By Edwin Heath
Article written to commemorate the opening of the Gaza Children’s Memorial Garden, August 2014
Unless you are famous, nobody will remember you in a hundred years’ time. So why remember the existence of little human beings whose lives were barely moulded by time?
Perhaps that itself should be the reason. Un-formed little lives, forever unable to make a mark, brutally and avoidably cut short by the actions of their “betters”.
We should be like elephants, discovering kindred bones: in a true state of shock, mystified, pacing around, reluctant to leave, trying to understand the cause.
We know the circumstances. Tank shells and airstrikes killing children at home, the place of safety and security…Or so it ought to be, since that is any child’s minimal, primary demand.
The ordinary circumstances of life, like going out to shop, are most significant for children. On 8th July, a drone fired a missile at three children on a street in Jabalia. One was killed on the spot, the other two injured. The boys were on their way to buy ingredients for a hummus dish for Iftar.
On 17th July, three children, who were feeding a family chicken on the roof of their homes, were killed. two children were injured.
Perhaps most poignant of all are the deaths, because of planning and action by adults, of children playing. On 16th July, four children were killed while playing on the beach near Gaza City port. Another two were injured.
But what can anyone do, apart for sympathising, apart for acknowledging the unfairness? Of course it is unfair, that nearly 500 children had to die, simply because they were on the “wrong” side, and in the wrong place at the wrong time. They themselves were not trying to hurt anybody, they were children. By definition, innocent.
But, you might say, it’s too late. Their lives are gone, and who can say what those extinguished lives might have been?
All we can do is attempt to save future lives, through speaking out, by protesting, by trying to help the survivors.
In that case, let use try, at least, to become like elephants. The elephants, shocked and saddened by the bones of their kind. We are impressed by their behaviour, because it seems to be human. In fact, it is better. Elephants don’t forget to be elephants, but humans can forget to be human. Human lives can become distorted by thought: to the point, sometimes, where memory and imagination are discarded.
So let us, at least here, mourn those we did not know. That is human. Let us imagine the lives of those who only wanted to play, or go out shopping, or feed a chicken. Let us remember them, since they can no longer remember themselves.
The Gaza Children’s Memorial Garden in Orkney was created in the summer of 2014, to honour the memory of 500 children killed in Gaza in one of a series of Israeli military incursion into the Gaza strip. It has been open to visitors ever since, from May to October, either by arrangement , or at specific garden open days, usually Sundays between 3 and 6pm. Admission is free, although anyone who wants to make a donation to a Palestinian charity, or perhaps bring a flowering plant to honour one of the lost children is very welcome to do so.
If you would like to become a Friend of OMG (Orkney Memorial Garden) please let us know. Better still just come and socialise with tea and cakes in the garden on one of our special Open Days.
For further information, please contact Edwin & Nadia Heath, Midgarth Cottage, Rendall KW17 2HD email: edwinheath@icloud.com
