Rethinking Victimhood in Mohammed El-Kurd’s Perfect Victims: And the Politics of Appeal

El-Kurd offers a stark formulation that captures the central argument of Perfect Victims: “What makes some people heroes is what makes us criminals. It is almost simplistic to say that we are guilty by birth. Our existence is purely mechanistic; we are reminded, through policy and procedure, that we are unfortunately born to die.” This statement serves as the thematic anchor for the book. Written in the shadow of Gaza’s ongoing destruction and from the intimate terrain of occupied Jerusalem, the book returns again and again to this asymmetry: the same acts that are celebrated as “defence,” “courage,” or “resistance” when performed by certain subjects become, in Palestinian hands, proof of congenital criminality. The task of the book is not […]