Dutch actor Ramsey Nasr goes viral with plea to see Palestinians as people, not numbers
Dutch actor Ramsey Nasr has gone viral with a plea for the Palestinian people on NPO 1 talk show Khalid & Sophie on Wednesday. His plea to at least recognize the residents of Gaza as people, not just numbers, has been viewed millions of times on various platforms.
Since the violence between Hamas and Israel flared up again nearly two weeks ago, all the media have reported the names of the hundreds of Israeli and European victims and hostages. And rightly so, said Nasr - son of a Dutch woman and Palestinian man. But the many thousands of Palestinian victims are only ever numbers. “48 dead, 12,000 injured. No names, but numbers. And that indicates how we distribute our compassion.”
“Because Palestinians are also burned alive,” Nasr said. “Palestinian children are being tortured, imprisoned for years without charge or help. And that’s happened generation after generation for more than 75 years.” The world may see Palestinians as numbers, but to Nasr, they’re family. “Will it never end? This, to me, very obvious system of apartheid and ethnic cleansing.”
“Prime Minister Rutte said after the Hamas attacks, ‘It is not so frequent that we see very ordinary people targeted in this conflict.’ Apparently, he does not think of Palestinians as being ‘very ordinary people.’ But they are there. We exist.”
“There’s something wrong with humanity. Our own, and that of everyone who watches and doesn’t intervene,” Nasr said. He expressed the hope “that someone will write down the names of the hundreds of thousands of Palestinian refugees, dead and wounded, and then, night after night, will interview their relatives on national TV. That amounts to countless TV broadcasts. That would be absurd but fair.”
