Anonymous graffiti artist Banksy has released a video showing new examples of his work in Gaza. This one depicts children on a swing around an Israeli watchtower.
Anonymous graffiti artist Banksy has released a video showing new examples of his work in Gaza. This one depicts children on a swing around an Israeli watchtower.
Well-known British graffiti artist Banksy has taken his distinctive work to the Gaza Strip, releasing a video of new creations painted in the coastal Palestinian territory.
The video begins with a view over the wing of a plane, and the phrases “Make this the year YOU discover a new destination” and “Welcome to Gaza.”
Shaky, hand-held footage then leads viewers through a series of tunnels and out onto the rubble-covered streets of Gaza.
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Israel and Hamas fought a 51-day war in Gaza last summer. More than 2,100 Palestinians and 70 Israelis were killed during the operation, and the United Nations estimates 96,000 homes were damaged or destroyed in Gaza.
In the video, a person in a grey hoodie spray-paints a stencil amid piles of rubble to reveal a version of Rodin’s famous “The Thinker” sculpture.
A prominent street artist and political activist, Banksy’s identity is unknown.
He has worked in Palestine before, painting images on Israel’s separation wall in the West Bank, and near a prominent checkpoint between Bethlehem and Jerusalem.
The Gaza video shows new examples of Banksy’s work: children on amusement park swings spinning around an Israeli watchtower and a cat wearing a pink bow.
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“This cat tells the whole world that she is missing joy in her life,” an elderly Palestinian man says to the camera. “The cat found something to play with. What about our children?”
According to a Gaza-based freelance journalist, who asked not to be named, locals said the graffiti had been created about three months ago.
“People aren’t really shocked with paintings being on walls, because graffiti is everywhere in Gaza,” the journalist said, adding that most Palestinians did not know who Banksy was.
The reporter said the cat graffiti was found in the northern town of Beit Hanoun, the Israeli tower was along the road to Erez crossing (between Gaza and southern Israel), and another was in Shujayea, a neighbourhood of eastern Gaza that was heavily bombed last summer.
“The cat, it’s drawn on a devastated house and the owner of the house saw him painting. (Banksy) told him that one day this painting would be really important.”
The video ends with graffiti — scrawled in red paint against a grey, concrete wall — that reads: “If we wash our hands of the conflict between the powerful and the powerless we side with the powerful — we don’t remain neutral.”
