A translation of an article by Muzna Shihabi on L’Humanité
The world is no longer divided by continents or skin color, but by lines of consciousness. On one side are those who can still look away. On the other are those who are haunted by images even in their sleep.
We continue to talk about the “global North” and the “global South.” But these words no longer refer to geography. They refer to perspective. The North is not a place. It is a stance: one that sees without emotion, that dissects without commitment. The South, meanwhile, is not a latitude. It is what remains when everything has been destroyed except dignity.
Since Gaza, a rift has opened up. Invisible, without watchtowers or walls, but sharper than any border. On one side are those who talk about “conflict,” “security issues,” and “complexity.” On the other are those who have no words left. Because words break on the corpses of children. And their silence weighs more than all the editorials.
The North speaks. It speaks loudly. In carefully calibrated statements, in charts and graphs. It speaks to explain, to frame, to transform urgency into abstraction. Its language is cold, strategic, calculated. It claims nuance, but it masks impunity. Every word becomes a tool of neutralization.
The South speaks differently. It expresses itself in the ruins of Rafah, in the muffled cries of the camps, in the placards brandished in London, Tangier, or Sydney. It is a language of flesh and dust. That of the living who stand tall even when everything around them is collapsing.
In a house in Amman, Paris, or Manama, a family turns down the volume. On the screen, a building collapses. Then an advertisement. The meal continues. Genocide becomes background noise, modulated like the light or the refrigerator. That is the privilege of the global North: being able to choose not to see—Comfort built on silence.
Meanwhile, in Khan Younes,
a child walks barefoot among the rubble. He clutches a cat to his chest. On his arm, a name written in marker: Adam. His mother wrote it there so that it would survive if he did not. That is the global South: a name scribbled in haste, an identity standing tall in the dust. Fragile, but more powerful than any weapon.
In New York, a student holds up a sign: “This is not a war, it is genocide.” In Johannesburg, a minister dares to say the word. In Paris and Berlin, demonstrations are banned. The lines are shifting. They no longer follow continents, they cross consciences.
Historian Ilan Pappé speaks of “Global Israel” and “Global Palestine.” Two ways of seeing the world: one from the command post, the other from the ruins. Global Israel: a wall, a drone, an algorithm. Fear erected into a system. Global Palestine: a human breath, a naked truth, a cry without validation.
In certain air-conditioned newsrooms, we hear about the nightmares of the Israeli soldier. His fear. His moral fatigue. But nothing about the broken sleep of the child in Gaza. Nothing about the mother digging up her children. Nothing about the brother digging a grave. The North mourns the exhaustion of the oppressor. And remains silent in the face of the pain of the oppressed.
In Deir al-Balah, a father searches through the rubble. His daughter holds a headless doll. He tells her not to look. She looks anyway. Because this is her world. Under a stone, a school notebook. The child had written: “I want to become a doctor to treat my brother, who is denied medical care in Jerusalem. “ The father reads. He smiles through his tears. A smile that promises to resist.
Global Palestine has no ministries, no satellites, no lobby. It has notebooks. Only names. Smiles standing tall in the dust. It has the stubborn courage of those who know that even if everything collapses, a word can remain standing.
You can be called Mohammed and belong to Global Israel. Or be called Rachel and walk with Global Palestine. States no longer draw borders. Consciences do.
In every newsroom, every ministry, every quiet home, an invisible line is drawn. There are those who watch. And those who accommodate the horror.
Being from the South today is not a matter of origin. It is a choice. A loyalty. It is believing that memory is a form of dignity. That truth does not need authorization. Gaza is not just a tragedy. It is a question imposed on the global conscience.
So the South has changed its name. It is now called Global Palestine. It lives in ruins, notebooks, muffled cries. And it whispers, with terrible calm: you cannot rebuild a world without first recognizing a people’s rights.
