I have a friend from Egypt who has gotten quite emotional after the hospital in Gaza was bombed .
She had been quiet about the affairs in Israel and Palestine until now, but after the hospital incident, I can see that she has become very upset.
She is doing what all of us do when we feel vulnerable and helpless.
Her mind is turning to the supernatural for consolation.
Oh God this, or Lord that, she has been making post after post on Facebook, to pour her heart out about the plight of Gaza.
I messaged her to tell her if things get bad, she can always come to Malaysia.
In return, she replied that if I really want to help, I should look past all the lies and propaganda, do my own research and spread the truth about Gaza.
I know that she thinks well of me, but I reckon that she also thinks that I have been swayed by the lies and propaganda.
But who is to say who is lying and who is telling the truth, which is facts and what is propaganda, at this point in time?
We have to be in a certain state of mind in order to recognize and appreciate the truths that we find. You can't make an agitated mind appreciate the truth anymore than you can make a buffalo appreciate music.
At this point in time, the only truth that we can be certain of is that there is a lot of pain, hate and anger in the middle-east.
Everybody has suffered from a loss and feel that they have been subject to a great injustice.
Everyone feels so oppressed, that it is fueling their desire to oppress.
If we were them, we would be looking at our opponents, and see only the devil's incarnate as well.
I wish I could tell my friend, “ let go of your pain, forgive those who have hurt you. No matter how much you look at the past, you will find no justice there. Look at the future for answers. Don't waste your life away by giving in to hatred.”
But who am I kidding.
When my cat died earlier this year, I spent a couple of days going insane and plotting murder myself.
It's easy to say forgive when you have not lost anything.
When you lose the things that you love, you have lost a part of yourself. The parts of you that remain can no longer love itself. When you lose a part of yourself, you can only live by entertaining an extreme hate for all that which has taken away your ability to love yourself. Without hatred, whenever you think of yourself, the only thing you will feel is shame and worthlessness, for not having the strength and courage to avenge yourself.
Like it or not, passionate hatred is the only thing that gives meaning and purpose to our lives, when we are unable to love ourselves.
Today, the fires of war rages so ferociously in Gaza that even a gentle Arabic teacher, whose imagination is so broad that she is amused by every little thing around her, whose heart is so large that she has lost a fortune feeding the strays she runs across in her life, now has murder in her mind and and vengeance in her prayer.
A day will come when those who have lost will learn to love again.
Until that day, I suppose that there is nothing else for the rest of us to do, than bear with their pain, as it sets the world aflame.
Nehru Sathiamoorthy was a columnist at FMT, a frequent contributor to the South China Morning Post, a mathematics teacher in the Klang Valley, and a seeker of the meaning of life. So far, there are three things that he holds to be unequivocally true. The first is that the purpose of life is to pursue happiness, the second is that you cannot be happy unless you carry your fair share of the world's weight and the third is that you can never underestimate your ability to take your own side.
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