I rarely contribute to lectures. I find it a valiant yet unnerving task to willingly summon the attention of two hundred pairs of eyes as you voice your concerns about the faltering education system or the hidden connotations of a Shakespearean metaphor. But there in that hot and fateful lecture theatre deep in the belly of John Woolley Building, I felt my hand shoot up at the question raised by my Linguistics lecturer: “What is the significance of the 21st of February?”
To me, that date represents a few things at once. It’s the day my parents took me to the Liberation War Museum in Dhaka, where I was in awe of a bullet-holed blazer belonging to a Bengali Language Movement martyr. It’s the day that I bought too many books at a Bangla book fair in Ashfield commemorating International Mother Language Day. It’s also the day that I contributed to a lecture to proclaim my heritage as a proud Bangladeshi woman.
The feelings of national pride I hold, however, are deeply confusing. For one, the myopic international status that the Bangladeshi Liberation War of 1971 has as a largely ‘forgotten genocide’ makes it difficult to bring up, and difficult for people to empathise. To this day, the war Bangladesh fought for its sovereignty is diluted into the ‘Indo-Pak War’, and the Bengali people’s struggle for autonomy and independence is considered a product of India’s conspiracy to fracture Pakistan and limit its geopolitical powers in the subcontinent. What results is an oversimplification of a painful history – one that leans towards complete non-narration of Bangladesh’s contribution to its own existence. The real victims of the War and their stories are undermined and delegitimised, genocide is denied, and human loss and trauma become simply collateral damage.
It seems fair then, for me to take every opportunity to speak about the War with others. My national pride drives it, as does my convenient position as a teacher and History student. But underlying all of this is a dizzying intergenerational guilt – a feeling that being of a generation with no lived experience of war, am I well-positioned to speak about it as if it is an integral part of my identity? I justify my passions with my grandparents’ accounts of war, using their trauma to inspire stories I write for creative writing units at university. How else do I inform others of a largely undiscussed and untold history?
I recognise that being so far detached from the threat of real violence and cultural erasure, I have the privilege to pick up and leave off my national pride whenever I choose. At the same time, I recognise that so many others in our current world cannot.
Palestinians cannot. Gazans cannot.
During the decades long carousel of oppression and resistance in Gaza and the West Bank, there has been one unwavering constant – Palestinian national pride. While the majority of the Western world basks in a dogged ignorance of Palestinian pain and suffering, Palestinians around the world don their keffiyehs, march in freedom rallies, show up to public forums, educate, share, and inform. Their indefatigable spirit is admirable, and their national pride is enviable.
Yet, Palestinians are denied the privilege of choosing when to represent their nation. It falls on each individual as a kind of perpetual responsibility, a crippling expectation that to be a ‘good Palestinian’ is to be outspoken about violence, to give voice to trauma, and challenge bulwarks of misinformation in an attempt to protect their nation from erasure. At the same time, Palestinians are tasked with propagating positive images of their nation to the rest of the world so that the terms ‘genocide’, ‘starvation’, and ‘suffering’ don’t become synonymous with their national consciousness.
Many Bengalis can empathise with this pressure. As a small nation with little international recognition outside of ‘Made in Bangladesh’ clothing tags, images of poverty, and an erratic national cricket team, we feel a continual need to keep redefining who we are. Perhaps this stems from wartime sentiment; a desire to highlight that we were once the victims who emerged as victors in a largely one-sided war. Our national pride gives us the momentum to reclaim our heritage, just as our forefathers did when the nation’s very existence was threatened. And perhaps this is also why Bengalis feel so strongly for Palestinians. When Bangladesh gained its liberation, advocacy for Palestine became part of its official foreign policy. Israel was one of the first nations to recognise Bangladeshi sovereignty in 1972, but the Bangladeshi government rejected this, in turn declining any diplomatic relation with Israel. To this day, Bangladesh is one of the 28 UN member states that does not recognise the state of Israel. In his article ‘For Bangladesh, Recognizing Israel Is an Immoral Choice’, journalist Nazmul Ahasan justifies this hostility:
“There may be pragmatic reasons for Bangladesh to consider ties with Israel. But having fought our own liberation war against a cruel occupier, we cling to one overriding moral imperative: Palestinian freedom”.
This week begins with March 26 — Independence Day of Bangladesh. It marks 52 years since the war against dispossession began and ended. I will remember this day with solemnity, reverence, and a bubbling sense of national pride. I will raise my hand to share what I know with others. And I will make sure that I mention Palestine, Gaza, the river, and the sea in the process.