The Urbicide of Gaza

 

"If you look at images of Gaza now, instead of cities where thousands of people lived, all you’ll see is rubble. The remnants of homes and apartment buildings lie strewn about, mangled beyond recognition. Shops, hospitals, schools, universities, religious buildings, whether ancient or new (it makes little difference now)—all have been reduced to unsalvageable heaps of rock and steel, some bombed beyond recognition, legible now only in the memories of those who knew them. There is a word for when buildings and cities are destroyed as part of a campaign of ethnic cleansing: “urbicide.” It is a tactic used to make sure there is nothing left to return to, nothing that can be cherished or latched on to. Its goal is a total colonization of the landscape that erases whatever used to be."

read article by Kate Wagner