Tal Niv : un ragazzo palestinese grida al cielo per la demolizione della sua casa

SINTESI PERSONALEQui è  ritratto  un ragazzo che grida al cielo.  La  devastazione e il ragazzo si fondono e diventano un tutt'uno  . Lui non  sarà in grado di ricomporre ciò che è stato perduto.  È molto giovane , troppo giovane .Forse i suoi genitori sapevano che la municipalità di Gerusalemme avrebbero demolito la loro casa quella mattina , gli hanno permesso di recarsi lo stesso a scuola e , al suo ritorno ,di vedere ciò che ha visto .Gli permettono di vedere che il suo letto non esiste più? Che i luoghi  dove  ha tenuto la foto del suo calciatore preferito  così come  il fossile  trovato  e la caramella  non esistono più? Come, esattamente si fa a capire la mancanza di una casa? La gente dopo tutto non può sopportare di perdere anche un solo piccolo oggetto di sua  proprietà.
Secondo il comune la casa del ragazzo è stata costruita senza permesso , come se fosse    facile per i palestinesi di Gerusalemme Est   ottenere permessi di costruzione. E 'stato detto che era  senza fondamenta  come se fosse impossibile ordinare il suo rafforzamento o offrire un permesso in cambio di un progetto di sicurezza. Che cosa può fare il ragazzo oltre che  piangere ?   Lo sguardo  di chi  guarda la foto passa    da un oggetto all'altro:  dalle  cornici al grande vassoio, dall'asciugamano    alla faccia di questo ragazzo con la testa arcuata all'indietro e la bocca spalancata.Ma in questa immagine notizia  il materasso rimane intero  e i tappeti sono arrotolati ordinatamente. Perché sono arrotolati? Quando sono stati arrotolati?  Accanto all'oggetto  che punta verso il cielo vi è una poltrona rossa e accanto ad essa, a destra, si trova una scala in legno piegata su una coperta rossa.Forse sarà  possibile collocare la scala altrove , così come salvare  gli effetti personali ammucchiati  delle 33 persone che vivevano in questa abitazione .  E' straziante guardare il ragazzo di Gerusalemme est  nella sua felpa a righe mentre accarezza la ruvida, griglia perforata  e mentre piange. Questo  ragazzo capisce profondamente e per sempre, nel modo più triste, l'essenza di dove si trova e l'essenza di un atto imperdonabile.

Snapshot: Home from (demolished) home

It is neither Isaac nor Samson nor Ashurbanipal who is seen in this AP picture; it is a Palestinian boy crying out to the heavens.

A Palestinian child cries amid the ruins of his house in Beit Hanina, which was demolished by the Jerusalem Municipality on February 5. Photo by Bernat Armangueת AP.

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Tal Niv

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East Jerusalem

One hand holds a construction rod that protrudes from a destroyed wall, the other clutches the wooden leg of an overturned piece of red furniture. Amid thickly woven textiles and curved table legs that thrust skyward, this boy binds himself to the ruins. Odd ruins they are, a pile of objects, among them a light brown towel, on the right on the low wall, which still hangs there, tied to a clothes dryer that is shut up like a clam. Embedded within this image, shot by AP photographer Bernat Armangue on February 5 in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina, is every representation of the bound Isaac: not so much tied up ahead of sacrifice as lying willingly in wait. And it also contains Samson, bringing down the pillars and going to his death with the Philistines; and “The Destroyed Room,” Jeff Wall’s important photograph from 1978, itself based on an agitated painting done in1827 by Delacroix, “The Death of Sardanapalus,” depicting the ruins of the palace at Nineveh and King Sardanapalus ‏(Ashurbanipal‏) observing the catastrophe.
But it’s neither Isaac nor Samson nor Ashurbanipal who is seen here; it is a boy crying out to the heavens. Here is the point at which the devastation and the boy merge and become one. It is the moment when he lies as in a hammock, connecting with and attached to the components of his house, which, when they stood in their proper places that morning, made a “home.” Now, dislodged from their natural places, they are fragments of memory, remains. This is the moment when it dawns on him that he will not be able to reassemble what has been lost. He grasps the possibility of entropy. He is very young − too young − and he is grief-stricken.
Possibly his parents knew that the Jerusalem Municipality would demolish their house that morning, after he went off to school, but nevertheless allowed him to see what he saw on his return. Should a parent whose home has been burned or destroyed by force of nature or, worse, by force of government, show or not show his child what happened to his home? Allow him to see that his bed no longer exists? That the places where he kept the card with the picture of his favorite soccer player and the fossil he found and the candy he hid, no longer exist? How, exactly, does one go about understanding the absence of a house? People, after all, can’t abide losing even one small item of their property. Think about losing your keys, having your phone taken from you. Think about having it all taken away.
According to the municipality, the boy’s home was built without permits − as though there is nothing easier for East Jerusalem Palestinians than to obtain building permits. It was said to be without foundations − as though it were impossible to order its reinforcement or offer a permit in return for a plan of safe construction. What can the boy do − but cry? A thick, gray square mattress lies below the mattress of gray sky above the ruins of the house in an open area of East Jerusalem. Some of the family’s possessions reman intact and the photograph − an extraordinarily effective news shot − leads the eye from one object to the next, from picture frames to the large round food tray next to the towel, and from the palace at Nineveh to Wall’s destroyed room, in which the mattress is ripped, slashed, split and gutted, and to the face of this boy, his head arched back and his mouth agape.
But in this news image − its composition and perspective so proportional and so unrelated to palaces − the mattress remains whole, vast and pristine, and the carpets are rolled up neatly. Why are they rolled up? When were they rolled up? One to the right of the large mattress; the other, a hollow cylinder above the boy’s head, under the overturned table. Next to the three-legged object that points to the sky is a red armchair, and next to it, to the right, lies a folded wooden ladder over a red blanket.
And precisely because it will perhaps be possible to place the ladder elsewhere, and precisely because the house was not gutted − rather, the belongings of the 33 people who lived in it were piled up − and precisely because it might be possible to salvage something, it is heartbreaking to look at the boy from East Jerusalem. For, in his striped sweatshirt and matching striped shoelaces, as he caresses the rough, perforated construction grating, and as he cries, this boy understands deeply and for all time, in the most melancholy way, the essence of where he is and the essence of an unforgivable act.

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