The stories that the Palestinian people tell about themselves because of their lived experience will outlive the propaganda that Israel and the West try to tell in their stead. Lived stories, told by those who have experienced them, have a power in their telling that propaganda never has. There’s a video going viral of a young Palestinian girl returning to her destroyed home in Rafah, but she’s beaming as she speaks, and her words, rushing from her mouth, are almost like those of the prophet Isaiah:
“Thank God the war is over and Gaza announces to the world that it is the unbreakable land of undefeated people.
“Thank God, an indescribable feeling, the joy of the displaced. Today is the day of victory; the time has come to return home, a time of joy after pain and a time of rebuilding after destruction.”
It’s this kind of spirit that makes a people triumphant and not defeated.