Last Ramadan (2020) I used to have panic attacks thinking how I won't be able to survive till the next one. Yet, I was blessed with another holy month. With deaths, pandemic, conflicts and questions, I survived. There are days when I feel so lucky, so small and so powerless within the chaos. Today is one of those. It bothers me how little I understand the world, how insignificant my opinions are and how I will never get my answers. Every Ramadan, my newsfeed becomes overwhelmed with horrifying photos of attacks on Palestine, Yemen and Syria. And my list of questions grow; what did they do to deserve this level of violence? What did I do to be blessed with full night sleeps on a cozy bed? How did the world become so Islamophobic? Why is there a red line under the word Islamophobic? Why doesn't google pick this term as a valid word? Or am I thinking way too much? No, I am not. Throughout my lifetime, I have never seen peace in the Middle East. Wait, why is it called Middle East even? It's not the midpoint of the alleged eastern part of the world. Who named them this inaccurately? How did US military convince them to let there be tanks and guns and troops? No sane country would allow the world's most powerful army to place a military camp on their sovereign territory! Has humanity died? How do people attack people they don't know, let alone bomb and kill them? How inhumane the attackers must be in order to conduct killings during a holy month? Why can't the media tell the truth? Why do people keep doing things that can destroy a planet? This is their habitant too, right? What do they have in their mind while shooting a nuke? Do they calculate the return of investment as well? Why are there people who starve to death while others are throwing away foods because they don't like the taste? Why do some people struggle to breathe in oxygen while others laugh on memes? How did we let this happen to our countries? To our world? To my utter disappointment no answer justifies them solely. People discuss and analyze the events based on history, politics, geography, even religion. But discussion isn't solving it. Spreading awareness isn't stopping it. The only thing that's useful here, is power. Power in the hands of the ones who question, who feel accountable to it and who are capable of making sure bad doesn't outweigh good. I don’t know if I would be able to live long enough to see peace in the Middle East and to witness the extinction of radical politics. But I wholeheartedly believe people will be free. Someday, the headlines will be filled with good news, nations will help each other to keep peace, politics will contribute in saving the world from environmental extinction, laws will make sure everyone has equal access to the fundamental rights and from that day everyone will wake up feeling powerful.

Written on July, 2021