My Left Hip Hip a Hop

From 2021-2025, I’ve been a student of distance learning at Hull University. As my health faltered (mobility, chronic illness, fibromyalgia and ME) and brought me into an early medical retirement at the grand age of 46, I knew that my sanity would only be saved if at least my brain could be busy. My teenagers were 15 and 17 and were becoming independent young men- we had our routines as living in a shared student house, shared chores, shared cooking, and evening catch-ups to throw in any extras as required. My boys grew up with their ill single mum always needing help and both developed caring roles as second nature, thinking nothing of putting on a washload or cooking a meal – they love it now; both at uni and unfazed by student life and the practical demands of staying clean, fed and watered.

With the early outlines of a novel filling a dusty notebook, I embarked upon a two year Masters degree in Creative Writing and spent the first year building characters, landscapes, writing short stories, and each week my routine included writing exercises for homework then lectures every week – online zoom style – with about thirty other writers and developing novelists.

For my birthday, my mum bought me the most beautiful Edwardian writing bureau for my spare room where I would take time each day to write and the routine in time afforded me structure and self-belief. I was reading and analysing texts, studying the writing styles of authors I admired and was learning of anew.

My second year stretched three years after my left hip started giving me real jip and while I waited on a two year list (the average at that time) I was given stronger painkillers which made me sick and dizzy and confined me to the house and then in time to my bed. Therefore I had to take ten months out of my MA which soon became two years. In this time, I tried to stumble through the next module extending all my hand-in dates until we decided mutually to take a breath, then start again after the necessary hip replacement came in November 2023. Hull University were a huge support at that time and reassurance came aplenty. I was scared that if I stopped my degree, I’d never return to it, but we made a plan to speak again the following year when I started to improve.

The hip replacement brought with it cold turkey as my morphine meds were reduced, but after six days I could go home as my blood pressure started to behave itself. Learning to walk, shower, sit, stand, balance was my primary aim and filled the next six months. I started back up in May 2024. I felt I’d forgotten everything I’d learned, but I came back in slowly and seemed to pick up after about six weeks. Building my novel again through assignments and research, I was able to work from bed. My recovery was much slower due to previous surgeries and skeletal damage over the years but with my MA to distract me, I was saved once more by the support of my family, my physios and a side car of creativity. 

Working with exceptional tutors online, I learned quickly that professionals were always there to ease the load and talk me round when my courage failed me; teachers, support staff and HR all contributed in some way.

My health is still unpredictable, but that’s why an online MA suited me; attending lectures and tutorials in real time or catch ups if my health got in the way.

This week I graduated, choosing to watch online as my health wasn’t up to the travelling on the day, my family enjoyed a celebratory indoor picnic due to an unexpected downpour and we toasted with glasses of (non-alcoholic for me) fizzy dressed up with strawberries Such a treat!

I have an MA in Creative Writing, a draft of a novel and a new left hip to show for my last four years. I’ve met some great people and know I’ll be writing and studying my whole life long as this fulfills a deep passion for learning and growing.

 

 

A Potted History of Israel in Palestine

 

Jaffa Gate in Jerusalem’s Old City, toward the end of the Ottoman Empire’s control over Palestine.

Palestine was once a place where people lived alongside their Jewish, Christian and Muslim neighbours peacefully. Palestinians welcomed refugees, those needing refuge, and was proud of its people, its traditions and its humanity. Holy buildings, schools, hospitals, markets; they all existed alongside each other and served the communities there. 

 In 1917 the British government announced its support for the establishment of a national home for Jewish people in Palestine. Palestine was then the Ottoman region with a small minority Jewish population. This was called the Balfour declaration and was financed by high profile Zionists at the time including British company, Marks & Spencer. 

The Balfour Declaration: [letter from] Arthur Balfour, Walter Rothschild, Leo Amery, Lord Alfred Milner. 1917

Between 1896 -1948, Jews came to the area now known as British-controlled Palestine, already home to majority Muslims, with minorities Christians and Jews. Over time, as a result of the atrocities faced by many people in World War Two, when over six million Jews were murdered, Zionism grew in popularity as a political organisation and taught the notion that in order to be safe, Jewish people needed a purely Jewish state, and quoted from the Jewish holy book, the Torah (aka the Christian Old Testament of the Bible, much of which is also in the Islamic holy book, the Qu’ran) referring to Jerusalem and the area around it as the Holy Land.

This form of Jewish nationalism, in the name of Zionism shaped Palestine into the two ‘states’ of Israel and Palestine.

 

In 1947, the United Nations intervened and voted to split the land into two states. 

Israel have subjected Palestine to increasing levels of apartheid ever since. 

Zionism is the ethno cultural nationalist movement that emerged in late 19th century Europe to establish and maintain a Jewish homeland through the colonisation of Palestine. In Judaism, this region corresponds with the land of Israel and essential to Jewish history Zionists wanted to create a Jewish state in Palestine with as much land, as many Jews and as few Palestinian Arabs as possible. 

The word earlier ALIYAH means assent and refers to the immigration of Jews to this geographical land of Israel or the Palestine region which today chiefly represented by the state of Israel.This was described as the act of going up to the Holy Land of Jerusalem. Moving to the land of Israel became one of the most basic tenets of Zionism.

            Aliyah became one of the basic tenets of Zionism

Through ‘the law of return’ that was passed by the Israeli parliament in 1950, all diaspora Jews as well as their children and grandchildren have the right to relocate to Israel and require Israeli citizenship and maintain their Jewish identity. Since the Israeli Declaration of Independence in 1948, more than 3,000,000 Jews have made ALIYAH. As of 2014, Israel and the Israeli occupied territories contain approximately 42.9% of the world's Jewish population.

          From 1948, the ethnic cleansing of Palestines began.

Zionists used the term ‘transfer’ to describe the removal, or in fact the ethnic cleansing, of the Palestinian population.

The ‘Transfer’ was not only seen as desirable but as the ideal solution by some Zionist leaders. This was not always the case across the growing state of Israel. Yet the genocide of Jews had frightened many in to thinking their safety relied upon the genocide of yet another ethnic group. Zionism thrived on fear and suspicion and destroyed a community that until 1948 had lived side by side in relative harmony.

 

References
The Zionist, the Zealot and the Emergence of Israel
Geoffrey Lewis 2009 (Bloomsbury)

The Balfour Declaration: letter from Arthur Balfour, Walter Rothschild, Leo Amery, Lord Alfred Milner.

My Father tried to hide the NAKBA. But it found me

Seraj Addi  (Forward Magazine) 14.05.10 

 

My Bones Are Killing Me!

So this week’s entry is the result of my latest ME and chronic pain flare-up. I’m sure so many will identify with this feeling when you’re in so much pain you’re climbing the walls. 

I’ve been listening to the fabulous Kae Tempest after watching their Glastonbury set and felt very inspired. I used to be in a weekly experimental writing group called ‘Scribblers’ run online by the super-talented Kate Hull Rodgers as part of Stepping Stones Théâtre, a creative arts company supporting mental health. I never took part in the poetry sessions fully but I took her advice today and used words as a distraction. I even had fun!

My bones are killing me!

Lying on a bed of nails

My nerves jar hot and scream

Heat pads, codeine, Gabapentin, Morphine

Spotify on loud/repeat

Distracts temporarily

An unread novel

Distracts temporarily

A notebook, my writing

Distracts temporarily

Yes please: Another cup of tea

Distracts temporarily

Lying on a bed of nails

My nerves jar hot and scream

Heat pads, codeine, Gabapentin, Morphine

Wordle and a crossword 

Distracts temporarily

Stretches, my physio 

Distracts temporarily

Up on tiptoes, left leg, right leg 

Distracts temporarily

And another cup of tea

Distracts temporarily

Lying on a bed of nails

My nerves jar hot and scream

Heat pads, codeine, Gabapentin, Morphine

Talk or text with friends online

Distracts temporarily

My kids come up and talk with me

Distracts temporarily

Another show of numb TV 

Distracts temporarily

And another cup of tea

Distracts temporarily

Lying on a bed of nails

My nerves jar hot and scream

Heat pads, codeine, Gabapentin, Morphine

Firm letter to my MP

Distracts temporarily

Watch news on social media

Distracts temporarily

Support our friends we’ve never met

Distracts temporarily

Share far and wide their world’s on fire

Distracts temporarily

Lying on a bed of nails

My nerves jar hot and scream

Heat pads, codeine, Gabapentin, Morphine

Family’s warm, dry, housed and fed

Distracts temporarily

Propped up soft pillows by my head

Distracts temporarily

Write a poem like my tutor said

Distracts temporarily

Count my blessings, meditate

The drugs will work eventually

Lying on a bed of nails

My nerves numb and serene

Heat pads, codeine, Gabapentin, Morphine

Day 625 of Israel’s Genocide of Gaza

 Today is Day 625 of Israel’s genocide of Gaza. I feel like I’ve been holding my breath ever since that day back on October 7^th 2023 when Israel upped its apartheid on the people of Palestine and began their genocide in earnest. I’d been familiar with the apartheid there but knew a very simple view of the political situation.

Earlier that day, Hamas had killed over 1100 Israelis at a music festival. What wasn’t broadcast initially was that this was a retaliation after recent murders of Palestinians by the Israeli Defence Federation (IDF) as part of their continuing seventy five years of apartheid against Palestinians. The Nova music festival was being held on desert land outside the Palestinian concentration camp that the Gaza Strip had now become that Israel claimed was Southern Israel. The IDF retaliated and it seemed as thought there had started a war. And at this point, news broke into the mainstream and we could not we would not look away. As Israel is illegally occupying most of  Palestine this was merely the occupied fighting the oppressor. These were not the optics the Israeli government wanted. 

 We are learning that the USA and Israel are closely alligned and millions of dollars goes into feeding the media machine each year. Just look at The New York Times reports in comparison to The Guardian in the UK. There seem to be heavy restrictions on the way journalists are allowed to report. Many people no longer watch mainstream news unable to stomach the pro-Israeli tightrope walk that goes on in the UK. But many other countries find this too.

 

Like so many, I began watching journalist accounts on Instagram from Palestine; such as award winning journalist, Bisan Owda, 

 https://www.instagram.com/wizard_bisan1 

to ensure honest updates of the continuing genocide in Gaza. Her reports are dependant on Israeli allowance of internet connection, her most recent posts in May 2025 told us that Israel are only letting a handful of aid trucks through to deliver food which is now being distributed in Aid Distribution points run by the IDF where people queue each day, are turned away, some are shot and maimed or worse, killed. Bisan tells us 'this is a drop in the ocean' that’s being let through compared to the desperate need of the starving population and illustrates again this planned starvation and genocide of the Palestinian people.

https://www.instagram.com/owenjonesjourno?igsh=MWN4MThlaDRya3Q5Mg==

Certain journalists we’ve come to rely on such as Owen Jones are also shouting out the truth (into a void it must seem at times) on social media and with The Guardian. Owen Jones examines media reports and shares those that show Israeli bias and not impartial reporting. His interviews and guest appearances are the wake up call anyone needs who is not already angry and sick at the reality the West needs to wake up to.

 

Back in November 2023, our very own Sheffield City Council was the first in the UK to vote for a ceasefire in Gaza. While it was lauded as a bold act of solidarity at the time, the uncomfortable truth was that Sheffield was and remains home to arms manufacturers complicit with the international weapons trade. Sheffield folk have been protesting against this for years. But it is only recently that this information has been placed in the public domain. Protests against them continue. BAE Systems are directly implicated.

 

In February 2024, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) declared Israel’s occupation of Palestine ILLEGAL and that Israel were committing apartheid in their claims on Palestine and the treatment of Palestinians and had been doing for the past seventy-five years. Their occupation is illegal and has been for seventy-five years.

 

Israel has ignored every directive from ICJ then and since, increasingly occupying Palestinian land to increase the land given to them in 1947. (My post on the history will follow).

 

Francesca Albanese is an Italian expert on human rights and a legal scholar. She was appointed United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur in the Occupied Palestinian Territories on 1st May 2022 and is the first woman to hold this position. This was renewed for another three year term on 1st May 2025. 

Israel's actions in Gaza, according to a report by the European Union's Domestic Corps, may have violated the terms of the EU-Israel Association Agreement. This is still under investigation. If this is proved to be true, the agreement will be null and void, and could include full suspension of trade between the EU and Israel or freezing Israel’s participation in EU programmes.

 

On May 1^st 2025, World Health Organisation (WHO) Head of the Health Emergencies Programme declared this as the ‘Gaza abomination’, stating that WHO are now complicit in the starvation of the people of Gaza as they have not been able to stop the Israeli blockade of food aid into Gaza. Palestinians are now starving to death due to this military blockade. Flotillas and marches to Gaza which attempted to open a humanitarian corridor for the trucks to be permitted access have been consistently blocked by Israel and Egypt.

 

There are protests across the world every day. There are boycotts of stores, restaurants and supermarkets with links to Israel, the boycotting of goods in supermarkets that are from Israel, we ring up and ask supermarkets not to sell Israeli goods. We march through the world’s city streets, we display Palestinian flags and we wear Palestinian colours. We send what we can to Palestinian families, Medical Aid to Palestine (MAP) and the great number of charities supporting the Palestinian people. Palestine is at the forefront of so many people’s minds. But the UK are still so complicit. 

The BBC has consistently broadcast biased pro-Israel coverage. Our government sells arms to Israel and even trains the IDF soldiers. It’s sickening. We even have a situation at the moment where a group called Palestine Action who organise marches and events to show support of Palestine is now being discussed in government as if they should be called a terrorist group! Kim Johnson MP was opposing the potential proscription of Palestine Action in parliament yesterday (24.06.24) stating that of course, no, they are not a national threat. They daubed paint on a couple of fighter jets which is criminal damage but not an act of terrorism.

 

Roger Waters explained it perfectly:

 

“There is the oppressed, and the oppressor; the oppressed are the Indigenous people of Palestine, the oppressor [is] the settler Colonial visitors from North America and Northern Europe. The oppressors are murdering all the oppressed people so they can steal their furniture, and their houses, and their olive trees, and their hills, and their water, and their land, and their birthright."

 

And today 25th of June 2025, the United Nations warns that the children of Gaza may begin to die of thirst amid Israel’s 100 day fuel blockade. This is insanity. 

 

To date:

Over 62,000 people have been murdered including 16,000 children one in five children.

We will now be looking at a death toll in the region of 300,000 taking into account the bodies of men, women and children still under the rubble, and of those injured and mutilated who will never recover, become ill and die through infection and lack of food, water and medical care. 

 

Israel cannot continue alluding to killing members of Hamas hiding in civilian areas. Civilians are never legitimate targets. Israeli genocide is happening right now, livestreamed killing, torturing starving, bombing, shooting. However Israel does it, by whichever means, it's genocide. 

 

"We know too well that our freedom is incomplete 

without the freedom of the Palestinians." 

Nelson Mandela  

International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, 

Pretoria, South Africa; 4th December 1997.

 

 So what can we do? We are chipping away and while sometimes it feels desperate, keep going. Palestine needs your love, support -financial and written, and we must bear witness to the atrocities that continue every hour and every day. For example, I do what I'm able to do: I have been writing letters, emailing MPs, signing petitions, writing more letters, wearing my keffiyeh on the back of my wheelchair, contributing to forums, discussions, sharing checked and verified information on social media. It’s not huge but all this tiny actions add up and apply pressure.

While my health keeps me from most of the street protests,  I hang a Palestinian flag outside my door to show solidarity with my Palestinian neighbours. It's proving to be quite the educational talking point for neighbours, window-cleaners and people delivering food (groceries) and parcels (usually books). Conversations are started as a result of seeing someone wearing a  keffiyeh (mine is on the back of my wheelchair)  and I sometimes share in those conversations. Be creative! Wearing a t-shirt or watermelon badge is just an easy way to tell each other we are fighting this together. Protests are the way forward and local groups in every town advertise weekly protests online.

All we can do each day is make sure that we do all we can to support  the people of Palestine and fight in our own tiny way against this continuing genocide. Palestine have been fighting this for 75 years. We can all do our bit.