Fearing the night in Gaza

This powerful free documentary gives voice to the suffering, and further educates us when we're scared of knowing more.

“When the night falls, it feels endless. Will morning come? The night won’t end. The night is long. The night is terrifying. The night means fear. The night means remembering Hind.”

I expect that the official figures of 39,324 killed and 90,830 wounded in Gaza is only the beginning of counting, and that we’ll be nearer to Ian Welsh’s half a million dead than that.

Some of my readers (and writers I follow), fervent supporters for Palestinian rights to humanity, have told me that they’ve stopped watching the carnage; that more horror images aren’t needed; that they’ve taken a break to regain their own sanity. Some of us are more emotional than our fellow human beings, more empathetic, so I encourage breaks when needed (so that we can care longer).

But I’m pushing everyone present to watch ‘The Night Won’t End’, an Al Jazeera documentary that has its Fault Lines team working with Airwars, Forensic Architecture and Earshot. It provides perspective, approaching the genocide chronologically, and allowing the victims to speak at length.

One incident relates how Israel attacked a residential building for 5 days before entering and arbitrarily killing men. Then they stripped the woman, and tortured at least 13 men before executing 11 of them (probably mistaking the remaining unconscious as dead). They left only to begin shooting and shelling from outside, killing a beautiful toddler girl.

You’ll remember another little girl who lay wounded in a car with her slaughtered family members for company, making phone calls for help. And when the ambulance arrived, with IDF approval, the IDF bombed it. You will hear from her mother. She will tell you about the dark.

Then there’s the injured boy, his endless days without painkillers but telling his father not to cry…