Sat in the warm night air of Abu Dhabi.. The memories of the past in England are like fragments of images smells and feelings that just arrive unannounced. They are so vivid and the happiness fear and sorrow they invoke is overwhelming and so difficult to accept that I often cannot put them away.
Its always interesting to me that in a different environment the flashbacks are the same, but there are less triggers. You see I have realised that the triggers are lesser in the environment where the trauma did not occur.. Logic right ? Well I am not sure that this is a scientific fact, but my anecdotal experience tells me that environmental triggers are everything.
One experience yesterday, I was at concert of western british music. The setting is beautiful in the gardens of the palace… But before the live performance the venue pipe instrumental music. The song that drags my mind back to before my family members were murdered ‘you are the wind beneath my wings’…
The song tells of how one persons love and admiration of the other gave them strength. The song my own mum had requested on the radio many years before on my Birthday. I was immediately taken back to that moment. In the kitchen of the house, where I lived with the person who attacked me almost daily… the fear the helplessness and the knowledge that my own mum too had experienced these things too. The control the abuse, even the rape by a male family member, where she was blamed for what happened. This relationship, my love for her, my fear for my daughters the same as her fears for me. The lack of control, the lack of safety, the need to take strength in others. But I was not strong enough for us all….
So sat in my silk hand made Omani dress, the warmth the smells of the Ouds, the distinctive sea air and the light breeze from the dessert. The song plays, I can almost touch my mumma. Her perfume her laughing and funny way of being and the unspoken words when we gathered on special days after we all had to leave our home and remarry.. The look in her eyes as she smiled, but in her gray eyes there was the sadness, unspoken, hidden…
So surrounded by over one hundred strangers, the memories of my babies, brutally murdered by the Nigerian and Israeli organised crime gangs, to protect a minority of offenders and ultimately trying to keep this huge influence on governance and the disappearances of over 115,000 children every year in England, quiet. Could I keep my family safe from people in human form, behaving like ferral dogs…
As the anger and memories surfaced, the tears fell quietly, like gentle rain…
After the concert, where there were more than a few more tears, a staff member approached me, invited me to stay for a second performance and as I took my seat, people began to arrive and there the door opened and an Israeli and a Nigerian woman enter the garden, I try to ignore, tidying my dress and hair and wiping the tears from my eyes. In the hundred seats in the garden he sits right next to me, the Nigerian sits to the other side. I smart in anger. He opens his legs and knocks my leg, placing his foot in front of me partially blocking my being able to stand. He loudly orders, the accent and attitude impossible to ignore. Self importance and expectations in a Arab country, which is in terms of Israeli views openly expressed to me, the ethnic group they hate…. But not when there is court case, compensation and ready cash. Then the oil rich nations can be Arab, no issues…
As I feel the bile rising in anger, I compose myself. I hear him loudly speaking to the Nigerian woman, laughing loudly and joking about ordering a ‘corona’ as we are all surrounded by candles, like a quiet reminder of the lives lost in the recent past from both the virus and the co morbid after effects, war and crime gangs running riot.
I sit and listen quietly, then when the auditorium is full, this man with the loud voice surrounded by some other Israeli men who have shaved their heads as a visible symbol of their involvement in collaborating in state deaths of innocent people, or maybe just for the convenience in a war time situation. Either way, I cannot sit with them. So when the place is full his voice is as loud as it can get. I shove his leg out of the way, I stand up and turn to face him. To say it was my best ‘Paddington’ stare is an understatement. I am on a flight in just a few hours, for not the first time Israelis have ruined my time and experience. This is a nation that kills indiscriminately. I know this, it is part of my family history. There is no loyalty not even to family or friends. Its money, power and a deep rooted sense of being wronged.
The truth is, I know what that is. I know the trouble that I faced for having Jewish roots. Yet I also know that these difficulties were compounded by Israelis. I am not Israeli. I was raised in part by an Arab man. I realise what discrimination is, I have experienced it in Europe. Yet I see that discrimination is also deeply rooted in the Israeli culture. Something I had not understood. But only for one group Arabs.
The sick feeling in my stomach I manage to control as I stare at this man, he catches my stare and in that moment I saw the emotion in his eyes, a flicker, maybe guilt, maybe something approaching remorse. The Nigerian woman I do not look towards, she is sat quietly. I have to move his leg out of my way. As the auditorium is full of over one hundred people. I stand stare, my distaste, my dislike for his behaviour clear crystal clear.
I stand very still and then I walk across the centre of the auditorium, leaving my seat the only empty one in the auditorium. Purposefully I walk to the door and the staff stand staring. In my Omani dress and heels I walk slowly, purposefully and refuse to cry. The staff look slightly shocked, walking out within minutes of the performance. My visible anger..
You see this is the thing about memories, trauma. It doesn’t require an outburst, just a recognition internally of my distress and removing myself from the environment or the people who were complicit in the trauma…
I realise that this is making assumptions of the Israelis, but they are sadly correct. I want it to be different. My non Jewish family can be incredibly racist, something that made any relationship difficult. But this is nothing to hatred of the Israeli side. Because their hatred is not openly expressed, until you scratch the surface. Then the hatred and bias against Arabs in the region ( Unless they are the oil rich variety) can be the target of abuse hatred, displacement and murder. If you dare to support the ‘wrong’ Arabs, expect to be called a terrorist. Your family targeted.
I left the event and walked to the beach and there I sat for hours, watching the stars the water the families enjoying the balmy evening air. Then I knew one thing. I I am seen as useful. The compensation owed by the British meant that the liability of ALL those who actively took part in the attacks were jointly liable. Make no mistake the attacks I suffered meant there was money, then the Israelis in my English community were keen to be friends. But if they are denied access to those funds, or the demands they no doubt make, are not met. Then its disposal and theft time…
As I write in a quiet Arab nation. Surrounded by a family that do not share my biology, but who have welcomed me and kept me safe. Just as my Christian family had all those years ago…
This dilemma of white Israelis is a difficult subject. They did not kill my daughters, but they arranged the murders after British companies had profited from the money sent to care for them. Interestingly siding with groups who have expressed and demonstrated hatred of Jewish women across europe. The psychology I cannot understand and do not wish to even try. But on that evening, surrounded by candles and music from my past.. I was confronted with just one reminder, a man loud disrespectful and whether British Israeli or European.. He represented the embodiment of what had happened to me, my daughters at the hands of Israeli and British European men who present themselves just like his behaviour….