It was a normal team meeting at the end of a busy week. Colleagues discussed the hospital weekend plans. I was there too, nodding, half present. My mind was elsewhere – on a message that I sent earlier that morning to a friend in Gaza.
I took a look at my phone.
A tick.
WhatsApp users know the signs: a tick means that the message has been sent. Two ticks mean it was received. Two blue ticks, it was read.
For most people, it’s a minor delay. But when you send an SMS to a Palestinian friend in Gaza during a war, a tick carries a feeling of dread.
Maybe his phone is out of charge – normal in a place where electricity was cut 20 months ago. Maybe there is no service – Israel often reduces communication during attacks. But there is a third possibility that I do not allow myself to think, even if it is the most likely result if you live through a genocide.
Always a tick.
Back in Reunion. We conclude. Plans are made and people are starting to think about their own weekend plans.
I look again. Always a tick.
It is the curse of being Palestinian. Bring the weight of your homeland, its pain, its inhabitants – while expecting to operate normally, politely, professionally.
Then I was told that the history of my teams were “potentially anti -Semitic”.
It was an image of a still life: figs, olives, grapes, oranges, watermelon and some glass bottles. A wink calm to my culture and my roots. But in today’s climate, even the fruits are political. Any symbol of Palestinian identity can now be interpreted as a threat.
Suddenly, I was questioned, accused and perhaps in the face of disciplinary measures. For a background. To be Palestinian.
Always a tick.
I felt silent, humiliated and exposed. How was my love for my culture, for art, for my people to be twisted in something hateful? Why is my virtual background choice more controversial than devastating violence takes place in real time?
It is not isolated. Many of us – the Palestinians, or any other person who care about Palestine – are challenged by our humanity between organizations, all motivated by external pressure.
And then it happened. Two blue ticks.
My friend was alive. He sent a message: they fled their house in the early hours of the morning. He wore his children, walked for hours, left everything behind. No food, no shelter. But alive.
How can I explain to him what had happened to me that day? That while he was running for his life, I was threatened with disciplinary measures about a fruit painting? That I was accused of racism for an image, when he witnessed the destruction of whole families?
This is what Palestinian means today. To constantly navigate a world that erases your humanity, silence your voice, deforms your identity. Be informed that your pain is political. Your joy is provocation. Your symbols are offensive.
I have been working in the NHS for 25 years. It’s more than a job – that is part of whom I am. And now, with two colleagues, I take legal action. Not for ourselves, but to protect the NHS from external political lobbying. To say, firmly and clearly, that our national health service should belong to its patients and its staff – and not to those who seek to silence, intimidate or twist it to serve a toxic program.
What happened to me is not only unfair – is illegal. Expressing genocide is not only my moral responsibility as a human being, but also my right as a British citizen in a democratic society.
I do not write this to compare my experience with the suffering of my friend. I write it to expose absurdity, cruelty, the way in which Palestinians are treated around the world. Whether under bombs or suspicion, we are made to justify our existence.
It shouldn’t be so.
Being Palestinian is not a crime. But too often, it feels like the world treats it as one.
The author is currently pursuing legal action, alongside two colleagues in the NHS, contesting, among other things, allegations of anti -Semitism.
The opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Tel Aviv Tribune.