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A review by moonyreadsbystarlight
Palestine by Joe Sacco
emotional
informative
reflective
4.5
Palestine by Joe Sacco is a comic/graphic nonfiction work of journalism that documents his travels through Palestine in the early/mid 1990's. Alongside his own experiences, he tells the stories of many Palestinians that he interviewed. He is invited into many houses for tea and food while hearing stories of brutal imprisonment, death of children, political divides within the community, and much more.
This work will certainly put the Palestinian struggle into perpective if you are unfamiliar. It also makes the crimes against humanity we are witnessing being livestreamed online even more horrific. For example: hospitals are being bombed now with doctors and patients inside, parallel is the story of a boy (15) who had already been shot by a soldier and sent to the hospital only to be beaten inside the hospital by soldier (his arm broken alongside the arm of a member of hospital staff who tried defending him). The horrors we are seeing now have a long history and this comic shows many small snapshots within that history.
Throughout the story of Sacco's time in Palestine, we see some of his thoughts and at times he outright discusses some of his biases. This was a self-aware framing that is supposed to (I think) show us some of the problems with the Western gaze. Even as I understood it, I still found some of it annoying in the moment. As I reflect on it, I do think that parts of this message are quite important in the context of journalism (particularly as we see how much western news has covered Palestine recently). I still have mixed feelings, but ultimately it's small parts that I have conflicted feelings about.
Overall, this was an intense collection of experiences and an important read. I'd definitely recommend it to people who are unfamiliar and wanting to learn more about Palestine. It is western journalism that is self-critical and even if the jurry is out on my full opinion of exactly how he did that framing, I'm glad that it was there.
This work will certainly put the Palestinian struggle into perpective if you are unfamiliar. It also makes the crimes against humanity we are witnessing being livestreamed online even more horrific. For example: hospitals are being bombed now with doctors and patients inside, parallel is the story of a boy (15) who had already been shot by a soldier and sent to the hospital only to be beaten inside the hospital by soldier (his arm broken alongside the arm of a member of hospital staff who tried defending him). The horrors we are seeing now have a long history and this comic shows many small snapshots within that history.
Throughout the story of Sacco's time in Palestine, we see some of his thoughts and at times he outright discusses some of his biases. This was a self-aware framing that is supposed to (I think) show us some of the problems with the Western gaze. Even as I understood it, I still found some of it annoying in the moment. As I reflect on it, I do think that parts of this message are quite important in the context of journalism (particularly as we see how much western news has covered Palestine recently). I still have mixed feelings, but ultimately it's small parts that I have conflicted feelings about.
Overall, this was an intense collection of experiences and an important read. I'd definitely recommend it to people who are unfamiliar and wanting to learn more about Palestine. It is western journalism that is self-critical and even if the jurry is out on my full opinion of exactly how he did that framing, I'm glad that it was there.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Child death, Death, Genocide, Gun violence, Misogyny, Torture, Violence, Xenophobia, Police brutality, Medical content, Grief, Religious bigotry, Murder, Colonisation, War, and Injury/Injury detail