“How can you sleep at night when you know that Muslims in Gaza are making dua against you?”
Roshan Muhammed Salih recounts a chastening experience when a Palestinian man who has lived through genocide rammed home to him the extent of the Ummah’s failure when it comes to Gaza.
“I’m not here to compliment you,” the young Palestinian man told a room of seasoned Muslim community activists, including me. “The truth is that you’re all to blame and you’re all guilty. Where was the Ummah during the genocide? They didn’t fight Israel like we thought they would. They couldn’t even get one strawberry into Gaza. Allah promises in the Quran that He will replace the wrongdoers with something better. And you will be replaced.”
The young man was addressing a room full of activists and imams who had given most of their lives towards Islamic activism. Or we thought we had. But through us he was addressing British Muslims and the wider Ummah. And with no respect for our age and experience, he proceeded to lecture us for one whole hour about our failures without interruption.
He told us how Gazans had naively thought that October 7 would spark a massive reaction by the Ummah who would rush to fight Israel and liberate the Palestinians. He said that at that time the dua was for the Muslims to save the Palestinians, but after they failed to move the dua in now against us. He said Allah will deal with us and that Muslims who did nothing were the enemy of the Gazans on the Day of Judgement.
He also told us that the suffering of the Gazans is now just something of passing interest to the Ummah, who shout platitudes on the one hand before going back to chasing the dunya on the other.
But the Gazans, he said, had passed their test from their Lord. They had remained loyal and steadfast to their Creator in the midst of unimaginable suffering. They had performed their prayers in the rubble without fail and under fire while they were seized with fear and panic. But what had the Ummah done apart from raising money, protesting and sloganeering? Have they passed their test, he asked rhetorically?
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And most shockingly, he told us that some Palestinians are now cursing the Ummah out of hopelessness and desperation and actively wishing them harm because of their dereliction of duty.
Allah’s punishment
Throughout his monologue he quoted the Quran and warned about the punishment of Allah for those refusing to obey His commands to fight for what is right. If we were serious about our words, he said, the first thing we would do would be to fight Israel. And failing that we would take some concrete action in the name of justice even if that meant going to prison.
He spoke in a low voice and tapped his hand on the table constantly in a sort of nervous tick. To me he seemed traumatised but above all he just seemed disappointed. Disappointed in us.
“There are Muslims out there who pray five times a day but they are not real Muslims. Real Muslims wouldn’t care about losing their wealth and possessions in the cause of justice. You British Muslims are five million. You think you are a strong community. But you are spoiled, you are in love with the dunya. You don’t do anything against Israel. Why not take 100,000 people to the Rafah border and force Egypt to open it? You don’t even do that. You are scared.
“Even when you protest it’s just about making yourselves feel better. We want action not words. How can you sleep at night when you know that Muslims in Palestine are making dua against you?”
As he spoke food was laid out on the table for us all to enjoy. I myself was very hungry and frankly looking forward to eating. But the food went untouched, not even one date or nut was consumed. It just felt inappropriate.
He told us how we take everything for granted. The chairs that we sit on, the roofs over our heads and the food that we eat in abundance. He told us that while he was in Gaza he drank contaminated water and ate pet food and was grateful for it.
Shame
During the lecture we kept our eyes low because we struggled to look him in the face. We all felt humiliated, belittled, even ashamed. But we didn’t say a word back to him because we knew he had experienced something that we never had. And we knew what he said was the truth.
Even after he had finished speaking we sat in silence for at least two minutes before the adhaan broke the awkwardness.
I thanked him at the end for his reminder, for humiliating and embarrassing us, and putting us in our place. But he told me he didn’t want my thanks and then abruptly excused himself, shook our hands and left.
A young man half my age had belittled and humiliated me. He had made me, and everyone else in that room, feel small. He had left us reeling. But were we angry or resentful? No, because we knew what he said was true.
