Welcome to Intifada 3

This image appeared in MSNBC’s “Week in Pictures” last Friday. Capturing a clash with Israeli forces near a Jewish settlement near Ramallah, you can see the caption below.

First, what’s informative about photo #25 out of 55, though no surprise, is how relatively little attention the eruption in Israel/Palestine is receiving in the US.

What’s also bluntly fatalistic about the photo is how it captures the Palestinian fighters in repose. That the rest amidst the coal-colored landscape and the burning tire, literally scorched earth (not to mention “the pillow”) is that matter-of-fact speaks to next-to-nothing to lose.

And, it’s also a little unnerving that you can’t see this fellow’s legs.

But, what this smart and surprisingly informative war photo is really about are the rocks. In a presentation that is ultimately about plenty (welcome to Intifada 3!), what it largely depicts is the Palestinian youth’s unlimited access to munitions.

(photo: Mohamad Torokman/Reuters. caption: A Palestinian rests during clashes with the Israeli army near the Jewish settlement of Bet El, near the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah, Oct. 5, 2015. A Palestinian teenager was killed on Monday in a clash with Israeli soldiers near the West Bank town of Bethlehem, a Palestinian hospital source said. Violence in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Jerusalem has intensified in the past few weeks and the teenager’s reported death was the latest in a series of incidents that has raised fears of wider escalation.)