Review by Frank Plowright
Mazen Kerbaj is a Lebanese artist and musician based in Berlin. Shortly after the Israeli invasion of Gaza in 2023 people there began sending him photographs and videos of what was happening, which struck a chord as he’d previously published Beirut Won’t Cry about the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 2006. Both invasions were in response to terrorist attacks, yet in Lebanon then and a Gaza conflict continuing as of writing, the Israeli reaction is totally disproportionate and places no value on the lives of ordinary people. Every bombing killing a dozen civilians is excused by the Israeli state on the basis a terrorist was targeted. Would Israel bomb an entire Tel Aviv apartment block if they suspected a Hamas terrorist lurked within? It’s horrific, yet the world won’t listen.
Kerbaj began drawing a daily cartoon in response to the messages and pictures he saw. In a world where any criticism of Israel raises accusations of anti-Semitism, Kerbaj’s honesty is going to be controversial, and his simple cartoon messages, often in the form of graphic questions or statements, are deliberately provocative. The drawing is crude and passionate, and also sharp and to the point, every single page a poster. That is apart from the page where Kerbaj supplies a dozen panels each filled with writing about horrific incidents he’s not yet had the time draw, or later lists along the same lines. One thing’s for sure, he’s not short of atrocities to chronicle.
Every time Kerbaj hits his target, even with pages where he writes of the difficulty of what he’s doing, knowing it’s infinitely worse for those experiencing what he draws. Even putting the mass killings to one side, some items are beyond belief, such as Israelis writing messages on bombs due to be dropped on Gaza.
On one occasion Kerbaj passes on a story about Israeli troops leaving behind bombs disguised as canned food now discredited by fact-checking sites. This shouldn’t detract from him being right about everything else.
Gaza in My Phone isn’t comfort reading, but an impassioned howl to a world refusing to see the truth. History will prove him right, but by then it will be too late.
