Under the walls of Jerusalem: the scar that unites the centuries

If we look at the images in newspapers, on the Internet, on television, we can realize that what is happening to Palestine has already happened to the left all over the world: a slow, inexorable, definitive disappearance from memory, from hearts, from history, from feelings of human beings. Why? Those who do not have their own way of seeing, their own way of looking, those who do not have their own peculiar way of “making” images disappear from history. Those who do not have “their” images will end up suffering and sharing the way of seeing the stronger. Not having one’s own gaze means being incapable of questioning an absolute order, a culture that denies and oppresses. Despite the riots, despite the blood, despite the thousands of deaths. The dead, the killed, the pain are infinite.

And we end up thinking that everything else is fine, that we just need to fix our own suffering, our own deaths, our own pain. There is “something to fix” in the Middle East, of course, but everything else is fine and is palatable, desirable; what we suffer, what we experience, is a theft of dignity, of culture, of happiness, of affection, of life, of water, of land… but everything else is “fine!”. And it would be fine for the victims of today or the day before. It seems that everyone, in every part of the world, even in Palestine, uses the same images, the same type of image, a literal and spectacular vision of what happens, of the events, of the things, of the people that unites everyone, victims and executioners , aggressors and the attacked, rapists and the raped.

According to that way, falsely participated, by court, by forensic medicine. That is, it isolates itself from the context; the context is ignored. Images are not a starting point for thoughts, for judgements, for sharing or revulsion. The spectator is not involved, he is not solicited. It makes him think he is superfluous, extraneous, out of the picture. The matter is in the hands of others. He has nothing to do with it. At most, from time to time, you can pretend to be a referee. Like in a football match seen distractedly on television.
The torment of Palestine is the unpresentable scar that unites the two centuries. A scar that runs through us, that calls us to account, that calls for the same thirst for justice as when we were children. As old people we remember that when there was fascism they were all fascists; when there was Nazism they were all Nazis. Today we stand with those who are strong, with those who justify abuse, with those who rediscover the colonial spirit of the West. The West watches and applauds.

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The Armenian genocide had to be done quickly, before international protests took their toll. The genocide had to be faster than communications at the time. Today communications are very fast, in real time, which is why genocide must be slow. The deaths must be continuous, day by day. With very violent and rapid massacres, those who oppose the robbery of memory are killed first; then, calmly and methodically, everything else is made to disappear.
After one of the army’s many offensives, I happened to be present when civilians were given permission to bury their dead. A bulldozer dug the grave in what had been a large parking lot. The dead were all young. I had seen someone executed with a gunshot to the back of the head. It was the fathers who buried their children. Everyone I asked what work their son did replied that he was a school teacher. A Nobel Prize winner for literature, the true noble father of the wall that steals even more land, even more water, even more life, even more dignity, even more happiness from the Palestinians, maintains that words in Palestine are dangerous because they have many meanings.

You have to be careful when pronouncing them; I’m biased. Even the word “peace” is biased, the director of one of the largest journalistic agencies in the world explained to me. It is biased because with peace one of the two peoples has everything to gain; the other all to lose.

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But let’s go back to the images. Palestine, like all just and noble causes in the world, no longer seems to have the support of images. Images had always been the refuge of the weak, the persecuted, the vanquished, the losers. Images have always been capable with their soul of showing the truth, of constructing the truth. The images had their soul, like living beings. They had a life and dignity of their own. They had abstractness, they were capable of living beyond their literal sense, beyond the letter, Barthes said. Palestine today no longer has images that defend it because the image without life, without abstractness, without music, without voice has won in every area. The dead image; the image thing. That you can use as you like, that you can reassemble as you want.

As long as only this type of image exists, the strongest will always win. With this image the truth will no longer have those who defend it and those who seek it. It will no longer have anyone who finds it or anyone who creates it.

The book

Under the walls of Jerusalem

by Tano D’Amico

Mimesis

The author

Tano D’Amico is one of the greatest living Italian photographers. He has made, among others, reportages in Palestine, Greece, Ireland, Germany, Switzerland, Spain and Portugal. With Mimesis it has

published Photography and destiny (2020), Mercy and betrayal (2021), Orphans of the wind (2022).