Settler Colonialism and Mortal Dangers: Affective Responses to COVID-19 and the 2021 Israeli Bombings among Young Palestinians in Gaza

Abstract

The article examines the affective dynamics of collective survival and resistance under Israeli settler colonialism in the Gaza Strip. Focusing on Gaza as an under-researched enclave of Israeli settler colonialism, it analyzes how young Palestinians renegotiated their affective bonds in response to two coinciding deadly events: the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2021 Israeli bombings. Theoretically, we extend the politics of emotions and affect to encompass experiences of settler-colonial violence. Drawing on original interviews with Palestinians in Gaza, we trace how affective bonds were impacted among families, friends, and neighbors and, from a transpersonal perspective, across the political community. We show how settler colonialism shaped responses to the pandemic, deepening existing inequalities and causing social frictions. The bombings, by contrast, triggered a unified response of pure terror and universal concern for collective survival. The military targeting of homes was countered by practices of physical and emotional togetherness in the face of death. Overall, our study shows how (i) different kinds of mortal dangers are experienced politically by colonized people, (ii) these experiences are conditioned by collective histories of colonial violence, and that (iii) they constitute expressions of collective affective life, necessary for the preservation of peoplehood amidst colonial oppression.