Sip that perfect Italian coffee under its clear sky, soft breeze, and warm sun… just sip it and smile. Make sure everything is okay and your heart isn’t darker than your doppio ginseng on ice… make-believe, and smile.

By Hiba Kilany
It’s so peaceful here, I could almost puke, thinking of what’s happening across the sea… Forget! Forget that a cruel, foreign criminal invader is bombing your city, taking over lands, and stripping away dignity.

Sip that goddamn perfect Italian coffee.

Make believe you’re too far to care, too far to be hurt. You’re Italian now; you don’t care. Your family chose to stay, your friends decided to hang in there… You can’t be held responsible for not wanting to believe in a country that’s long been drowning in its mess and the Machiavellian plans of the world’s powerful.

Don’t overthink things, or rather, don’t think!
You cannot change things! You cannot tell the world that Hezbollah was born out of the pain of southern Lebanese who saw their lands being taken by greedy, evil neighbours to the south.

That militias like the Lebanese Forces and others emerged because of greedy, evil neighbours in the north!

You cannot think that maybe the Israelis’ "Hebrew" plan is to expand into its biblical lands, including the beloved south of Lebanon… and I’ve seen plenty of maps to confirm that.

Doesn’t their Talmud preach the need to reclaim every inch of their ancestors’ promised land? The lands of the lost tribes of Asher and Naftali? Lands from which they vanished, lands where Palestinians and Phoenicians have lived for centuries… Lands they have no right to claim by the force of ethnic cleansing.

The people living there now did not take these lands by force; they naturally grew there. And that is the big difference! You can’t claim it’s yours because of ancestral fairytales!

Don’t believe those ads about Jewish settlements in your lands… it’s all fake, all fake… repeat after me: fake! Fake! Fake like my smile, fake like my relaxed moves, sipping that disgustingly perfect coffee.

Life goes on, even for family and friends. When I asked my sister about the bombing, she said: “Yes, we hear the explosions and the non-stop whizzing of drones over our heads. I’ve come up with a smart way to sleep despite the noise: I convince myself it’s just thunderstorms… and I love winter!”

Yes, my people are like this. They want to live; they dare to live, smile, and work, and sleep… under tons and tons of hatred raining down over their heads, under tons and tons of lies and misinformation.

Suppose you would ask me, where do I stand in all this. I stand with Hezbollah. I stand with anyone resisting a plan to take over—perhaps our lands, but our dignity. And alas, with Nasrallah gone, I feel part of my dignity has been erased. Inside, I feel dead, helpless, hopeless, emptied, and drained. I feel betrayed by those who call themselves our partners, our allies. Betrayed by the entire human race.

I avoid Italian news: Meloni calls the Iranian response criminal. Yet the bombing of Beirut is legit. They call Hezbollah’s response terrorism, yet the genocide of most Middle Eastern people is self-defence. Israeli Prime Minister Satanyahu says Iran will be “punished” for its mistake! Punished! Who the hell are you? They replied to your attacks!

HYPOCRITS!
Inside, I curse myself for believing we can stand before the world with stones, courage, and resilience. We’ve had enough - we’ve had enough of all the pain pouring incessantly into our lives. Could someone please give us a break?

On the outside, I smile, a cheap, poor smirk that doesn’t reach my eyes.
On the outside, I drink my iced ginseng to soothe the burn inside…

Justice isn’t for this world. I hope somewhere in a parallel universe, the burn and pain will consume all those evil, wicked devils controlling today’s scenery. That is my only hope, my only prayer, down with that last sip, that last sunray of a dying summer, and a long winter already moving in, at giant steps.

Meanwhile, to that thought, I smile; I really do!