Is This a Dream or for Real?
A psychoanalytic reflection on inaction and impasse
Lama Z. Khouri DPsa 
This essay is part of our rolling online issue about Palestine, born out of both the unfolding genocide in Gaza, in the aftermath of October 7th, and ongoing contentions with international emanations of the so-called “Palestine Question.” Essays will engage the colonial politics of Zionism, Palestinian resistance, perennial questions about loss and diaspora, identitarian entanglements with Islamophobia and antisemitism, and more. As contemporary interlocutors of psychoanalytic traditions, we are inheritors of the field’s ambivalence toward Israel and the politics of Zionism, inaugurated by Freud himself. But as a magazine preoccupied with the unruly mesh of psychoanalytic, psychosocial, and historical-material analysis, we are decidedly unambivalent about our steadfast solidarity with Palestine and the diasporic geographies of Palestinians beyond Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories. This series shares a name with the Palestinian chorus calling for freedom: “From the River to the Sea.”—The Editors
I am a Palestinian-Jordanian psychoanalyst based in New York. My journey into the field of psychoanalysis was not a conventional one. My career began in the halls of the United Nations (UN), where I spent 14 years, most of which were as a Political Affairs Officer at, what was then called, the Department of Peacekeeping Operations.
Joining the UN in my twenties, during the twilight of the Cold War era, instilled in me a profound belief in the possibility of a just world at peace—finally the paralysis of the Security Council was lifted, and it will be able to fulfill its mandate, I thought. The principles enshrined in the UN Charter and the power of international law were not just theoretical concepts to me; they were beacons of hope. My conviction was that if the world could witness firsthand the crimes of the settler colonial state against the Palestinian people—beyond the distortions and misrepresentations—a just outcome would be inevitable. Yet, the past five months have shattered my heart and dispelled my once unshakeable hope. The harsh realization dawned on me that my belief in a just world was, perhaps, naive. Witnessing the extent of human cruelty and indifference has left me disillusioned, questioning the very essence of humanity and justice.
This article is born out of a deep-seated need to grapple with the incomprehensible—to make sense of the nonsensical. To merely state that Palestinians are dehumanized, to chalk up the ongoing genocide to historical contingencies, or to dismiss it as "realpolitik," feels grossly inadequate. These are not justifications but rather evasions of responsibility for the crimes committed against a people who have been dispossessed and oppressed for far too long. Through a psychoanalytic lens, I seek to explore and understand the machinations of global affairs that currently seem beyond comprehension. It is my hope that this framing can offer a new perspective on the seemingly abhorrent complicity of the Security Council; and that the article will provide insights into the depths of human nature and the complexities of the world stage.
A Dream or for Real?
Among the numerous videos depicting what has been termed a “textbook case of genocide,” one poignantly stands out. In this harrowing footage, a young girl lies on a stretcher, seemingly just rescued from the wreckage of her home. Covered in gray dust with superficial facial wounds, paramedics diligently work to clean the debris and tend to her injuries. In a moment of heart-wrenching vulnerability, she asks:
“Uncle uncle. I want to ask you something.”
“Ask my dear”
“Is this a dream or for real?”
The girl’s query not only highlights the traumatic reality that Gazan children are experiencing amid the ongoing atrocities, capturing the profound shock and disbelief felt by Palestinians and their allies regarding the indifference and futility of international actors and entities, particularly the UN Security Council, to stop the genocide. For those among us who once held some faith in the principles of international law, human rights, and basic human decency, this abysmal failure serves as a harsh awakening, leaving us profoundly disheartened and disillusioned. The international community’s necropolitical approach lays bare the criteria for deciding whose lives are worth saving. This revelation unfolds against the backdrop of the ongoing live-streamed genocide in Gaza, highlighting a grievous moral failure.
The absence of decisive action by the international community, particularly the UN Security Council, to end the atrocities in Gaza is deeply troubling. The Council is endowed with both the legal authority and military capability to terminate this genocide and hold the perpetrators accountable. The girl’s haunting question in the video—“Is this a dream, or for real?”—poses a significant dilemma: how is it possible to observe such widespread destruction, suffering, and pain, and yet remain indifferent and passive?
“How is it possible to observe such widespread destruction, suffering, and pain, and yet remain indifferent and passive?”
The Normative Unconscious and the United Nations[1]
Lynne Layton’s “normative unconscious” may provide a useful framework with which to understand the UN Security Council’s seeming indifference. Layton applied this concept to describe how sociocultural factors and political discourse become internalized, shaping our identity and consciousness. She further elucidated how these factors bias our interpersonal communications and subjective, as well as intersubjective, relations.
In the arena of international relations, the normative unconscious is the result of living in a world in which norms serve the “dominant ideological purpose of maintaining the status quo.” UN Security Council member states operate in a system which they created (consciously or unconsciously) to maintain their hold on power. For example, we rarely question something as simple as why Europe is at the center of any map of the globe and the rest of the world is represented in relation to it.
The normative unconscious of UN Security Council appears in systematic and structural issues, the shadow of which is already evident in the foundational Charter—particularly in its conception of the Council and its powers. Although the UN Charter’s creation of the Council was ostensibly aimed at preventing another world war, it effectively reflected a Eurocentric, Orientalist, and binary view of the human race and international relations—“us” and “them.” The UN Charter itself is flawed: although it begins with “We the Peoples of the United Nations,” its subtext implies that while “all people are equal, some are more equal than others,” to paraphrase George Orwell.
The imperious normative unconscious of the UN Security Council (particularly that of its permanent members, chief among them the United States) is repeatedly being exposed. This is evidenced most recently by the United States’s repeated assertion that Israel has the right to defend itself, with the subtext that this right extends to “murdering over 1300 children, and making 17,000 of them orphans.”
By structuring the UN Security Council such that the five permanent members of the organization are the only ones with veto power, the UN Charter seems to imply that these members are thoroughly rational and psychologically solid. It may also imply that they are the only nations that can be trusted with the task of protecting humanity from self-destruction. Consequently, the “other” part of the world (“the Orient” in Said’s terminology) is presented as psychologically labile, weak, feminized, and irrational, and therefore cannot be trusted with the perpetuation of the human race. Apart from China, whose inclusion in the UN Security Council followed a distinctly different rationale and trajectory, the other four UN Security Council member states are European or quasi-European in their values and structures.
Concerning these four members, as Said argued, “the non-European world contains only natives, and ‘the veiled women, the palm trees, and the camels make up the landscape, the natural background to the human presence of (colonial powers).’” The UN Security Council’s mostly veiled prejudice and subhumanization of the developing or colonized nations are brought into stark focus when comparing its reaction to the 1994 Rwandan Genocide with that of 9/11. In less than 24 hours, on September 12, 2001, the UN Security Council issued a stern and unwavering presidential statement condemning the attack that led to almost 4,000 people being killed. It was only in the case of Rwanda (and now Gaza) that the UN Security Council and reportedly the UN Secretariat had evidence that a genocide was imminent but did not take any forceful measures to stop it.
The Palestinian as Absent Referent
Carol Adams’s term absent referent is a critical concept in feminist and animal rights theory, originally used to describe how the reality of animals’ lives and experiences is made invisible or abstracted in the context of their consumption. In her work, Adams argues that the language and practices around meat consumption obscure the animals themselves, turning them into objects or commodities rather than acknowledging them as living beings. For example, when we discuss bacon or pork, the pig—the actual animal whose life was taken—is the “absent referent.” The animal’s existence is erased from our consciousness, facilitating a disconnection between the living being and the consumed product, thereby making the act of consuming meat more palatable and less ethically troubling for individuals.
Expanding upon this concept within the context of the United Nations Security Council and their view of Hamas and its resistance, Adams’s notion of the absent referent may help us to understand the complacency of the UN Security Council. Here, Hamas is condemned and blamed by the Council without acknowledging Israel’s crimes, without a deep engagement with history, and without recognizing the necropolitics of the settler colonial state. Evidence of the absence of such engagement is the repeated reference to October 7, 2023, as the cause of the genocide. Just as the pig becomes an “absent referent” in the context of consuming pork, the individual members of Palestinian armed resistance and their complex motivations become “absent referents” in policies and resolutions regarding Palestine in general and Gaza in particular.
By labeling Hamas and the Palestinian armed resistance more broadly as terrorist organizations, without acknowledgment of the settler colonial state’s violations and crimes against the Palestinians, it obscures the motives of such entities’ actions. The Security Council’s approach effectively erases the humanity of the Palestinian people. Such erasure of narrative and history makes it easier to justify war crimes and murder without confronting the more challenging task of understanding and addressing the underlying issues that led to the formation and persistence of the resistance.
The concept of the “absent referent” thus provides a powerful lens through which to critique our ethical disconnections and the broader political and institutional practices that dehumanize and simplify complex human conflicts. By drawing this parallel, this essay invites a deeper reflection on how entities like the UN Security Council engage with the concept of terrorism and the implications of such engagement for both policy making and for the possibility of achieving lasting peace and security.
Edward Said’s “Permission to Narrate” can be interpreted through the lens of the “absent referent” as it pertains to the Palestinian people and their place in global narratives. In the essay, Said discusses the challenges that Palestinians face in having their stories, perspectives, and sufferings acknowledged and legitimized in the global arena, especially in Western media and discourse.
According to Adams, the concept of the absent referent emphasizes the erasure or invisibility of particular subjects in particular contexts. Applying this to Said’s argument, Palestinians become the absent referents in the narratives constructed about the Middle East, where their experiences, rights, and aspirations are often overshadowed or omitted entirely. This erasure facilitates a simplified, skewed representation of the conflict that frequently marginalizes Palestinian voices, reducing their complex history and struggles to mere footnotes in a predominantly Israeli-centric narrative.
Said’s critique is fundamentally about power, representation, and voice, themes that resonate with the concept of the absent referent. Just as animals are made absent in discussions about meat consumption, Palestinians are made absent in many narratives that shape international perceptions and policies. This absence is not merely about being overlooked; it is about the denial of agency, the silencing of voices, and the rendering invisible of legitimate claims and grievances.
By framing Palestinians as absent referents we can better understand the mechanisms of exclusion and marginalization that operate in the media, politics, and academia. This perspective urges a reconsideration of who is allowed to speak, whose narratives are legitimized, and how these dynamics shape our understanding of conflicts and crises. Said’s “Permission to Narrate” challenges readers to recognize and question these absences, advocating for a more inclusive approach that acknowledges and incorporates Palestinian narratives as integral to the broader discourse on the Middle East.
Thus, viewing Palestinians as absent referents in world affairs enriches our understanding of the power dynamics at play in the construction of narratives and highlights the importance of striving for a more equitable and representative discourse.
“Denial of Death” and the Morality of Nations[2]
Ernest Becker’s “Denial of Death” posits that much of human behavior can be reduced to an attempt to deny and transcend our awareness of mortality. This existential fear can drive individuals and, by extension, nation states to seek symbolic or literal immortality through actions that assert power, significance, and an enduring legacy. In the context of the UN Security Council member states, this theory suggests that awareness of their mortality could motivate actions that either prevent or contribute to atrocities. The pursuit of national legacy, influence, and power lead states to engage in actions that they justify as necessary for their survival or supremacy, potentially overriding moral considerations against committing atrocities.
Uriel Abulof’s “The Mortality and Morality of Nations” further explores how the existential anxiety of nations influences their moral choices and political actions. Abulof argues that the fear of national oblivion can lead states to prioritize their survival and interests in ways that often conflict with universal moral principles. In the context of the UN Security Council and its response to genocides or atrocities, this perspective suggests that member states might prioritize their national interests, strategic alliances, and power dynamics over moral imperatives to intervene. The fear of losing influence or of facing negative consequences might outweigh the moral duty to prevent or stop atrocities, even if such atrocities include grotesque violations of human rights, degradation, and destruction.
The tolerance exhibited by UN Security Council member states in remaining bystanders during a genocide could be interpreted through these lenses as a complex interplay of denial of death, existential fear, national interest, and the limitations of international politics. The UN Security Council’s structure and the power of veto play significant roles in how decisions are made or stalled, often reflecting the strategic interests and existential concerns of its permanent members rather than unbiased moral judgments.
Framing the actions and inactions of the UN Security Council member states within the context of their existential anxieties and their denial of mortality should not undermine the recognition of the deeply ingrained issues of racism and a necropolitical approach within the council’s policies. Achille Mbembe coined the term necropolitics, which refers to the authority and capacity of sovereign entities to determine who may live and who must die. This strategy has been evident in the UN Security Council’s selective engagement and responses to international crises. The reality is that the actions or inactions of the council, influenced by the strategic interests and power dynamics of its members, have had devastating effects on populations, particularly in the Global South. Acknowledging the role of existential fear and the quest for legacy or survival does not negate the responsibility of the UN Security Council to act justly and ethically. Nor does it exonerate its members from the impacts of their decisions, which have often prioritized political interests over the sanctity of human life.
The Palestinian and the Uncanny
Sigmund Freud’s exploration of “The Uncanny” delves into the psychological realm of experiencing something as both familiar and alien, evoking a sense of discomfort. While Freud’s work centers on individual psychology, its principles offer a poignant framework for understanding broader societal and political phenomena, such as necropolitics. For Freud, what is uncanny is the sight of something familiar that also carries elements of the unfamiliar or alien. The necropolitical theoretical perspective and the framework of Freud’s explanation of the uncanny, are especially relevant in analyzing the UN Security Council’s failure to secure a permanent ceasefire in Gaza, amid the backdrop of actions and statements by various Israeli officials that were genocidal in content.
Mbembe articulates that the capability to exert dominion over colonies through states of exception (that is, through a suspension of the law in service of what is perceived as the good of the group) is predicated on a racial negation of any shared humanity between the colonizer and the colonized. In the colonizer’s view, the life of “the savage” is reduced to a mere animal existence. For the colonizer, then, the encounter with the colonized is deeply unsettling, as the colonized are perceived as utterly alien and incomprehensible. These “savages” are seen as “natural” humans, stripped of the qualities that constitute a distinctly human essence.
This dehumanization and racism, which is a core element of Mbembe’s necropolitical theory, can be productively linked to Freud’s concept of the uncanny, emphasizing a profound sense of estrangement or othering.
The uncanny—as described by Freud and potentially fundamental to Mbembe’s necropolitics and the ability of nations to declare lives ungrievable, to use Judith Butler’s formulation—arises from the paradoxical experience of something being simultaneously eerily familiar and foreign. This duality evokes a feeling of discomfort because it is both recognized and alien. In this context, the Palestinian, borrowing from psychoanalyst Sverre Varvin, “presents as both an unfamiliar and somehow known entity, whose human attributes are either downplayed or completely erased.” In the context of this ongoing genocide, the uncanny may be the result of an unconscious interplay that embodies Freud’s concept, wherein there is a simultaneous recognition and denial of the other’s humanity, making the “other” appear both known and eerily strange. Such interplay is reflected in the rhetoric of the Zionist state, as exemplified by genocidal statements by the state’s officials. The resulting narrative manipulation effectively leverages the uncanny to justify policies, by casting the colonized as eerily familiar yet fundamentally alien, thereby rationalizing their subjugation and dehumanization under the guise of foreign policy.
The shadow of Freud’s uncanny appears in Netanyahu’s framing of the genocide in Gaza, as a fight between the “children of light and children of darkness.” The uncanny is also evident in his invocation of the Amalekites—an ancient people described in biblical texts as enemies of the Israelites whom God commanded to be utterly destroyed. Such statements parallel defense minister Yoav Gallant’s description of Palestinians as “human animals.” All of these proclamations epitomize a dehumanizing rhetoric that underpins necropolitical practices justified by unconscious dynamics which make Palestinians uncanny. Such statements not only strip Palestinians of their humanity but also implicitly sanction their extermination, echoing the darkest elements of genocidal logic.
Against Nightmares Made Normal
The question posed by the girl in the video—“Is this a dream or for real?”—while seemingly simple, serves as a critical call to action which challenges us to confront the surreal horror of inaction and indifference in the face of genocide. I have endeavored to utilize psychoanalytic thinking to explore how such unfathomable atrocities are allowed to continue, leveraging concepts such as the normative unconscious, the uncanny, the morality and mortality of nations, and the absent referent.
Psychoanalytic theories do not yet offer us a definitive answer to the haunting question: “How can this be allowed to happen?” Yet, examining the interplay between these concepts, highlights the complex psychological and sociopolitical mechanisms that underlie the global community’s failure to effectively address the genocide in Gaza. It could also be argued that international relations are often driven more by the pursuit of strategic advantages and the demonstration of military or economic power. This reality poses a challenge to the psychoanalytic effort to uncover the moral deficiencies behind global inaction, as it may overlook the degree to which the principle of "might makes right" influences the behavior of states on the international stage. Perhaps Israel and the United Sates act as they do simply because they can.
The question “is this a dream or for real?” demands a profound reevaluation of our collective moral and ethical frameworks, urging us to confront the uncomfortable truths of our inaction and indifference. Only through such introspection and the willingness to challenge the normative unconscious, confront the uncanny dynamics of dehumanization, and acknowledge the morality and mortality at play in our global interactions, can we hope to prevent the perpetuation of such horrors, and work towards a future where human rights and dignity are truly upheld for all.
[1] This section is based largely on part of an article that was published by the author in 2019: Khouri LZ.(2019) The Normative Unconscious Of Nations: A critical geopolitical and psychoanalytic perspectives on the United Nations Security Council's counterterrorism strategy. Int J Appl PsychoanalStudies.2019;16:244–257. https://doi.org/10.1002/aps.1635
[2] The Psychoanalyst Irwin Hoffman has written about death and mortality extensively and, I believe, any mention of death and mortality must refer to his work. (Hoffman, 1979, 1991, 2000, 2001, 2013)