Ever since the death of Egyptian President Gamal Abdul Nasser, none of the regional powers in the Middle East had shown genuine solidarity with the Palestinian liberation movement.
Jordan severed its ties with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in 1970; Lebanon ceased to be the geographical hinterland for the movement in 1982; Syria, which probably was more loyal than other states, did not allow Palestinian independent strategy and visions while Egypt altogether ceased to play a prominent role in regional politics.
Other Arab countries were also quite absent from the Palestinian struggle.
Türkiye, under Erdogan, at times showed greater solidarity, in particular with the besieged Gaza since 2005, but also pursued an ambivalent policy due to its strategic relationship with Israel.
The only regional power that constantly and unconditionally supported the Palestinian cause was Iran.
Erroneous Equation
The Western narrative equates erroneously, and probably intentionally, Iran with the Islamic State (ISIS), that very same organization that, in actuality, planted bombs in Iran, killing many people.
It should also be remembered that the Western support of Sunni Jihadism as a counterforce to the secular and left anti-colonial movement planted the seeds from which both Al-Qaeda and ISIS grew and prospered.
Their violence was also directed against Shia groups in Southeast Asia and the Arab world. Many of these groups are directly linked to Iran.
Contrary to Western propaganda, the Iranian support to mainly Shia resistance groups is part of its perception of self-defense and not derived from a wish to impose a kind of Jihadist regime all over the world.
De-Zionized Palestine
Since the fall of the Soviet Union, over 30 years ago, Israel is the only state in the region that enjoyed unconditional support from an external superpower and its allies.
And it is important, even at the risk of sounding trite, to mention once more what this unconditional support is for.
Under this US-championed international immunity, Israel stretched over the whole of historical Palestine, ethnically cleansed more than half of its population over the years, and subjected the other half to a regime of apartheid, colonization and oppression.
Thus, direct support for the Palestinian cause from an important regional power such as Iran is meant to counteract the existential danger faced by the Palestinian people in the last 75 years.
Iran is a complicated ally. It still has some way to go in terms of its own human rights record.
The vocabulary and reservoir of images used by Iranian leaders and, at times, media does a disservice to the truly genuine Iranian solidarity.
Slogans such as “Small Satan” or “Death to Israel”, along with promises of total destruction, are all unnecessary tropes for galvanizing a nation that is already galvanized. Indeed, during the dictatorship of the Shah, the Iranian people supported Palestine and resented their regime for its close ties with Israel.
Aside from rhetoric, however, the policy itself is highly valuable in terms of redressing the imbalance of power between apartheid Israel and the occupied Palestinians, who, again, are facing an existential threat.
It should also be noted that the language Israeli propaganda uses in referring to Iran, the Palestinians or Hamas is far worse – as was revealed in full in the material the government of South Africa handed over to the International Court of Justice last December.
In this respect, many of us share Iran’s vision of a de-Zionized and decolonized one-state solution in historical Palestine, which, at least I hope, will also be a democratic welfare state.
Iran’s policies towards Israel are portrayed in the West as motivated by antisemitism of the worst kind.
Due to Israel’s intrinsic resentment of any pro-Palestine sentiments, in the Middle East or anywhere else in the world, Iran’s strong position in support of the Palestinians makes it the main target for Israel and its allies. In order for Israel to maintain Western-led pressure on Iran, it often, if not always, rewrites the history, the very chronology of the events, thus always presenting Iran as an aggressor and Israel as a country in a permanent state of self-defense.
Israel’s Aggressions and Iranian Counterattack
For a long time, Iran has tolerated sabotage acts on Iranian soil, including the assassination of scientists, the killing and wounding of its personnel in Syria and the Israeli pressure on the US to abolish the Iran nuclear deal in 2015.
Imagine if Iran would have destroyed an American embassy, killing some of the most senior officers of the US army, one would only imagine what the American reaction would have been.
In their last attack on Israel, on April 13, Iran did everything in its power to show that it is not seeking collateral damage or wishing to target civilians. In fact, they gave Israelis more than ten days to get ready for the strike.
Yet, Israel and the West were very quick to declare that the Iranian attack was an utter failure that caused no damage at all. A few days later, however, they had to admit that two Israeli air bases were, indeed, directly hit in the Iranian strike.
But this is hardly the point. Of course, both sides have the capability to inflict great damage and loss of life on each other. This balance of power, however, has implications that are far more important than the ones analyzed by military experts.
A Counterweight
If the Hamas operation on October 7 cast doubt on the invincibility of the Israeli army, the technological know-how Iran has introduced is another indicator that Israel is not the only military superpower in the region.
It should also be noted that Israel needed direct support from Britain, France, the US, Jordan and some other Arab countries to protect itself from the Iranian attack.
So far, there is no sign Israelis internalized the important lessons they should have learned in the last seven months: about the limitations of power, the inability to exist as an alien state in the midst of the Arab and Muslim world, and the impossibility to permanently maintain a regime of racial apartheid and military oppression.
In this respect, the technological capacities of a powerful regional power such as Iran, by itself, is not a game changer. But it does constitute a counterweight to a strong and wide coalition that has always supported the Zionist project since the very beginning. A counterweight that was not there for many years.
It is obvious that the situation in historical Palestine will not change through the development or transformation of one single factor. Indeed, change will occur as a result of many factors. The combination of these processes will eventually merge into a transformative event, or a series of events, which will result in a new political reality that is situated within decolonization, equality and restorative justice in historical Palestine.
This matrix requires a strong Iranian presence, which can even be more effective if coupled with reforms inside Iran itself. It also requires the global south to prioritize Palestine; a similar change should also be registered in the global north.
A united and younger Palestine liberation movement, alongside the de-Zionization of the global Jewish communities, are also two important factors.
The social implosion inside Israel, the economic crisis and the inability of the government and the army to address the current needs, are also crucial developments.
When fused, all of these factors will create a powerful transformation on the ground, which will lead to the creation of a new regime and a new political outfit.
It is too early to give the new outfit a name and it is premature to predict the outcome of the liberation process.
However, what is quite visible is the need to help this new reality to unfold as soon as possible. Without it, the genocide in Gaza would not be the last horrific chapter in Palestine’s history.
– Ilan Pappé is a professor at the University of Exeter. He was formerly a senior lecturer in political science at the University of Haifa. He is the author of The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, The Modern Middle East, A History of Modern Palestine: One Land, Two Peoples, and Ten Myths about Israel. He is the co-editor, with Ramzy Baroud of ‘Our Vision for Liberation.’ Pappé is described as one of Israel’s ‘New Historians’ who, since the release of pertinent British and Israeli government documents in the early 1980s, have been rewriting the history of Israel’s creation in 1948. He contributed this article to The Palestine Chronicle.
As horrifying scenes from Gaza have been recorded, published, and replayed around the world, people have been jolted into action and have thrown themselves into solidarity work. This surge of activism is fuelled by visceral reactions to the harrowing realities of Israel’s ongoing genocide unfolding on the global stage. People are realising, by the thousands, that zionism is a political program of indigenous erasure and primitive resource accumulation.
Many new activists and reactivated organisers seek to translate their emotional responses into tangible support. They are also searching for community hubs, often in the form of organisations, that confront zionism and colonialism – the root cause of this genocide. Whether activists know it or not, they are looking for an anti-zionist home for their organising efforts. It is exactly the moment, therefore, to provide an honest discussion on some of the essential characteristics of this organising, firmly rooted in the principles of Palestinian liberation and decolonisation, peeling away any remaining layers of confusion or mystery. This essay aims to open the overdue conversation with some suggestions for individuals to consider as they search for their anti-zionist organising home.
If we accept, as those with even the most rudimentary understanding of history do, that zionism is an ongoing process of settler-colonialism, then the undoing of zionism requires anti-zionism, which should be understood as a process of decolonisation. Anti-zionism as a decolonial ideology then becomes rightly situated as an indigenous liberation movement. The resulting implication is two-fold. First, decolonial organising requires that we extract ourselves from the limitations of existing structures of power and knowledge and imagine a new, just world. Second, this understanding clarifies that the caretakers of anti-zionist thought are indigenous communities resisting colonial erasure, and it is from this analysis that the strategies, modes, and goals of decolonial praxis should flow. In simpler terms: Palestinians committed to decolonisation, not Western-based NGOs, are the primary authors of anti-zionist thought. We write this as a Palestinian and a Palestinian-American who live and work in Palestine, and have seen the impact of so-called ‘Western values’ and how the centring of the ‘human rights’ paradigm disrupts real decolonial efforts in Palestine and abroad. This is carried out in favour of maintaining the status quo and gaining proximity to power, using our slogans emptied of Palestinian historical analysis.
Anti-zionist organising is not a new notion, but until now the use of the term in organising circles has been mired with misunderstandings, vague definitions, or minimised outright. Some have incorrectly described anti-zionism as amounting to activities or thought limited to critiques of the present Israeli government – this is a dangerous misrepresentation. Understanding anti-zionism as decolonisation requires the articulation of a political movement with material, articulated goals: the restitution of ancestral territories and upholding the inviolable principle of indigenous repatriation and through the right of return, coupled with the deconstruction of zionist structures and the reconstitution of governing frameworks that are conceived, directed, and implemented by Palestinians.
Anti-zionism illuminates the necessity to return power to the indigenous community and the need for frameworks of justice and accountability for the settler communities that have waged a bloody, unrelenting hundred-year war on the people of Palestine. It means that anti-zionism is much more than a slogan.
A liberation movement
Given the implications of defining anti-zionism, we must reorient ourselves around it within the framework of a liberation movement. This emphasises the strategic importance of control over the narrative and principles of anti-zionism in the context of global decolonial efforts. As Steven Salaita points out in ‘Hamas is a Figment of Your Imagination’, zionism and liberal zionism continue to influence the shape of Palestinian resistance:
Zionists [have] a type of rhetorical control in the public sphere: they get to determine the culture of the native; they get to prescribe (and proscribe) the contours of resistance; they get to adjudicate the work of national liberation. Palestinians are entrapped by the crude and self-serving imagination of the oppressor.
We have to wrestle back our right to narration, and can use anti-zionist thought as a guide for liberation. We must reclaim anti-zionist praxis from those who would only use it as a headline in a fundraising email.
While our collective imaginations have not fully articulated what a liberated and decolonised Palestine looks like, the rough contours have been laid out repeatedly. Ask any Palestinian refugee displaced from Haifa, the lands of Sheikh Muwannis, or Deir Yassin – they will tell that a decolonised Palestine is, at a minimum, the right of Palestinians’ return to an autonomous political unit from the river to the sea.
When self-proclaimed ‘anti-zionists’ use rhetoric like ‘Israel-Palestine’ – or worse, ‘Palestine-Israel’ – we wonder: where do you think ‘Israel’ exists? On which land does it lay, if not Palestine? This is nothing more than an attempt to legitimise a colonial state; the name you are looking for is Palestine – no hyphen required. At a minimum, anti-zionist formations should cut out language that forces upon Palestinians and non-Palestinian allies the violence of colonial theft.
The settler/native relationship
Understanding the settler/native relationship is essential in anti-zionist organising. It means confronting the ‘settler’ designation in zionist settler-colonialism – a class status indicating one’s place in the larger settler-colonial systems of power. Anti-zionist discourse should critically challenge the zionist (re)framing of history through colonial instruments, such as the Oslo Accords and an over-reliance on international law frameworks, through which they differentiate Israeli settlers in Tel Aviv and those in West Bank settlements.
Suggesting that some Israeli cities are settlements while others are not perpetuates zionist framing, granting legitimacy to colonial control according to arbitrary geographical divisions in Palestine, and further dividing the land into disparate zones. Anti-zionist analysis understands that ‘settlers’ are not only residents of ‘illegal’ West Bank settlements like Kiryat Arba and Efrat, but also those in Safad and Petah Tikvah. Ask any Palestinian who is living in exile from Haifa; they will tell you the Israelis living in their homes are also settlers.
The common choice to centre the Oslo Accords, international humanitarian law, and the human rights paradigm over socio-historical Palestinian realities not only limits our analysis and political interventions; it restricts our imagination of what kind of future Palestinians deserve, sidelining questions of decolonization to convince us that it is the new, bad settlers in the West Bank who are the source of violence. Legitimate settlers, who reside within the bounds of Palestinian geographies stolen in 1948 like Tel Aviv and West Jerusalem, are different within this narrative. Like Breaking the Silence, they can be enlightened by learning the error of colonial violence carried out in service of the bad settlers. They can supposedly even be our solidarity partners – all without having to sacrifice a crumb of colonial privilege or denounce pre-1967 zionist violence in any of its cruel manifestations.
As a result of this course of thought, solidarity organisations often showcase particular Israelis – those who renounce state violence in service of the bad settlers and their ongoing colonisation of the West Bank – in roles as professionals and peacemakers, positioning them on an equal intellectual, moral, or class footing with Palestinians. There is no recognition of the inherent imbalance of power between these Israelis and the Palestinians they purport to be in solidarity with – stripping away their settler status. The settler is taken out of the historical-political context which afforded them privileged status on stolen land, and is given the power to delineate the Palestinian experience. This is part of the historical occlusion of the zionist narrative, overlooking the context of settler-colonialism to read the settler as an individual, and omitting their class status as a settler.
Misreading ‘decolonisation’
It is essential to note that Palestinians have never rejected Jewish indigeneity in Palestine. However, the liberation movement has differentiated between zionist settlers and Jewish natives. Palestinians have established a clear and rational framework for this distinction, like in the Thawabet, the National Charter of Palestine from 1968. Article 6 states, ‘The Jews who had normally resided in Palestine until the beginning of the Zionist invasion will be considered Palestinians.’
When individuals misread ‘decolonisation’ as ‘the mass killing or expulsion of Jews,’ it is often a reflection of their own entanglement in colonialism or a result of zionist propaganda. Perpetuating this rhetoric is a deliberate misinterpretation of Palestinian thought, which has maintained this position over a century of indigenous organising.
Even after 100 years of enduring ethnic cleansing, whole communities bombed and entire family lines erased, Palestinians have never, as a collective, called for the mass killing of Jews or Israelis. Anti-zionism cannot shy away from employing the historical-political definitions of ‘settler’ and ‘indigenous’ in their discourse to confront ahistorical readings of Palestinian decolonial thought and zionist propaganda.
The zionist version of ‘all lives matter’
As we see, settler-colonialism secures the position of the settler, imbuing them with rights, in this case, a divine right of conquest. As such, zionism ensures that settlers’ rights supersede those of indigenous people at the latter’s expense. Knowing this, the liberal slogan ‘equal rights for all people’ requires deeper consideration. Rather than placing the emphasis on the deconstruction of the settler state and the violence inherent to it, which eternally serves the settler to the direct detriment of indigenous communities, the slogan suggests that Palestinians simply need to secure more rights within the violent system. But ‘equal rights’, in the sense that those chanting this phrase mean them, will not come from attempts to rehabilitate a settler state. They can only be ensured through the decolonization of Palestine, through the material restitution of land and resources. Without further discussion, the slogan simply serves as another mechanism of zionism, one that maintains the rights of the settler rather than emphasising the need to restore rights to indigenous communities, who have long been the victims of settlers’ rights.
Anti-zionists cannot both denounce settler-colonialism and zionism, and centre advocacy on the claim that settlers should have equal, immutable rights. Zionists would have you believe that their state has always existed, that Israelis have always lived on the land. But a brief reference to recent history reminds us that anti-zionism must confront the ongoing mechanisms materially advancing the development of colonies in Palestine.
In 2022 alone, zionist institutions invested almost $100 million, transferring some 60,000 new settlers from Russia, Eastern Europe, the United States, and France to help secure a demographic majority and ensure a physical presence on indigenous lands. This only happens by maintaining the forced displacement of Palestinians, and by violently displacing them anew as we see on a daily basis, particularly across the rural West Bank.
There is no moral legitimacy in the suggestion that these settlers have a ‘right’ to live on stolen Palestinian land, the theft maintained by force, as long as there has been no restoration of Palestinians’ rights. No theories of justice exist in mainstream ethical or philosophical discourse that advocate for a person who has stolen something to rightfully keep what they have taken. The act of theft, by definition, violates the basic principles of theories of justice, which emphasise fairness, equitable distribution of resources, and respect for individual rights and property.
Reminding people that decolonisation is not a metaphor, some activists with Israeli citizenship, including Nadav Gazit and Yuula Benivolsky, have taken the initiative to tangibly support Palestinian liberation and renounced their claim to settler citizenship. When liberal NGOs champion ‘equal rights for all people’ with no further discussion of what this means, it is the zionist version of ‘all lives matter’, perpetuating – or at best, failing to question – the maintenance of systems of violence against Palestinians.
Having laid out some of the foundational concepts and definitions pertaining to zionism and anti-zionism, we can explore some essential strategies and tactics of anti-zionist organising.
Structural changes to support liberation
As anti-zionism necessitates the systematic dismantling of zionist structures, this process may include educational programs and protests, which serve as foundational activities. However, it is essential to be cautious of organising spaces and activities that become comfort zones for activists, lacking the necessary risk and meaningful challenges to existing structures of zionist violence. Anti-zionist organising must involve strategic policy and legal reform that support decolonisation from afar, such as targeting laws that enable international charities to fund Israeli settler militias and settlement expansion. After all, our aim from abroad should be to make structural changes to advance decolonisation, not simply shift public sentiment about Palestine.
Decolonial approaches abroad include changing the internal structures of institutions that support colonisation: charities, churches, synagogues, social clubs, and other donor institutions. This includes entities that many international activists are personally, professionally, and financially linked to, such as the nonprofits we coordinate with and large granting institutions like the Open Society Foundation and Carnegie Corporation of New York.
In the context of the United States, the most threatening zionist institutions are the entrenched political parties which function to maintain the status quo of the American empire, not Hillel groups on university campuses or even Christian zionist churches. While the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) engage in forms of violence that suppress Palestinian liberation and must not be minimised, it is crucial to recognise that the most consequential institutions in the context of settler-colonialism are not exclusively Jewish in their orientation or representation: the Republican and Democratic Party in the United States do arguably more to manufacture public consent for the slaughtering of Palestinians than the ADL and AIPAC combined. Even the Progressive Caucus and the majority of ‘The Squad’ are guilty of this.
Politicians, organisational leaders, and funding institutions must see the real political consequences of their decisions to support genocide. Reluctance within the executive leadership of international solidarity organisations to hold elected officials accountable is a red flag, as we cannot balance our loyalties between liberation and temporary political convenience. Anti-zionism requires more than political organising that is targeted at those intentionally maintaining white supremacy through zionism; it requires that we wager our access to power to dismantle mechanisms of oppression. We must stop betting on the longevity of zionism.
When we properly decouple zionism from Judaism and understand it as a process of indigenous erasure and primitive resource accumulation, the dominant political formations, the armaments industry, and the high-tech security sector are easily understood as indispensable institutions in the broader zionist project. These bodies also materially benefit from the status quo of zionist colonisation, and therefore wield their power to maintain it. This is part of a larger function of these formations to uphold white supremacy, imperialism, and colonialism globally – systems that harm all communities, albeit unequally. This helps us recognise that zionism does not serve to benefit Jewish people, even if this is not the primary reason we should abolish it. Equating global Jewish communities’ safety and prosperity with the safeguarding of colonial violence is an antisemitic and fallacious argument. It contends that in order to thrive, Jewish communities must displace, dominate, incarcerate, oppress, and murder Palestinians.
This relates to the earlier discussion of understanding Palestinians as the authors and caretakers of anti-zionist decolonial thought. We must be cautious not to portray anti-zionism as belonging in any exclusive way to Jewish activists, or requiring Jewish organisations’ initiative. Characterising anti-zionism as a practice necessarily spearheaded by Jewish activists, rather than acknowledging it as a decolonial praxis aimed at deconstructing the institutions maintaining the colonisation of Palestine, displaces Palestinian decolonial leadership. By placing undue emphasis on the role of Jewish organisations, we de-centre Palestinian knowledge, experience, and decolonial efforts in favour of non-Palestinian agencies. This is a grave error. Such a conflation not only misrepresents the objectives of anti-zionism but also inadvertently contributes to the continuation of antisemitic sentiments by equating Judaism and colonialism.
Bold solidarity
In summary, anti-zionism is not a slogan, but a process of decolonisation and liberation. Palestinians committed to resisting zionism and erasure are the caretakers of this political movement. Cities such as Tel Aviv and Modi’in are settlements, just like Itamar or Tel Rumeida in the West Bank. Decolonisation does not imply the displacement of all Jewish communities in Palestine; however, it is crucial to recognise that not every individual identifying as Jewish is indigenous to Palestine. This basic framework must be unabashedly articulated by anti-zionist organisations and allies in their advocacy. Anti-zionist organising should move towards dismantling the colonial structures through the changing of laws and policies of the institutions and formations most essential to the Israeli state project.
This essay is not an exhaustive manual; instead, it begins a much-needed conversation and presents central principles of anti-zionist praxis. These principles are non-negotiable and represent some of the markers of anti-zionist organising. These anti-zionist indicators should not be sprinkled about through emails or social media posts that one has to dig for, but should be glaringly evident in our work and analysis.
An organisation’s commitment to solidarity and conceptualisation of resistance should be transparent. Its ideals should be clear to potential newcomers as well as its donors. We have seen, too many times, organisations intentionally obfuscate what they stand for so they relate to a broad mass of people while at the same time being palatable to liberal donors. They use vague language about the future they envision, describing ‘equality, justice, and a thriving future for all Palestinians and Israelis’ without a thoughtful discussion of what Palestinians will need to reach this prosperity. The dual discourse phenomenon, where contradictory messages are conveyed to grassroots supporters and financial donors, is a manipulative tactic for institutional or personal gain. It should be clear from the onset that a group’s efforts have one ultimate goal: from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free. Anti-zionism and solidarity should be bold. Palestinians deserve nothing less.
Acknowledgements: We would like to thank Em Cohen and Omar Zahzah for their meticulous editing and thoughtful suggestions.
Leila Shomali is a Palestinian PhD candidate in International Law at Maynooth University Ireland and a member of the Good Shepherd Collective.
Lara Kilani is a Palestinian-American researcher, PhD student, and member of the Good Shepherd Collective.
Coming Thursday, May 17, will mark a month to the hunger strike, with over 2,000 Palestinian political prisoners in Israeli jails participating in it. As Israel refuses to accept the prisoners’ demands for their basic rights, including humane treatment, many of them face immediate risk of death as the world watches over in silence.
The prisoners have decided to live in dignity or starve to death in their isolation cells, and a global mobilization is urgently needed to break the deafening silence ! A month into the hunger strike, join a
Global 24-hour hunger strike
In front of Israeli embassies, consulates and UN offices
May 17, 2012
Endorse the Palestinian civil society call for a boycott of G4S due to its complicity in Israel’s violations of Palestinian prisoners’ rights
Background
More than two weeks ago, some 2,000 Palestinian prisoners have launched an open-ended hunger strike and their life is in danger. Their demands are simple and the strike’s slogan, echoing through the prison walls, is just as plain- freedom or death. The lives of all prisoners on strike are currently under danger, but among them is a smaller group, which has been striking for a longer period and whose lives are under immediate threat.
Thaer Halahleh and Bilal Diab have not eaten for more than 70 days – since the 29th of February. Israeli courts have rejected their appeals and refused to free them from administrative detention where they remain without charge or trial, subject to secret evidence and secret allegations. They are in critical condition.
Hassan Safadi has been refusing food since the 2nd of March, Omar Abu Shalal, 54, since the 4th of March, Mahmoud Sarsak, the only Gazan to have been incarcerated under Israel’s Illegal Combatants Law, since the 24th of March, Mohammed al-Taj, 40, also since the 24th of March and Ja’afar Ezzadeen, 41, since the 27th of march.
The Prisoners’ key demands include :
Ending the policy of solitary confinement and isolation ;
End to the use of administrative detentions ;
The restoration of visitation rights to families of prisoners from the Gaza Strip, a right that has been denied to all families for more than 6 years ;
Canceling ‘Shalit’ law, which restricts prisoners’ access to educational materials as punitive measure. The law remains intact despite a prisoner swap deal last October ;
Ending systematic humiliation, including arbitrary strip searches, nightly raids and collective punishment.
Palestinian prisoners on hunger strike have been hit hard with retaliation from Israel Prison Services, including beatings, transferring from one prison to another, confiscation of salt (an act that could have severe health consequences for hunger strikers), denial of family and lawyer visits, and isolation and solitary confinement of hunger strikers.
In response, Human Rights Watch issued a statement chiding Israel’s over its administrative detention policy ; it said, “It shouldn’t take the self-starvation of Palestinian prisoners for Israel to realize it is violating their due process rights.” Amnesty International also issued a call for urgent action from individuals around the world to contact Israeli authorities about Bilal Diab and Thaer Halahleh.
Emphasizing imprisonment as a critical component of Israel’s system of occupation, colonialism and apartheid practiced against the Palestinian people, Palestinian civil society and human rights organizations have called for intensifying the global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign to target corporations profiting directly from the Israeli prison system. In particular, we call for action to be taken to hold to account G4S, the world’s largest international security corporation, which helps to maintain and profit from Israel’s prison system, for its complicity with Israeli violations of international law.
Signed :
Popular Struggle Coordinating Committee
Palestinian BDS National Committee (BNC)
If the pen is mightier than the sword, what is the power — then — of a hundred pens?
Many of the world’s cartoonists are determined to find out.
Last week, Comic Riffs put out an open call to cartoonists: Now is the time for the brethren of the drawing board to pick up their pens and paintbrushes and digital pads in support of Ali Ferzat. This came after Ferzat, Syria’s popular political cartoonist, was adbucted and viciously beaten after criticizing the brutal regime of al-Assad; the photo of Ferzat in bed, his battered hands raised, quickly became as much of a visual lightning rod as a cartoon by Ferzat himself.
In response, Comic Riffs soon heard from many cartoonists, including Politico’s Matt Wuerker — who also represents the American Association of Editorial Cartoonists — and Bill Day of Cagle Cartoons. We also spoke with cartoonist Matt Bors , who helps run the excellent comics-journalism site Cartoon Movement.
Within the comics community, you could sense the groundswell. Commentators the globe over helped beat the drum of outrage, and the U.S. State Department even pointedly condemned the attack. But it was from among cartoonists that eventually sprung the rallying cry: “We Are All Ferzat.”
Over the weekend, Comic Riffs began linking to some art within the steady stream of cartoons. Today, we offer a gallery to spotlight eight of the most eye-catching artworks:
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1. NEXT MEDIA ANIMATION:
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The Taiwan-based animation house is, essentially, responding to the cartoonist responders themselves. Featured in this video are some of the actual pro-Ferzat cartoons, including those by the aforementioned Wuerker and Day.
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2. MATT WUERKER:
(MATT WUERKER – Politico) Politico’s Pulitzer-Prize finalist was among the first-responders who devoted his deft ink and watercolors to the Ferzat cause.
3. BILL DAY:
(BILL DAY – Cagle Cartoons) Day contacted Comic Riffs last Saturday to expressly answer the open call. Since then, his pointed cartoon has deservedly received wide exposure.
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4. SHERIF ARAFA:
(SHERIF ARAFA – Alittihad newspaper) Comic Riffs interviewed the talented Egyptian cartoonist during the Arab Spring, and he continues to be a pen to be reckoned with from his political hot-spot. On the Cartoon Movement comment thread, Arafa wrote: “Ferzat inspired me when I was a child, I owe him a lot.”
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5. NATE BEELER:
(NATE BEELER – Washington Examiner) The Washington Examiner’s gifted cartoonist offers this powerfully rendered work of art.
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6. TJEERD ROYAARDS:
(TJEERD ROYAARDS – Netherlands / Cartoon Movement) The Amsterdam cartoonist wrote on the Cartoon Movement comment thread: “I actually Googled for cartoons first because I was afraid someone had already thought of this idea…” No, Mr. Royaards — you’re the first we’ve seen to spin the pen/weapon metaphor with such satiric firepower.
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7. GIACOMO CARDELLI:
(GIACOMO CARDELLI – Italy / Cartoon Movement) The talented Italian writes: “The fall of Bashar al-Asad is only a matter of time (and human lives ).”
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8. RICK MCKEE:
(RICK MCKEE – Augusta Chronicle) Through his own line, the Augusta Chronicle cartoonist captures the power of a hundred pens. “We Are All Ferzat,” indeed.
[This campaign that we have been working very hard on for months is just
beginning. The week of activities will go on with all your help. We will
plan bigger and more dramatic events in the months to come. The collusion
of the governments and corporations in Israeli oxccupation and colonization
must be further exposed.]
‘Welcome to Palestine’ campaign responds to Israel’s denial of entrance to
international visitors who support human rights
Bethlehem and Jerusalem, July 7, 2011 – The Israeli authorities are
escalating attacks on anyone they suspect of participating in the peaceful
events of the ‘Welcome to Palestine’ campaign. Israeli authorities sent
hundreds of names to airline companies telling them to deny travel to
individuals on the list. Several people on the list who had booked flights
were sent letters from airline companies cancelling their reservations
‘based on a request from the Israeli authorities.’ We call on all airline
companies not to accept such provocative, blackmailing, and illegal actions
by the Israeli government. Ominously, Israeli Prime minister has directed
the interior security minister that the Israeli authorities must ‘act with
determination’ towards those who do make it to Ben Gurion Airport.
The visitors coming from the US and Europe on Friday are committed to the
principles of international and humanitarian law and believe strictly in
nonviolence. They were invited by dozens of Palestinian civil society
organizations and groups. They have stated that the only way to visit and
work with Palestinians is by passing through Israeli border controls. They
have declared their commitment to pass these border controls in an orderly,
peaceful and fully transparent way.
Before stepping onto the airplanes, the visitors will have passed through
meticulous security procedures at the various airports of origin and will
pose no threat in any way. The propaganda efforts to paint human rights
advocates as ‘hooligans’ and even ‘violent’ (an attempt to demonize and
dehumanize them in order to justify violence against them) is simply not
credible and indeed ridiculous. We are pleased that this episode further
exposes Israeli policies towards anything or anyone relating to
‘Palestinians’ as dictatorial, racist, and criminal and not complying with
basic elements of democracy or human rights.
Visitors traveling between countries have rights under international law and
bilateral travel agreements. Our foreign visitors insist that they must be
treated with respect in the same manner Israeli citizens receive when
traveling to their countries. Those who had reservations cancelled will
exercise their right of protest including bringing legal cases in their own
countries. We will also bring legal cases in Israeli courts under our
continued attempt to expose the racist policies of the Israeli government.
Several peaceful protests will be held at airports throughout Europe on the
8th of July and we urge all civilized people throughout the world to protest
these undemocratic moves to silence free speech and legal travel. We ask the
media to insist on access and fair reporting on Israeli tactics that are
against basic human rights of international solidarity activists before,
during and after they arrive at the Israeli airport. We demand Israel
publishes all instructions given to their ‘border control officials’
regarding visitors who intend to visit Palestinians.
The “Welcome to Palestine” campaign has been successful in exposing Israeli
attempts to isolate and imprison Palestinians and prevent international
visitors from coming to find out what is really happening on the ground.
Friday 8 July 2011 at 10 AM in Bethlehem Peace Center, located in Nativity
Square, we will have a Press Conference to announce further steps we will
take and to answer any questions.
Twitter: #PalSpring
Facebook: Welcome to Palestine
Jerusalem: Nikki or Laura, sergioyahni@gmail.com , +972 2 624 1159 or +972 2
624 1424
Berlin: Sophia Deeg, sophia_deeg@yahoo.de, +49(0) 30 88 007761
<file:///\\tel\%252B49%25280%2529%2030%2088%20007761> , +49 (0) 1799878414
<file:///\\tel\%252B49%20%25280%2529%201799878414> . 13:00 Press briefing;
beginning 13:30 news center, including (if possible) direct contact with the
travelers as they land at Ben Gurion airport. Filmbühne am Steinplatz,
Hardenbergstr. 12, Berlin Charlottenburg.
Paris: Nicolas Shahshahani, bienvenuepalestine@orange.fr +33 (0)1 42 94 39
94 <file:///\\tel\%252B33%20%25280%25291%2042%2094%2039%2094> and +33 (0) 6
73 38 24 84 <file:///\\tel\%252B33%20%25280%2529%206%2073%2038%2024%2084> .
The press office will answer questions from the media around the clock.
Security dragnet prompted by Israeli release of list of blacklisted passengers to European carriers.
A pro-Palestine activist at Charles De Gaulle Airport holds a sign that reads: “Hinderance to free movement. On what grounds?” [Reuters]
Nearly 100 French activists en route to Israel have been stopped from boarding their flights by French authorities in Paris.
Stranded at Charles De Gaulle Airport, the activists have staged a protest denouncing the French authorities’ action.
“They have staged a noisy protests at the airport, shouting ‘Collaborators, collaborators!’ to condemn the French authorities for their action,” our correspondent said on Friday.
The Welcome to Palestine movement includes an estimated 600 people and around half of the activists destined for the West Bank town of Bethlehem are reportedly French nationals.
Al Jazeera’s Cal Perry, reporting from Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion international airport, said: “Across airports in Europe, we understand that a blacklist of passengers has been released. The Israelis are asking airlines to stop people from boarding planes. But the Israelis are saying those people will be deported anyway.”
View Al Jazeera’s in depth coverage
Earlier Israel deployed 600 additional police officers at the already heavily guarded Ben Gurion airport and asked European airlines to bar “potential troublemakers” from Tel Aviv-bound flights in anticipation of the arrival of hundreds of pro-Palestinian activists.
Following the warnings, “the companies have already refused to take on board around 200 of these passengers”, Sabine Hadad, an Israeli immigration spokeswoman, told the AFP news agency.
Two US activists who had arrived overnight were sent back to the US, she said.
Eight activists were blocked from boarding a Malev Airlines flight in Paris on Thursday.
Philippe Arnaud, one of those turned away, has led calls to boycott Israeli products in France.
He said Malev, a Hungarian airline, showed him a list provided by Israeli authorities of some 329 people being barred from Israel, which holds complete control over who can enter and exit the West Bank.
Organisers of the “Welcome to Palestine” movement, which some describe as a “flytilla” in reference to a parallel maritime protest flotilla, say they hope to spend a week visiting Palestinian families.
Expected to arrive in Israel late on Thursday and on Friday, the activists say they are on a peaceful mission to draw attention to the plight of Palestinians living under Israeli occupation.
Cautious measures
Israel has been wary of entanglement with foreign activists since its naval commandos attacked passengers aboard an international Gaza-bound flotilla last year, killing nine people.
Micky Rosenfeld, the Israeli police spokesman, said officers deployed at Ben Gurion airport have been prepared to deal with scenarios such as airport officials being attacked or activists settings themselves on fire.
Our correspondent earlier reported from Jerusalem that Israel aimed to counter the activists with an equivalent number of additional airport police.
“Six hundred-nine hundred people is generally the number people think are going to come in. [Israeli authorities] say they have the names of half,” Perry said.
Israel is known for its strict airline security, beginning with check-ins on incoming flights and officials claim they have sophisticated intelligence procedures in place to identify potential threats.
It remains unclear how many activists would be denied entry after landing at the airport.
Israel says it will not stop people because of their political beliefs and that it will bar people who plan to carry out illegal or violent acts.
Rosenfeld said airport facilities could hold as many as 80 detainees, and that any overflow would be sent to a prison in southern Israel.
European activists
The airborne activists have denied any direct connection with the latest attempt to breach the Gaza blockade, which appears to have largely fizzled out this week after flotilla ships were held up by mysterious malfunctions and refusal by Greek authorities to let the vessels set sail from its ports.
Organisers of the flights to Tel Aviv say their people will tour the West Bank in solidarity with the Palestinians.
Some, the organisers said, would take part in routine Friday protests against Israel in East Jerusalem and the West Bank.
In Europe, German federal police said as long as passengers had valid tickets and passports, they had no grounds to stop any activists at airports there.
But German authorities also said that German citizens of Palestinian descent would not be allowed into Israel.
The vast majority of Palestinians are barred from using Israel’s airport.
Two German airlines, flagship carrier Lufthansa and Air Berlin, said on Thursday they received lists of people from Israel who are not allowed into the country.
“[Lufthansa] is obliged not to transport any passengers who do not hold valid entry permits or whose entry into the respective state has been denied by local authorities beforehand as in this case,” Patrick Meschenmoser, a company spokesman, said on Thursday.
Yigal Palmor, spokesman for Israel’s foreign ministry, confirmed that the list had been made available to carriers, who are liable to repatriate at their own expense passengers refused entry at their destination.
“The organisers did not come with any intention of demonstrating at the airport or doing anything like that,” Mazin Qumsiyeh, a Palestinian-American professor, said.
“Israeli authorities made the mistake of mobilising security on people who are obviously not a security threat.”
Press Release 2: “Welcome to Palestine” Organizers decry Israeli propaganda
efforts and threats of mass deportation
Bethlehem and Jerusalem 5 July 2011–The organizers of the “Welcome to
Palestine” initiative decry the numerous attempts by Israeli and other media
to distort our message and planned activities. There were messages claiming
that we are attempting to reach Gaza by going to Lod Airport (aka Ben Gurion
airport) on July 8. Some claimed that this initiative came after the
flotilla was blocked. Others claimed our visitors want to disrupt things at
the airport and some even claimed they will try to take over planes. These
claims and many others being circulated are false; we urge media not to
disseminate false statements.
As stated in our first press release: we invited international guests,
including families, to visit us in Palestine. We hope and expect the
Israeli authorities to allow them safe passage in compliance with
International law and normal diplomatic bilateral protocols. We also reject
the Israeli government threat to engage in mass deportation of peace
activists and the apparent attempt justify this unjustifiable action by
using rumors that they spread.
We are accessible to the media and encourage them to speak with the actual
organizers and participants of this peaceful initiative. Journalists will
be flying with us, and we encourage more journalists to join us and to
report on what actually happens (without innuendos and propaganda efforts –
Israeli hasbara).
Our visitors are coming to Palestine with a nonviolent approach to peace
building and conflict resolution, with full respect of the universal
declaration of human rights. We urge the Israeli authorities to allow the
journalists to have access to our participants and to report the true story
of “Welcome to Palestine.”
Inviting Palestinians and internationals to join us is our right as people
under colonial occupation who yearn to be free.
Some journalists are flying with our visitors and we invite all journalists
who want to exercise their right to free press to fly in of the 8th of July
to Palestine.
We will have a press conference Friday July 8 at 10 AM at the Bethlehem
Peace Center in Bethlehem.
Ending the policy of solitary confinement and isolation ;
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