Kevin Foster

Lately, I have been feeling so frustrated. When the talk turns to the terrible suffering in Gaza, I hear the same thing again and again.

“It’s very complicated,” people say.

This phrase is often followed by a shrug, or a suggestion that we should not have strong feelings about it. The message is clear: you cannot understand this, so you should be quiet.

But I think this is wrong. And here is why.

Yes, the history is deep. But what is happening right now is not complicated. It is simple.

We must remember a key fact. For decades, Israel has controlled Gaza’s borders, its airspace, and its supplies of food, water, and electricity. Under international law, when a power has this level of control, it has a duty to protect the people living there. Israel has not protected them. It has oppressed them.

Then, on October 7th, Hamas committed a horrific act. Many people now frame everything that has happened since as simply a response to that day. But this misses the point. The attack by Hamas did not happen in a vacuum. It was a brutal act of resistance from a people who have been trapped in an open air prison for 16 years, under a brutal siege for decades. This does not excuse the killing of civilians, but we cannot ignore the context of a desperate population fighting their oppressor.

Calling this “complicated” is a way to avoid these truths. It lets people off the hook. It makes them feel it is okay to look away.

For those of us in countries like the UK, it is a privilege to call this “complicated”. It is a privilege to be able to avoid horrific reports because it is upsetting. For the people in Gaza, there is no switch.

We are not asking everyone to be a historian. We are asking everyone to be human. We are asking you to see a clear injustice and call it by its name.

Do not let “it’s complicated” silence your conscience. Some things are simple. Right now, humanity is one of them.