Read a new poem by Ruba Al Faleet, they call it a ceasefire
They Call It Ceasefire
My friend,
they hung a new word above our heads —
ceasefire —
a thin paper lantern trembling in a wind that never stops.
From far away it must look like a small light,
but here, up close, you can see the flame inside it
is eating the paper.
They say the war is resting.
But the sky still sleeps with its boots on,
and every drone circling above us
is a reminder that even silence has teeth.
In this so-called ceasefire,
we move like shadows who have forgotten the direction of the sun.
The Strip has become a narrow throat,
and we are all learning to breathe
through the smallest crack of air.
You cannot take one step without asking the wind for permission.
The roads curve around absence.
The borders behave like a jealous lover
who would rather cage you than lose you.
My friend,
they open the crossing the way a fist opens —
reluctantly,
ready to close again the moment hope dares to blink.
In the markets, everything feels borrowed:
flour measured like secrets,
tomatoes bruised by the journey,
sugar that arrives as though apologizing for existing.
Prices climb the walls like lizards,
quick and impossible to catch.
And the people with no homes?
They walk with the posture of torn flags —
upright,
but carrying the wind inside their bones.
Their tents inhale rain,
exhale despair,
and still stand like small lungs refusing to collapse.
The world thinks genocide is only the sound of buildings falling.
But there is another kind —
the slow one,
the quiet one —
where the living are peeled away layer by layer
until even their shadows look tired.
Let me tell you about today:
I spent hours performing the rituals of primitive life —
shaping fire like an ancient prayer,
washing dishes with water that remembers cold better than warmth,
cooking in pots that feel older than the century,
sweeping dust that keeps returning,
as if it is trying to tell me
it has nowhere else to go.
There is no electricity here,
except the spark of exhaustion in our bodies
when we try to charge ourselves
the same way we charge our phones —
briefly, desperately,
searching for a socket in a world of dead walls.
Sometimes even the act of boiling water
feels like negotiating with fate.
They call it ceasefire.
But my friend, what kind of ceasefire
lets the rain drown the tents
while the world looks the other way?
What kind of ceasefire
asks us to swallow hunger
as if it were a form of patience?
The war has not left.
It has only removed its uniform
and put on a quieter mask.
It walks beside us every day,
touching our shoulders lightly,
as if to remind us
that it still knows our names.
And still we endure.
We gather the little light we find,
fold it carefully into our pockets,
and walk forward
as people who refuse
to let the paper lantern go out.
I am constantly amazed by the powerful and beautiful writing coming out of Gaza, writing forged in fire. But no one one should have to pay such a price. As a mentor and editor on We Are Not Numbers, a platform for young Palestinian writers to tell their stories, I see the courage, the dedication, the determination of Gazans to survive, both as individuals and as a people. Yesterday a friend of my daughter's here in the UK told me that seeing our leaders enabling Israel to continue to commit genocide in Gaza is changing her view of the world and humanity as a whole, and I've heard the same thing from many other people of all ages recently. We are all waking up to the indifference and cruelty of our political systems and realising that our leaders, whatever their political persuasions, care only about their own selfish interests and are willing to secure them by clamping down on our freedoms. We need to rise up and force them to act, both out of humanity but also understanding that anyone who can condone or collude with such evil has no heart or moral compass, and - as in the US now - will turn on us and willingly oppress and enslave all of us to serve their interests, as they are already starting to do. It's past time to remind them, before it's too late, that there are more of us than there are of them, and that we will not tolerate this barbaric behaviour any more. Each one of us needs to do whatever we can to help Gaza, whether it's writing to our MPs, demonstrating, spreading awareness or helping people in Gaza directly by donating to charities or individuals.
Many years ago I was briefly in Gaza and I fell in love with the people and the place, and have despaired at how they have been misused by their enemies and leaders alike. The future of Gaza is in its people, its communities, its culture and in voices such as that which we can hear in this beautiful piece. We all need the people of Gaza to thrive, in peace and equality. Currently, there are too many who can't or won't see that. May peace extend this brief, imperfect visit and come to live in your streets and in your homes, and stroke the heads of your sleeping children soon.