Innocent Palestinians have been engulfed in devastation and violence by Israeli forces for 76 years, four months and eight days. For some people I’ve spoken to, Israel’s genocide against Palestinians started on 7 October 2023, for some, boycotting brands funded by the Israeli government and advocating for the rights of Palestinians was a trend over the past couple of months. For some, the war is now over and they’ve returned to mindlessly consuming brands that they very loudly voiced to boycott just a few months back. It’s as if they’ve been programmed to mindlessly chase whatever is trending at the moment, only to abandon it as soon as everything simmers down a little bit. Why does this happen with us? I ask myself this question almost every day.

Especially now, as so many of us remain devoted to staying resolute on our belief that Palestine deserves sovereignty and freedom from the tight grip of the oppressors. Aside from a handful of people who could use a morality check with their, “the money doesn’t go straight to Israel does it?”, “chill, you’re being an extremist now”, “relax, it’s not that big of a deal, everyone else is doing it too”.

It’s particularly hard to digest when so many of us are now forgetting about our brothers and sisters in Palestine, who arestilldying at the hands of vicious Israeli forces.

It is for this reason that I wasn’t too surprised when I saw what had taken social media by storm over the past 24 hours. A video of our dear president Dr. Mohamed Muizzu, who is currently in the states to attend the 79th Session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA 79), sipping on a cup of ‘Costa Coffee’; anyone who has the ‘No Thanks’ app downloaded on their phones can easily identify that this is one of the brands being boycotted by Muslim communities and many others worldwide, for either being funded by Israel or are profiting from the genocide of innocent Palestinian civilians.

Costa Coffee is among the many brands included among the list of companies profiting from the genocide of innocent Palestinian civilians. Individuals across the globe are actively participating in protests calling to boycott these brands and their products. The list includes other chains that are actively operating in the Maldives despite so many of us calling to shut them down, including Pizza Hut, KFC and Puma.

Although nothing surprises me anymore, it has raised a serious question, especially among social media users who are demanding to know why the president, who claims to strongly advocate for the rights of Palestinians and says he would “die” for them, is drinking coffee from a brand boycotted by several Muslim communities.

It wouldn’t be as absurd as it is if it was a leaked video. However, the video was recorded and posted officially by the President’s Office, by the PR team accompanying the president on his trip to New York City. The coffee cup is shown from two angles in the video and the ‘Costa Coffee’ logo is clearly identifiable as we see him calmly sipping on his coffee without a care in the world that it carries the weight of thousands of innocent lives.

Something else that seems to have caught the public’s attention is that while there were many people around him, the president was shown to be enjoying his coffee alone, without offering a sip to anyone else.

One of the reasons for the intense backlash and frustration directed at this viral video on social media was the painful message it sent to the people of Palestine especially in Gaza. What message was the Maldivian leader giving the world by so happily, unabashedly drinking and very obviously promoting a product known to be backing the brutality of Israeli forces? Very unhinged.

At a time Muizzu has openly promoted ‘Costa Coffee’ on his way to the UNGA, he has left the bill on banning Israeli passports pending at the People’s Majlis for over 100 days now.

On his trip to deliver a speech at UNGA, accompanied by a large delegation and a massive PR team, he made an unfortunate choice for a drink aiming for a moment of “demure” during his transit. As soon as the cup touched his lips, the scalding steam from the drink singed the government's reputation.

This made many of us wonder if all the work done for PR has faded, and the government and the president plummeted on a downward spiral of defamation due to the incompetence of the PR team. Or, perhaps this was a deliberate strike against the president by those close to him?

If the president was unaware of what he was consuming, wouldn’t it have been common sense for those around him to at least have reminded him, to avoid public uproar?

We can only conclude that the president’s attempt at a moment of demure has greatly backfired on him, leaving his government burned.