It is loud. It is messy. Honestly, it is kind of overwhelming at first. When you open Palestine by Joe Sacco, you aren’t just looking at a comic book; you are staring into the mud and the cigarette smoke of the First Intifada. Sacco didn't go there to find a "balanced" corporate news soundbite. He went there to live in the rain, drink too much tea, and draw the faces of people that the rest of the world usually treats like statistics.
Comic books were for superheroes, or at least they were until Sacco dragged his pen through the West Bank and Gaza Strip in the winter of 1991 and 1992. He basically invented "comics journalism." It sounds like a gimmick, right? It isn't. There is something about the way he draws himself—this wide-eyed, slightly goofy caricature with thick glasses—that makes the reader feel like a witness rather than a spectator. You're right there in the taxi with him, bumping over dirt roads, wondering if you're going to get stuck at a checkpoint.
The Gritty Reality of Palestine by Joe Sacco
Sacco spent two months in the Palestinian Territories. He didn't stay in a fancy hotel in Tel Aviv and commute in. He slept on thin mattresses. He listened to stories of torture in the Ansar III detention camp. He watched how people survived the mundane, grinding exhaustion of the occupation. What makes Palestine by Joe Sacco so enduring is that it focuses on the stuff the evening news skips. It’s about the mud. It’s about the way a mother looks when her house has been demolished. It’s about the black humor people use to keep from losing their minds.
People often get hung up on the idea of "objectivity." Sacco is pretty upfront about the fact that he isn’t being objective in the traditional sense. He is being subjective. He is telling you what he saw and heard from the perspective of the people living under military rule. Edward Said, the legendary intellectual who wrote the foreword for the collected edition, noted that Sacco’s work had the power to break through the "screen" of media representations that usually dehumanize Palestinians.
The art style is dense. Cross-hatching everywhere. It feels claustrophobic because the camps are claustrophobic. You can almost smell the heaters and the damp wool coats. When you read about the "shaking" technique used during interrogations, Sacco doesn't just write a paragraph about it. He draws the physical distortion of the body. He makes you feel the headache.
Why the First Intifada Context Matters Today
You've got to remember the timing. This was the tail end of the First Intifada. The Oslo Accords were just around the corner, though nobody knew it yet. There was a specific kind of fatigue in the air. Sacco captures that transition from hope to a sort of cynical endurance.
🔗 Read more: The Name of This Band Is Talking Heads: Why This Live Album Still Beats the Studio Records
- The Stories of Detainees: Sacco spends a huge amount of time on the legal and physical reality of being a Palestinian prisoner. These aren't just dry reports; they are visceral accounts of physical pain and psychological pressure.
- The Role of Women: Unlike many journalists of the era, Sacco actually talks to the women. He looks at how the Intifada changed family dynamics and the incredible burden placed on mothers and sisters when the men were frequently arrested or injured.
- The Settlements: He explores the visual and physical encroachment of settlements, showing how the geography itself was being rewritten in real-time.
It’s easy to think this book is a relic of the early 90s. It’s not. Many of the systemic issues Sacco documented—the checkpoints, the land seizures, the administrative detention—are still the bedrock of the conflict today. If you want to understand why things look the way they do in 2026, you have to look at the patterns Sacco traced thirty years ago.
The Power of the "Gaze"
In journalism, there’s this idea of the "parachuting" reporter. Someone who drops in, grabs a quote, and leaves. Sacco is the opposite. He lingers. He draws the trash on the street. He draws the way someone’s hands shake. Because he is drawing, he has to spend hours looking at his subjects. That level of attention translates to the reader. You can’t skim Palestine by Joe Sacco. The eye gets caught in the details of a ruined olive grove or the specific way a soldier holds a rifle.
It’s also surprisingly funny in a dark way. Sacco depicts himself as a bit of a vulture at times, always looking for the "best" tragic story. He’s self-aware about his role as a Westerner consuming these stories. This honesty makes the work feel more trustworthy. He isn't pretending to be a saint. He's just a guy with a sketchbook trying to make sense of a nightmare.
Beyond the Panels: Impact and Criticism
The book won an American Book Award in 1996, and it basically blew the doors open for graphic non-fiction. Without this, we probably don't get Persepolis or Maus getting the same level of mainstream academic respect.
But it hasn't been without its detractors. Some critics argue that by focusing so heavily on the Palestinian experience, Sacco ignores the Israeli perspective of fear and security. Sacco’s response has generally been that the Israeli perspective is already the dominant narrative in Western media. He saw his job as balancing the scales by giving a voice to the side that was being ignored or misrepresented. He isn't trying to give you a "both sides" history book. He’s giving you a "this side" witness account.
💡 You might also like: Wrong Address: Why This Nigerian Drama Is Still Sparking Conversations
The book is structured as a series of vignettes. It doesn't follow a straight "hero's journey." It’s more like a mosaic. You meet a guy named Sameh. You hear about a kid getting shot with a rubber bullet. You see the interior of a hospital. By the end, you don't have a neat solution to the Middle East crisis, but you do have a much better grasp of the human cost of the status quo.
How to Approach the Text
If you’re picking it up for the first time, don’t try to rush it. The text is dense. The layouts are unconventional—sometimes the panels tilt and overlap, mimicking the chaos of a riot or the confusion of a crowded market.
- Look at the backgrounds. Sacco puts as much effort into the crumbling walls as he does into the faces. The environment is a character in itself.
- Pay attention to Sacco’s internal monologue. He often questions his own motivations and the ethics of what he’s doing. It’s a masterclass in reflexive journalism.
- Cross-reference with Footnotes in Gaza. If you finish this and want more, Sacco’s later work Footnotes in Gaza is even more meticulously researched, focusing on a specific, forgotten massacre in 1956.
Actionable Insights for Readers and Researchers
Reading Palestine by Joe Sacco isn't just about absorbing information; it's about shifting how you consume news.
Analyze the Visual Rhetoric
Notice how Sacco uses scale. When he wants to show the power of the military, the soldiers often loom large or are depicted with obscured faces. When he focuses on the Palestinians, the eyes are usually prominent and expressive. This is a deliberate choice to foster empathy. When you watch the news today, ask yourself: whose face am I seeing? Whose eyes am I looking into?
Contextualize the First Intifada
Use the book as a jumping-off point to study the history of the PLO, the rise of Hamas (which was a relatively new player during Sacco’s visit), and the failure of the peace process in the 90s. The book provides the "vibes" of the era, but supplementing it with a historical text like Rashid Khalidi’s The Hundred Years' War on Palestine will give you the structural framework to understand the anecdotes.
📖 Related: Who was the voice of Yoda? The real story behind the Jedi Master
Support Local Journalism
Sacco’s work highlights the importance of "slow journalism." In a world of 24-hour news cycles and 10-second clips, deep-dive reporting is dying. Support outlets and creators who take the time to embed themselves in stories rather than just reacting to headlines.
Engage with the Medium
If you are a student of media, look at how the graphic novel format handles trauma differently than film or prose. The ability to "freeze" a moment in a hand-drawn panel allows the reader to process violence or grief at their own pace, which can sometimes be more impactful than a moving image that flashes by in a second.
The reality is that Palestine by Joe Sacco remains one of the most important pieces of political art of the last fifty years. It doesn't offer easy answers. It doesn't promise peace. It just refuses to look away. In 2026, when the world feels more fractured than ever, that kind of stubborn, detailed witnessing is exactly what we need.
To get the most out of your reading, compare the events in the book to current maps of the region. Seeing how the "Areas A, B, and C" of the Oslo Accords mapped onto the places Sacco visited provides a chilling look at how temporary military measures became permanent features of the landscape.