After the Paris massacre a photo popped up in my Facebook news feed, signed the Kurdish security forces, Peshmerga, that I follow. A photo of a murdered young man, clearly shot dead while on the move, probably fleeing for his life. His face is frozen in a frightened expression, his hands curled up in spasms, his face covered in blood.

In front of him another young man is peeking in to the camera and cheekily sticking out his tongue. The photo caption reads “Gift of the Peshmerga heroes to French people“.

The comments are almost exclusively overwhelmingly joyous and sarcastic:

“Nice shot”

“Stay Frosty”

“He’s throwing ISIS gang signs LOL”

I didn’t hit the like button for this photo. I didn’t share it. I did consider potentially stop liking Peshmerga forces, despite the information the page provides me.

It might be obvious to you why I reacted like this, but to sum it up, here’s the comment from the one follower of the page, a young man too and I believe he is Kurdish, who did not agree:

“By posting this you bring shame on the Kurdish people.
We should not be driven by hate, but by humanity and our love to freedom.”

If only more young men were thinking like him.

I have never and will never share photos of murdered or injured or caged IS terrorists. We might be approaching the third world war, we might be in the middle of it, but at one point, this still needs to end. And peace will not come faster by seeking revenge and mocking the dead ones.

I will not be the person to prolong the wait.