Prabowo’s tears for Palestine are not enough

On Saturday, President Prabowo Subianto was in the middle of a speech when he stopped talking, wiped his eyes with a small towel, and apologized to the crowd. “I am sorry,” he said. “I just remembered our brothers and sisters in Palestine. They are being slaughtered, they are bombed, they are attacked again and again. And we seem powerless to help them.” He was speaking at Pondok Modern Darussalam Gontor in Ponorogo, East Java, one of Indonesia’s oldest Islamic boarding schools, marking its 100th anniversary. Later, the Palestinian ambassador gave him a keffiyeh, the scarf that symbolizes Palestine. Prabowo cried again, then chanted “Free Palestine” several times, saying a strong Indonesia can help its oppressed “brothers and sisters.” It was […]