Skip Schiel is a US-based activist who spends time in the Middle East.
He’s currently in Gaza and writing some evocative posts. Here’s one about the city port, a place I saw a few weeks ago with my own eyes:
A day yesterday when my muses were brilliant: to the port, El Mina in Arabic, when earlier as I planned my foray thru Gaza City I thought I might be heading in the opposite direction, possibly toward the old city. In 2008 I’d visited the Beach refugee camp side of the port with Mosab, stopped by security before we could enter. I concluded the port was off limits. Not so. This time I accessed it from the other direction, the south side. But first a stop at the fish market, or what remains of it. A shabby structure, the fish displayed on the floor, sometimes elegantly, flies everywhere, no apparent refrigeration, and a paucity of fish. What can’t be seen are the poisons floating in each animal. I wonder how aware people are who harvest, process and consume the fish, and if they are aware, how they experience cognitive dissonance—eat the fish, appreciate the nourishment, love the flavor, but realize they are eating what has eaten of the strongly polluted waters, including human shit.