Gaza’s Illusory Jubilation and Trump’s ‘Legendary’ Joy

By Hassan Asfour

Finally, after 732 days since the start of a comprehensive, genocidal war unlike any in modern history, the city of Sharm el-Sheikh emitted the “white smoke of an agreement” to stop it — a very brief announcement that carried no details but bore the long-awaited and most important headline for all humanity, and for those who paid a price no one else paid for them: the people of the Gaza Strip.

The joy of the people of the Gaza Strip — and, by extension, the people of Palestine — at the white smoke from Sharm el-Sheikh is enough to convey a message that contains all the meanings missing for some who were drowned in illusions whose cost was destruction, ruin and an uncertain future. It is a joy that speaks in every language amid the wreckage and loss of everything that once was reality and dream — a joy unique to its people, whoever we are and whoever rejoices with them.

The joy of Gaza’s people at the white smoke from Sharm el-Sheikh, which signals a halt to the killing and the madness, declares that what was will not return. The 732-day journey of death will not simply be swept away by the wind, but the strength to survive and the defeat of death is a moment that will not be lost without accounting for those who led the conspiracy of great destruction.

The joy of Gaza’s people at the white smoke from Sharm el-Sheikh is not merely a dance to stop death but a dance for a coming life, whatever its contours. It is the choice that was long awaited, delayed amid the petty calculations of the small and estranged from its people, its land and its inhabitants.

The joy of Gaza’s people at the white smoke from Sharm el-Sheikh may be a sign of a non‑political victory, a mark recorded for them alone. Victory is always a political act, not political coercion, yet Gaza and its people have altered the concepts of victory and triumph.

The joy of Gaza’s people at the white smoke from Sharm el-Sheikh, rising above the rubble of all they once had and from amid their remains, is a message to write history in a different language than the one used before the great conspiracy of October 7 — in description, behavior and stance, in scenes of searching for a scrap of bread and some water before seeking a private corner away from predatory eyes that no longer see what other eyes see.

The joy of Gaza’s people at the white smoke from Sharm el-Sheikh, at the halt of a massacre that struck every facet of life — a slaughter with a price like no other and losses without parallel — is an equation also without precedent.

The joy of Gaza’s people at the white smoke from Sharm el-Sheikh calls for restraint from sinking into an examination of who caused the collapse of our national fabric and the pursuit of those responsible — those days will come later.

The joy of Gaza’s people at the white smoke from Sharm el-Sheikh echoes Nizar Qabbani’s masterpiece “The Fortune‑Teller” — that they never read a cup like hers, nor knew a sorrow like hers — yet their choice is life.

The joy of Gaza’s people at the white smoke from Sharm el-Sheikh reached Washington, where the President of the United States experienced a unique bout of “hysteria” — a legendary celebration not for stopping the deaths of Gaza’s people, since he was complicit, but a strange self‑obsession in search of awards that will not knock on the White House door.

The joy of Gaza’s people at the white smoke from Sharm el-Sheikh will not erase the dark stain on the White House, despite all the attempts by its president to present something other than the evident plan of individual subjugation.

The joy of Gaza’s people at the white smoke from Sharm el-Sheikh urges us not to drown in analysis and reading of what was a price paid for actions outside the national act — its time for reckoning will not be long, for individuals, groups and a black alliance.

Peace be upon you, Gaza — peace to those who went beneath your earth without choosing the time of their departure; peace to those on your land waiting at a freedom’s door long overdue; peace, Gaza, to your promised future though its shape is not yet known; peace to you so long as you remain what you have always been: Gaza.