in breaking news from Occupied Territories. It was a Gaza special coverage from Al-Jazeera. The horror dawned on me and I realized that this had been going on for the last two days at least. I left the hairdresser soon after and headed straight back home all the while thinking how come I did not hear about this ? Yet this is what happens when you don't go online or watch TV for a few days: the world crashes.
The discussion on the Libyan blogs covered many angles but mainly focused on sadness and solidarity with the Palestinians, feelings of powerlessness- in addition to outrage, and infuriation at Israel's action and the joint Arab inaction.
The post title “Gaza Burning” is in black bold font from Tasnim ,who is usually more voluble in her commentary, and has only added a black poster to go with the statement [1].
Other bloggers seem to have lost their ability to speak and instead chose to post photos and cartoons of the utter chaos and the senseless cruelty perpetrated in Gaza of which they are witnessing all over the media.
“Isreal is striking Gaza- A New year blitz, Opss! Presents [2][sic]”, cries Naohama as this air campaign coincides with the Islamic New Year and the upcoming Gregorian new year.
Nasim Libya is asking “what else???? [3]” and the cartoon she has up refers to what is in store now for Gaza.
Bloggers Musa and Julia, a couple cycling the Mediterranean sound resigned to the inevitable.
“You may have wondered why I haven't posted anything about Ghaza.The reason is that it is an inescapable presence and source of pain shared by all to such an extent that the news are largely watched in a thick, loaded silence.”
[ref [4]]
Libyan mom My Being Days encompasses the helplessness [5]many are feeling.
“My thoughts are with you people of Gaza…
I feel sorry that I can not do much but pray for you…
I feel ashamed that as Arabs our leaders are not lifting a finger to help…”
On the other hand, when her mom calls her to switch Al-Jazeera on, White African takes her gloves off in order to “tell it like it is” [6].
“forgot about being politically correct, you cant with isreal, they just seem to have no human qualities what so ever, western news doesn't seem to help either, there coming up with titles such as ‘Israeli warplanes demolished dozens of Hamas security compounds across Gaza’ what complete utter lies, they put in the word ‘Hamas security compounds’ to make the reader excuse isreal for their actions.
truth is since opening the tv all I've seen is civilians, children on their way to SCHOOL, even a donkey amongst the dead, so what kind of security compound are they talking about.
and as for the Egyptian government, well frankly I'm disgusted by hussni mubarak, sorry excuse for a man…
first thing he decides to do is place tanks on the border to prevent ‘flocks’ of Palestinians entering into egypt!!.
you watch the other arab channels and all you see is musalsalat ‘soaps’, chat shows, music, concerts blah blah[..] [sic]”
Fragola informs us that the Libyan Red Crescent has undertaken a campaign for blood donations [7] in order to help the wounded in Palestine.
Other bloggers wonder about how to talk about the news to their children when the children's channels are filled with heartbreaking poetry about Palestine.
Anglo Libyan is at loss to explain to his son the reality and he noticed that they figure it out anyway [8].
“the children are learning on their own from watching the news and not Arab news but mainly BBC News that there is a bad monster called “The Israeli Army” killing people that they kept under siege and treated worse that caged animals for over a year[sic]”