Content warning: Mentions of genocide, death, and dismemberment.
The eighth event of Quebec Public International Research Group (QPIRG) McGill’s Spring into Action series, “Gaza as a Compass for Thinking,” took place on March 21. It explored the theme of “home” through accounts of Palestinians reclaiming their towns that had been reduced to rubble.
Keynote speaker and professor in McGill’s Department of Philosophy, Alia Al-Saji, drew upon her years of research regarding the Israel-Palestine conflict to discuss how the Israeli state has systematically debilitated the infrastructure of Palestine’s healthcare system. Al-Saji described how this action has maximized the harm done by targeted bombings, using the dismemberment of civilians as a means of colonization.
Al-Saji began the talk with a history of how Palestinians have experienced qahr—which refers to the impact of colonial duration in Palestine—over the last few years. She first critiqued how the West paints Palestinians as either perpetual victims or vengeful terrorists. Al-Saji stated that it is critical to outline the logic of Palestinian resistance to understand that Palestinians’ rational agency is what motivates people to work against the actions of the Israeli state.
“What does it mean not to pity, but to bear witness to Palestinian resistance in returning to live on the land that Israel has made ‘uninhabitable?’” Al-Saji said. “For that matter, what does it mean to call the land ‘uninhabitable’ or ‘unlovable?’ For whom and by which standards of humanity?”
Carl Bistrom, QPIRG McGill’s community research and working groups coordinator, emphasized the importance of platforming talks that raise awareness for advocacy in Palestine in an interview with The Tribune.
“Our role is to give platforms to educators, and collaborate with many causes for the colonial perspectives,” Bistrom said. “When you’re looking at a place that is in the media, mainly through this horrific process of victimization, you’re not able to really pay attention to the experiences of people and how they understand themselves.”
One of the event organizers, Yasmine Mkaddam, U2 Arts, highlighted how the talk exemplified Spring into Action’s goal of spreading awareness through education. The high attendance showed the importance McGill students place on student activism.
“Social media holds such a big space in decolonization and awareness, but I think that for true advocacy, we need to protest, educate, and advocate,” Mkaddam said. “It goes beyond simply a post.”
Al-Saji continued the talk by explaining how the Israeli government creates Ashla’a—meaning dismembered body parts—every day in Palestine. She described how strategic bombings or hellfires are routinely used to debilitate citizens in Gaza, especially those who show active resistance. Dismemberment is not a side effect of these targeted strikes, but the intended effect, Al-Saji argued.
“It matters how one dies dismembered under the rubble, how amputation takes place without anesthesia, and what care is available to the disabled body thereafter,” Al-Saji said. “The prognosis of maiming is no longer disability, but debilitating pain and slow death through infection and sepsis when the healthcare system has been shut down.”
Al-Saji noted that few news sources cover the aftermath of severe bombings and attacks beyond the body count. For Al-Saji, this lack of care shown to those grieving speaks to the dehumanization of Palestinians. In one such case on Aug. 10, 2024, Israel dropped 39 U.S.-made bombs on the al-Tabin school in the Daraj district in Gaza, which Israel justified by claiming it to be one of Hamas’ headquarters. This theory was proven false after the attack, at which point over 100 civilians, who had been using the school as a shelter after being displaced by Israel, were killed. Paramedics were unable to discern whom the dismembered body parts belonged to, and allotted bags of dismembered remains by weight for burial.
Al-Saji stressed that following Israel’s violation of the ceasefire on March 18, McGill students ought to stay up to date on Palestinians’ acts of resistance.
“Since Tuesday, the genocide has not so much resumed as intensified,” Al-Saji said. “And while the past hurts, histories of the present are excruciating.”
