We're just coming out of that time of year when many people will get together to celebrate the birth of a wee baby born in Bethlehem. I hope all those who observe Christmas had a wonderful time, and all those who don't just had a lovely week.

Regardless of what celebrations we participate in, in this part of the world we are able to sit around tables with access to food and clean drinking water, to gather in unbombed houses and go to sleep fully expecting to see tomorrow.

For most of us, the structural integrity of our homes, communities, and lives will remain intact, while on the other side of the world people are experiencing unimaginable horror. Every passing day brings more tales of death, trauma, the destruction of ancient monuments, the desecration of religious and cultural sites, and the irreparable damage done to the Palestinian people and their communities.

It has become overwhelmingly apparent that nowhere is safe for the people of Palestine: not the schools where children can now learn only of suffering, the religious sanctuaries subjected to unholy desecration, the hospitals where both patient and doctor bleed as one, and not the homes, a visual reminder of the displaced, the occupied, the wounded and the dead.

What were once thriving hubs of community and vitality have been reduced to rubble and ash, transformed into graves, silent and solemn. This year, it feels hollow to sing of peace on earth, joy to the world or indeed the little town of Bethlehem as for many people actually living in Palestine right now, things like peace and joy have been replaced with war and misery.

The images coming out of Palestine are horrific, but perhaps even more of a tragedy are the scenes we can't see, the despair and trauma being enacted without witnesses, the people without a voice, or a platform through which to have their pain shared.

We will never know the full extent of the damage, or the true death toll, and we shouldn't need to in order to say enough is enough, and to advocate for an immediate and permanent ceasefire. There can never be a justification for indiscriminate trauma inflicted upon civilians; it is the antithesis of every moral code to which we as a society should adhere. Much like the destruction of once-thriving Palestinian olive groves, entire family trees have been decimated, entire bloodlines gone in the blink of an eye and the push of a button or the pull of a trigger.

There is not a single facet of society this humanitarian crisis should not affect: it is a feminist issue, a human rights issue, and in the Scottish context, it highlights the limitations and discrepancies in our democratic system. The Scottish government has been committed and unwavering in its support of a ceasefire since the conflict erupted, and yet due to the political structure of the UK, this voice has gone unheard on the global stage.

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We are watching the mass killing, wounding, and traumatisation of generations of people. There is no second chance, there is no excuse and there is no coming back from this for humanity. So many lives have been lost, or irrevocably changed in the past few months, there has been a devastation of infrastructure and culture millennia in the making.

In the coverage of Gaza, many of the people reporting or commenting are solely focusing on the tragedy of the women, children and babies being killed, and while this is important, I also want to take a second to acknowledge the humanity and dignity of the men, the fathers, the brothers and the friends whose right to live in safe, peaceful conditions is equally as valid, and whose trauma is no less of a tragedy. Fathers grieve their children no less, and children miss their dads just as much.

The tenderness of Palestinian people shown to family, friends and strangers, coming together in the face of indescribable inhumanity is something which should inspire pride and shame in equal measure: we should be proud of the unbreakable spirit of the Palestinian people, and ashamed that we are not doing more to prevent their continued suffering.

There are some things that shouldn't ever be up for debate – calling for the end of a preventable daily increase of human suffering is one of them. To hear stories of babies carried for nine months in the protection and warmth of the womb only to enter and leave this world within a matter of days, to know nothing but pain and panic, is despicable.

To hear of children wishing they had been killed alongside their parents, mouths half full of baby teeth crying out for parents who will never again hold them, is heinous.

To hear soulmates separated by death, familial ties severed and bloodlines erased by horrific weapons of war, some of which go against every moral and legal standard of the international community, is reprehensible.

While millions celebrate the birth of one child, so many people are mourning the death of others, no less precious, no less deserving of a peaceful world and a full joyous life. One by one come the stories of sacrifice, suffering and solidarity; journalists faithfully reporting the murders of their fallen comrades, poets writing their own elegies, people of all faiths, or no faith sending hopes, prayers, wishes and pleas first for a safer tomorrow, then for any kind of tomorrow at all.

I'm hesitant to include statistics in this column as by the time I've finished typing this sentence, then handing it in, then it going to print, as with every day preceding it the numbers will have increased, the death toll will have risen; there will be more trauma, more death, more loss.

It feels disingenuous to call this a war. The overwhelming majority of casualties are not soldiers; there can be no victory in the continued decimation of a population. This is the perpetuation of generational trauma, this is a preventable tragedy, and this will leave an indelible stain on the fabric of history.

We will remember who votes, and advocates against a ceasefire. We will remember those who abstain, remember those who deny and remember those who do not use every avenue of power available to them to help end this senseless and cruel situation.

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But once those names have faded to nothing more than a footnote in some textbook warning future generations, we will remember the people of Palestine, to whom we owe our respect, our condolences, and an eternal apology.

We already have too many lessons on what happens when we stand idly by and ignore the suffering of innocent people, we must ensure we do not continue to repeat the mistakes of the past.