Why am I so invested in Palestine? Quite simply, I’m a human being
I don’t know about you, but I have empathy. I have been an active campaigner for human and animal rights since my early teens.
From the age of 13, I have campaigned for a nuclear-free world and for cruelty-free toiletries and cosmetics which are against animal testing.
Thankfully, there are more and more independent businesses producing natural, ethical, sustainable and cruelty-free products.
I try to promote these over at my website, Only Natural.
I’m just one small woman in Scotland so I can’t claim the credit but, collectively, I know we can affect change.
Yet, while a lot has changed since the early 90s, it’s only been recently.
Historically, any company that wanted to trade in China had to comply with mandatory animal testing.
I’m so glad this changed in 2024 – dismissing the need for pre-market testing.
This marked a huge ethical step forward for global brands.
Let’s face it, no matter how ethical they’d like to be, the likes of Unilever (think Dove, Comfort, and Domestos) doesn’t want to pull out of a big market like China.
Diversion
Despite my early campaigning for WWF and CND and lots of other causes, I got blown off course.
I got caught up in motherhood and marriage – but probably on a journey that wasn’t really mine. I lost part of myself.
Despite being a business editor and working on various other journalism jobs, I forgot what it was I was passionate about – human and animal rights.
That’s not to say I became a bad human. I just lost that time or passion to campaign for them along the way.
I’ve had to remind myself I studied current affairs as part of my media qualification and, at one point, was set to study politics at Stirling University.
But human and animal rights shouldn’t be political. They should be a given.
And so this brings me here.
Like I say, I forgot part of myself and got caught up in being a mum and wife, but I’m ashamed to say I also became ignorant to the rest of the world.
That’s until everything went boom – a series of unfortunate events, you might say.
But then good things – and new people – came into my life.
They educated me on the world today and reminded me who I am. It set me on a path – my true direction.
I learned about Palestine – which, ashamedly, I’d been completely ignorant about before. And it’s true that once you see it, you can’t unsee it.
Now I feel disgusted in myself, having been so ignorant and, as some might see it, a privileged white person.
But my eyes are now well and truly open and I can only apologise to my brothers and sisters in Gaza, the West Bank and diaspora for my late arrival (or awakening).
Making the change
Once I educated myself, I was really keen to go to Hebron in the West Bank to help out in the hospital. That’s just before the shit really hit the fan.
I had been set to sign up with Go Palestine. My plan was to help out in the hospital and then report on it.
But things soon escalated in the West Bank and I was advised not to fly to Tel Aviv. As a white, female journalist, who knows what would lie in store for me.
I also spoke to fellow female journalists who had visited Israel and felt threatened – long before the genocide.
There was a glimmer of hope when I had the fortune to encounter an Edinburgh taxi driver with Palestinian badges all over his jacket. I asked him about them.
He was Palestinian! It’s fate, I thought.
He told me, “Fly to Jordan and tell the (Israeli) occupation you are headed to east Jerusalem to look at the old buildings and you will be fine. From there, you can go to Hebron.”
I wanted to but I also knew I might never come back and I had my children to think of.
I decided I would do everything I could, from here, to help – for now.
I have not given up on Palestine. And when it’s safer for me to go, I will be there.
Why is Palestine important and why should you care?
As much as I love and have connected with the Palestinian people, this is not just about Palestine. This is about occupation. This is about genocide.
This sets a precedent. Have you seen beautiful Gaza before, for example? It was a gorgeous palm-tree-lined coastal area. Now it’s rubble.
This could happen to any of us. And, by allowing it to happen to Gaza is sending out the message that they have free reign over any of us, including the UK.
Don’t become complacent. We could be next.
Free Palestine
Phone Calls from Palestine 
Leave a comment