Bilal is not playing the media’s game; he knows that the emperor isn’t wearing any clothes
By Rogel Alpher • Translated by Sol Salbe
The Bedouin live on the margins of Israeli society. In unrecognised villages, such as Birkat al-Batel near Rahat, where the al-Ziyadna family lives, four of whose members were abducted on October 7. The teenagers, Aisha and Bilal, were returned in a prisoner exchange. The older brother Hamzah and the father Yousef were left behind. Alive. But now the father is dead, and the son is apparently also deceased. Because the lives of the abductees are not important in Israel. And at any rate the Bedouin are excluded from the Israeli mainstream.
Their Ra’am/United Arab Party Knesset representatives are considered by the Jewish majority to be jihadists who support terror and Hamas [The party formed part of the Lapid/Bennett coalition -tr]. Their media image is that of violent gangs that scoff at Jewish “governance” in the Negev/Naqab and terrorise the Jews there. A real existential threat. They don’t have any television presence: neither in in the news programs, nor even in reality shows. Absolute outsiders. They are not playing the Israeli media’s game of war. They don’t participate in the television rituals. They do not buy into the codes according to which the television ceremonies are carried out. Those that are meant to be taken seriously and said to be providing real assistance for the return of the abductees. Those rituals are not only meant to hasten the abductees release and may even improve their feelings while they are in captivity.
Outsiders can sometimes reveal big truths just by being out of the game. And so did Bilal al-Ziyadna, when he was asked to follow protocol and automatically participate in the main televised ritual when it comes to the abductees’ relatives — an emotional appeal by the family member to the abductee themselves, as if they were listening. Following the announcement of Yousef’s death, an excerpt from an item prepared in advance a few months ago by Kan 11’s commentator on the [Palestinian] Arab community in Israel, Eran Singer, in which he visited Birkat al-Batel and met with the al- Ziyadna family. Bilal doesn’t speak Hebrew. The language barrier significantly sharpens his outsiderism.
“If Yousef and Hamza could hear him,” Singer asked a relative to translate, “what would he want to tell them?” Bilal reacted with shock. It was clear that the request seemed moronic to him, as it was completely detached from reality. “How could they hear me”? He was astonished, his hands in his pockets. Bilal doesn’t play the game. “Let’s say that they could hear you,” they urged him. His answer was immediate, emphatic and somewhat dismissive: “They won’t hear me.” In other words, cut the bullshit. Is this a news program or wishful thinking? Recognise reality.
It’s the little boy who shouts that the emperor isn’t wearing any clothes, of course. And the naked king is Jewish society in Israel as a whole that plays the “what if” pretend game. Just as the king had pretend clothes, we pretend that the abductees could hear their relatives on television. Family members are being exploited. The real purpose of the rituals is to soothe the conscience of the public, not to help the abductees. And indeed, it doesn’t help them. It doesn’t help those whose relatives are screeching in the streets, at the Knesset and on television. And it doesn’t help those whose relatives are silent, such as Yousef’s brother Yunus, who explained that the Jews are “stronger than me. I can’t do what they do. This is a state matter. I can’t.” At least he doesn’t fool himself.
