The Difference of 6,000 Miles

6,227 miles.

That is the distance between my home state of Kentucky and the Palestinian land in Gaza.

Over 6,000 miles provide me safety. Safety from bombings, massacres, torture, evictions, violations of human rights, and only God knows what else.

Over 6,000 miles provide me secure access to water, food, and electricity. They give me a warm bed. The security of my family.

The expectation that tomorrow will come.

6,000 miles ensure that I am not writing my last will on a social media post. That I am not saying goodbye to the world.

6,000 miles means I am not watching my entire ethnic group be methodically massacred- erased from the earth.

I'm not watching the world turn it's back on me.

I'm not hoping against hope that someone out there will see I existed, that I had a future, that I had things to say. That I was young. That I deserved to live.

6,000 miles means I don't have to beg to be seen or heard or remembered.

That I don't have to see my life burned and charred out-literally.

But 6,000 miles away, the story is different.

6,000 miles to the east, children are dying.

Houses are collapsing. Hospitals are being bombed. People-if they are "lucky" enough to live through the night-are being forced out of their homes, their homeland.

6,000 miles away children are waking up orphans. Parents, childless.

People are prepared to identify kids by scrawled names on their remains-a preparation for the end. A father carries his children’s remains in grocery bags - for what else could be possible do?

6,000 miles to the east, life is entirely different.

It's open season on civilians. Human rights are tossed out the window. Palestinians are compared to animals. Anything to validate their extermination.

6,000 miles East, genocide is occurring.

There is a comfort in 6,000 miles. A false sense of safety. A feeling of helplessness.

The idea that we are not complicit.

What is happening 6,000 miles away makes us sad, but it doesn't shove us in the center and demand action.

Instead, 6,000 miles lets us bury our heads in the sand.

But even 6,000 miles away is not too far to hear the call for help.

The screams of tortured mothers and fathers. The broken wails of children. The moans of agony.

6,000 miles away, there is a call for help rising to anyone who will listen.

Will we answer? And if we don't, how will we justify ourselves in the aftermath?

Here is some more information about helping those victim in Gaza and Palestine: