There are songs that exist beyond the boundaries of genre — compositions that carry within them the full weight of history, grief, and conscience. “I Feel Helpless,” the latest stand-alone single from Palestinian filmmaker, visual artist and musician Hisham Zreiq, is one of those songs. Released in December 2025 via Bandcamp, it is a work that refuses to be ignored.
Purchase and Stream “I Feel Helpless” via the Bandcamp player below:
Based in Germany since 2001, Zreiq is an award-winning independent filmmaker who turned to music in 2023, channeling through sound the same urgent, uncompromising vision that defines his visual work. With “I Feel Helpless,” he delivers what may be his most direct and devastating statement yet — a Progressive Rock lament that confronts moral collapse, collective indifference, and the unbearable reality of a people whose suffering has been normalized by the world’s silence.
Musically, the track unfolds with a progressive architecture built on cyclical refrains and escalating tension. The structure is deliberate — relentless, almost ritualistic — as if the repetition itself is meant to mirror the numbing, ongoing nature of what it describes. Stark imagery fills the lyrics: the innocence of children set against the machinery of war, famine, and dehumanization; words like solidarity and morality reduced to hollow echoes. The chorus — “I feel helpless / helpless, that is how I feel / blood of the forgotten / blood of the innocent ignored” — lands not as melodrama but as testimony.
“I Feel Helpless” follows a growing body of work in which Zreiq has consistently refused artistic detachment, including previous singles such as “Children’s Voices from Palestine,” “I Am Afraid, Mother,” and “Fighting the Sadness.” Across this catalog, a singular artistic voice emerges — one rooted in Palestinian identity, shaped by exile, and driven by the moral imperative to bear witness when the world looks away.
In a moment when art that speaks truth is more necessary than ever, Hisham Zreiq‘s voice deserves to be heard far beyond the underground.