Dear President Biden 

Perhaps I am one of the few who had hoped against hope that your arrival into the holy land today would make a difference.  Perhaps this was not the case for those who have already passed, but it definitely, would have for those who are still alive.  I was shuddering after the horrific shelling of a Christian hospital reflecting on videos of pieces of children and human bodies strewn all over the grounds.  Ten days of relentless shelling on human beings, yes human beings mostly women and children who have no place to hide and no shelters to shield them.  We were all awaiting anxiously for a statement from you as the media had described what happened yesterday as a “Game Changer.”

I watched you take on the presidency with an emphasis on being a Christian Catholic president as you attended mass on your inauguration.  I wonder if this is what your catholic upbringing has taught you, Mr. Biden.  Has it taught you that an eye for a body and a tooth for a head, as an Arab Palestinian Chrisitan catholic, I recall it differently I recall my catholic teachings calling for peace justice forgiveness for equity of all humankind.

“As an Arab Palestinian Catholic, I recall it differently I recall my catholic teachings calling for peace justice forgiveness for equity of all humankind.”

Since when has war brought about Peace? Since when has killing ended the cycle of violence, I am not a president nor am I in charge, but I am old enough to have heard the stories of my grandparents’ survival of the Ottoman period and my parent’s British mandate as well as the ethnic cleansing in 1948.   I am old enough to have witnessed the Palestinian dispossession and violations of human rights since 1967, and old enough to have served in hospitals during shelling and witnessed the missing heads and limbs.  Old enough to have helped at the Anglican hospital that got shelled yesterday, to patch up the legs and limbs of a whole generation that was rendered disabled as Palestinians from Gaza tried to March to end the siege.  Old enough to see a generation of youth losing hope, and watching the transgenerational trauma continue; generations of women and mothers mourning the loss and imprisonment of their loved ones.  

As you are older than me Mr. Biden, and have personally suffered loss, have you not seen that war only brings about more death and destruction and hate?

God grants life and takes away life, however, it is how we have lived our life that makes a difference, if only you had stood there on the 7^th of October and said it differently, you might have made a difference for peace in this world.  Once more today my optimism in life was crushed because what is happening in Gaza is being described as crimes against humanity according to international law.  Upon your arrival to the holy land, you decided to align yourself with those causing the suffering instead of doing what needs to be done: uphold the conventions of human rights and hold all parties to count.  We are not children of a lesser God Mr. President we are the Palestinian Christians of the holy land where the message of love peace and justice started, and we call upon you to stop this Genocide.

A Palestinian Daughter Mother, and Human Being

October 18^th 2023