I'm like Phil Collins, I don't wanna dance

I've read a lot of comics recently. Comics are good. I am so smrt.

I suppose the most topical of all the comics I read was "Palestine" by Joe Sacco. Though it was written in the early 90's, the book illustrates the tension between the Israelis and Palestinians, as well as the tension between the different Palestinian factions that is still ongoing today. Only a week after finishing the book, Hamas took control of the Palestinian government over a oft criticized Fatah party. One of the folks that Sacco meets in the course of his travels even gets dirty leers from passersby when he reluctantly starts sporting the signature Fatah scarf.

Since Sacco spent the majority of his time in Palestinian towns and relocation camps, the book is very sympathetic to them. Chapter after chapter are filled stories of people going to jail, trying to find work, being harassed by Israeli troops, and lots more depressing stuff. It was especially hard for me to stomach one story where a man was held for weeks on end with no evidence against him. He would be taken to court periodically, where his lawyer would contend that the Israelis had no evidence against him, and the Israelis would counter by saying that they just needed more time to find it. In the meantime, instead of actually looking for evidence, they cruelly tried to torture it out of him. The sheer volume of horror stories that Sacco is bombarded with during his time in Palestine almost starts to become comical as the comic goes on.

It's said that history is written by the winners. America's revolution against Britain was successful, therefore it was a noble war that helped establish a wonderful nation, instead of an illegal secession from a sovereign nation. Unfortunately, Palestine's struggle hasn't resulted in anything resembling independence, so the occasional act of patriotic resistance is instead called terrorism. I feel very sympathetic for the Palestinians plight after reading "Palestine", but I'm incredibly wary of Hamas at the same time. However, Israel has done tons of horrible things to provoke Hamas. I think that I'd end up hating everyone involved, on all sides, were I to read up on the issue more in depth.

Sacco's narrative reads a lot like a Cometbus story, if you were to replace a back alley in Berkeley with a muddy Palestinian street. Pages filled with winding text are parsed side by side with Sacco's realistic yet exaggerated artwork. His drawings capture wonderfully the emotions and individuality of the people he has encountered. Were he to take a more grotesque approach to his artwork, it would look something like R. Crumb's stuff.

Sacco has also written several books about his time spent in the land formerly known as Yugoslavia near the end and after said country's time of upheaval. That was a weird sentence. Regardless, I wanna read more of his stuff. Boy oh boy, there are lots of comics out there to read.