to contribute to our next issue, please email olymovementmag@proton.me
MOVEMENT MAG is a declaration.
MOVEMENT MAG feels the thrumming of a local movement for a free Palestine here in so-called Olympia, WA (the traditional lands and waters of Squaxin/Coast Salish peoples and their relatives). We’ve felt it growing here -- slowly, consciously, surely -- since the events of October 7, 2023. Neighbors have been leaving their individual lives and coming together at weekly vigils and community meetings; overcoming the anxieties that come with being in political spaces; coming back to each other; to become a part of something bigger than ourselves. Because we see what’s happening, what keeps happening.
We say that we have to do something.
We see the tender sprouts of this movement breaking ground, and we want to nurture them. We know that tender sprouts are not enough in the face of such horror (bombardment, displacement, disablement; destruction of homes, bodies, ways of life; the tens of thousands of innocents lost). Still we plant the seed and try to grow something.
We say that we must not be useless.
Especially as people living in the United States, whose military, political, and financial support makes this genocide possible. And even despite the privilege of living in the United States, most of us are still members of the exploited classes, our lives made to fit into the interests of capital, nation, white supremacy. Many of us feel lucky just to be sheltered from the worst of it. We try to live our lives through small freedoms, while knowing that this freedom is not truly free. What’s stopping us from wanting more?
We say that a better world is possible.
We hope to bring about a world that is truly better, where the preciousness of life does not have to be mixed up with the horror of living under a government that enables and profits from genocide. This, the same government that regularly lets its most vulnerable live and die suffering. This is why we see our freedom as bound up with the people of Palestine. If we can work together to throw off the forces holding us all down, we can work together to build a new world on our own terms.
We say there is work to do.
In the meantime, there is much work to be done, and it will require all of us to chip in. Here in the United States we suffer a crisis of individualism via segregation, which inevitably seeps into our organizing spaces. We must be willing to learn to overcome this. We must be willing to learn what it means to be a part of a social movement. It will not always be pretty; real learning often is not. It will take all of us choosing to come back together, time after time, to keep learning with each other. It will be only through this deep commitment that we can build the power to bring about our desired ends: a free Palestine, and a world in which Palestine can be free. The transformation of these social conditions will not happen overnight, or maybe any time soon. We need to see each other as accomplices and comrades for the long run.
We say that we are here, this is what we believe, this is what we are doing, and this is what we are fighting for.
For now, MOVEMENT MAG is just a zine, and who knows its fate beyond this first edition. We know that, as things stand, we are missing folks in our movement. We know that we don’t have all of the relationships we need. But we hope that MOVEMENT MAG can be a space to find each other -- to build and nurture the relationships we’ll need for the long fight to come.
We say that the future is ours to make.
In solidarity,
The Palestine Action of South Sound (PASS) Zine Collective
PALESTINE IS FREE
Background art from “A Child’s View from Gaza” collection, drawn by children who lived through the 2008-2009 Israeli bombardment of Gaza. The collection was censored before its first exhibition at the Museum of Children’s Art in Oakland, CA.
War is not acceptable. Murder is not acceptable. Genocide is not acceptable. Correcting errors of the past by bombing people to death is absolutely not acceptable. Better options (commands!):
You shall not covet, steal or murder.
Honor EVERYONE’s mother and father.
At times difficult, but ever so rewarding:
Love thy neighbor as yourself
Do unto others as ….
There is enough if we share.
If you steal people’s lives it will come back to you.
If you give love freely it comes back to you.
Tell me it’s not genocide
And that the sun won’t rise tomorrow
And that the rivers will never again run red
And that the fruit of the vine is not blessed
Tell me it’s not genocide
And to forget about the lambs blood
And to obey the Pharaoh
And to drown in the Red Sea
Saving $$ on foreign aid is not easy, but it is simple. Stop sending medical aid.
How?
Stop sending weapons.
Medical aid cannot reverse the deadly effect of even one bullet. Defense Contractors Profit When People Die.
Let’s re-tool and produce high quality tools for living. Imagine what cool cars or pre-fab houses Boeing could produce!
--from chingalamigra360
On Friday December 15, 2023, there was an action at the Eastside Olympia, WA, RE/MAX office.
This action was organized old-school style. Kept off social media, word of mouth and distribution of printed flyers got the word out.
On the day of the action, dozens of people gathered and received chant sheets and leaflets detailing RE/MAX’s complicity in Israeli apartheid. After a brief announcement and explanation of logistics, the crowd moved in silence on the way to the RE/MAX office building.
The Palestine solidarity protesters disrupted the real estate corporation and delivered a letter, demanding that RE/MAX stop buying and selling real estate in stolen Palestinian territories of the West Bank and East Jerusalem. The group chanted, drowning out the complaints of a neighboring corporation’s office workers.
Afterwards, a fleet of city police SUVs arrived on the scene. The police locked down the nearby food co-op and prevented grocery shoppers from leaving the area for over an hour until they eventually and unjustly arrested three people. All have been released on bail.
RE/MAX LLC is a multinational real estate corporation based out of Denver, CO. RE/ MAX Israel has been operating since 1995, and is the largest real estate network in Israel. RE/MAX Israel operates a licensed RE/MAX office in the Israeli settlement of Ma’ale Adumim in occupied Palestinian territory. This and their other Israeli offices sell and rent real estate in all the major West Bank settlements and in occupied East Jerusalem. RE/MAX Israel is a franchise of the larger RE/MAX, LLC and pays recurring fees and a percentage of their sales revenue to their RE/MAX parent company.
RE/MAX is a corporation that contributes to housing scarcity and gentrification worldwide. Domestically, they are a major player in raising the cost of living for renters and first-time home buyers. In Israel and Palestine, their business goes beyond the classic gentrification playbook. Israel’s occupation is a history of violent land grabs against the people of Palestine.
CONCLUSION
--from pseudacris
Demonstrators participated in an action on February 11th in solidarity with Palestine. They met at 1 p.m. at the Eastside St. SE Bridge (Woodland Trailhead Bathroom). When demonstrators arrived, there were three police cars at the meeting location, but they were there for another disruption that had occurred previously. Shortly after the police left, the group decided to continue with the banner drop and were there for just under 2 hours. The banner drop went smoothly, and the only event that occurred was an incident report vehicle that came around half way through the demonstration and warned the demonstrators that they could not have banners tied to the bridge but that in the future they can use poles to hold the banners up by the bridge. There was some nervousness around continuing safely, but the demonstrators decided to continue with the banner drop as planned. There is another banner drop planned for March 5th; the bridge location and exact time are still being discussed.
As activists and dissidents around the world continue to denounce and fight against the forces carrying out the genocide in Gaza, in addition to finding vulnerable points in the global war machine, we will need to put increasingly more of our attention to our own organization. Our prolonged resistance and its eventual success will require our own protagonism to be a more important factor than the errors and weaknesses of our antagonists. We can never expect to win just by outsmarting the enemy or assuming that we see something that they don’t; we have to outlast them. However, this does not at all mean that it’s useless or a waste of capacity to repeatedly make sharp attacks to the weak points of the machine. Through these various “instances” of struggle, these smallscale battles brought on by attacks coming from multiple angles,the various micro resistance actions will be able to develop into a social force which is larger and more effective than any one act. And it is by coordinating these moments over time that we will develop a Popular Power with international influence, capable of bringing an end to capitalism, colonialism, and imperialism.
The different actions around the world attempting to impede the killing of Palestinians have been dynamic and unpredictable because they have tended to be context specific. Preventing the loading of arms on a ship that happens to be in a local port or blockading highways in a major city are both examples of actions that are specific to time and place. They don’t make sense everywhere and aren’t always possible. While this has sometimes been a tactical benefit, it has also meant that the resistance is easily divided into powerless fragments. The variety of possible attacks complicates the task for repressive and reactionary forces from the State, but it also limits the overall effect of these small battles. If we don’t start to imagine the federation of these micro forces politically, we will continue to lose to more coordinated forces organized by the war industry and the state governments.
Some of us have been on the front lines, organizing combative actions that initiate conflict. But we’ve seen how even successful front-line efforts have a limited existence. These unavoidable ebbs and flows create political cycles that imply a natural coordination between front-line and rear-guard forces. It’s time to practice shifting gears. By changing more smoothly between confronting the enemy during a conflict and organizing ourselves during lulls, we can start to generate power, which can be understood literally as force applied over time. The full potential of our forces will be a combination of various tactical cells that can connect their attacks to the broader, more steady work of organizing, educating, and relationship
building. This will allow seemingly unrelated parts of the movement to becoome involved in the same project of keeping the cycle moving. Riding the waves of this cycle will help active militants to more easily “tap in” and back out again to recover, prolonging their commitment. And regularly “changing gears” will imprint a model of performance on the movement that will have no use for rigid, dogmatic commitment to tactics.
A front-line/rear-guard strategy like this won’t immediately exclude people like parents and caretakers involved in reproductive labor in the home. They should be on our side too! The same goes for all kinds of workers and tenants,especially people disabled by the conditions on the front line. We have to practice popular protagonism of the masses, not just small victories of able-bodied, young activists. But to do that we will need to move beyond the well-known practice of “lower-case o” organizing which keeps us at the level of a bunch of “mini” forces, none of which is remotely capable of affecting the conjuncture of forces that include the US and Israeli militaries among others. Without popular organization, our resistance movement won’t have autonomy, which is the fruit of collective force and solidarity. Instead, we will be left with atomized strikes which are the result of disorganization and repression. By intentionally participating in and anticipating the cycles, we’ll create a new culture, and instead of demanding that politicians solve the problems they created, we’ll be the protagonists in our own struggle. We’ll do it ourselves!
This begins locally, but it has to spread. The trouble is that, on the front line, the priorities are very particular and don’t apply outside of the most immediate conflict. On top of that, the rear guard can’t see anything that’s happening up there, at least not for themselves. They’re left to decide how to act in solidarity with those at the front. In this way, the international community is in a rear-guard position as it relates to the atrocities taking place in Gaza. Our exposure to images and stories does not put us in that situation. We aren’t making decisions from that context, and since our circumstances are different, our protagonism looks different. There is no use in competing amongst ourselves to be at the front of the struggle since we’re all spectators to the bombing and the killing. It would be a gross mistake to confuse the front lines of our localized battles with the front lines of genocide. From where we are, the best we can do is try to be in solidarity with the resistance. And while this absolutely means taking up the responsibility for our own actions, we should never overlook the protagonism of others who are resisting at different points in different ways. Laser focus on the real enemies, movement between different fighting positions, continual cycling through modes of struggle, inevitable ebbs and flows of conflict, these are the revolutionary gymnastics that we call anarchism. And this is our “coordinated-gear strategy” for continuing to fight at every point of the cycle.
School aged children have immense potential to be strong comrades within the fight for liberation of all people, water and land. Many groups fail to get creative about how to invite participation and endorse the ideas and movements of youth in their community. Children are magic, because they are new to Earth. Anyone who is new to any space can make observations that those who have been here longer, may completely miss. Children can remind us to slow down, and they invite adults to make events and ideas accessible to all.
Throughout history and presently, children have served as powerful witnesses and participants in social movements. Currently on the ground in Gaza, nine year old journalist Lama Jamous (@lama_jamous9 on IG) has been reporting the terror unfolding during the genocide. Lama is providing pertinent updates to the rest of the world, all while modeling to other children their potential and power. Her small frame is at times, made smaller by the bulky press vest she proudly wears. Our Western eyes and perception may compulsively dismiss this “goofy” image of “a child doing an adult’s job”, but it’s unwise and unsustainable of us to only do so. We must retrain our Western brains to legitimize and respect children as whole, worthy people capable of perspective, action and change. Additionally, on the 29th of January, six year old Hind Rajab was the only person who remained alive in a vehicle that had been brutally targeted by the Israeli Occupation Forces in Gaza. In the car, she had access to a phone, and was able to contact the Red Crescent Paramedics. She was forced to become her own leader in an extended moment of terror. She stayed on the phone for hours until the phone lost connection. An ambulance crew attempted to reach her, only to be targeted by the IOF themselves. Hind’s body was found after 12 days of efforts to rescue her. Despite the trauma of enduring a genocide for over 100 days, and watching her family perish in front of her eyes, Hind knew how to use a phone. She knew who to call. She took steps to save her life. Someone taught her how to do those things. Let us teach children how to believe in themselves, and their ability to problem solve in various conditions, by not constantly questioning their methods and ideas. May we raise and nurture children in a way that allows them to act confidently and vulnerably. We can do this by giving children ample control over day to day choices, and present opportunities which invite them to put their ideas into action.
There are obvious barriers we face in the goal of collaborating with children as fellow revolutionaries, posed by the complex and unfor-
Lama Jamous
Hind Rajab
giving social systems and structures we live under. Adults dominate and exploit one another, as well as children, on individual and collective levels. Parents trying to survive their own exploitation are additionally tasked with figuring out how to best steward their children, who exist in ways that are not necessarily convenient for efficiency or productivity under capitalism. Our society criminalizes adults and children for not having enough resources, while failing to provide families with housing, nutrition, among other basic needs.This has been going on for many, many generations. The cycle of survival and abuse by the government is the hallmark of an American childhood, and it leaves most adults feeling traumatized from their childhood experience. There’s more to be said, too, about the powerful vulnerability that children experience the world through, which can trigger many different, complex reactions and behaviors within adults, e.g., appreciation, patronization, PTSD, impatience, anger, violence, fear, etc. In a culture that is fixated on punishment and control, children can serve as the ultimate punching bag for structural problems. It is, in most spaces, socially acceptable to speak about children in a way that completely dehumanizes them. Many accept that hating our own childhood and then hating children is a rite of passage in America. We’ve heard “you don’t hate Mondays, you just hate capitalism”, but could we evolve to say “you don’t have kids, you just hate how capitalism ruined your childhood and the relationship you have with your parents?”
At the same time, there is immense hope in recognizing that these attitudes are not inherent to our relationship with children. These fraught dynamics are unnatural to our bodies. Much like colonization and imperialism is unnatural to the water, trees and birds. Like many norms, we are conditioned to feel this way about children, and we can reflect on our own childhood and how it was stifled by a variety of American systems. How might these reactions to children be similar to our society’s attitudes towards those who are vulnerable at large? How could things be transformed if we saw ourselves in solidarity with children? How could we as adults start to build a practice of solidarity with children?
Reflecting on our own childhood, or the American childhood in general, is a meaningful place to start. Ask yourself: did you feel valued and supported growing up? What power, if any at all, did you have as a child within your home? How were local and/or world politics addressed at home? How were vulnerable people, such as disabled people, or elders, viewed or spoken about while you were growing up? What did you need but didn’t receive growing up? IInitiating the healing of our inner child, and addressing emotions that come up is integral to revolutionary work. How can we truly address the needs of others, if we can’t address the needs of our own inner child? Can we show up as the adult that we needed in our community when we were children ourselves? A worthwhile next step is creating or increasing proximity to children.
Ask a child about their experience in the world thus far. Ask them what they think about their school, neighborhood, or town. 90% of a person’s brain forms between birth and three years old. They aren’t usually as emotionally attached to ideas, concepts and identity in the same way that adults are. Their fluidity, willingness and excitement to evolve can serve as a strong example for the adults who quite literally have harder, less flexible brains due to age and/or trauma. Welcome their invitation to see the world with fresh eyes. At the same time, we must also accept the inherent power and capacity imbalance within the relationship between children and adults. We must accept our different abilities, different levels of experience, and different capacities physically, cognitively and emotionally. We must approach these comrades with the utmost ethics, considering their special vulnerability in our society.
In times of revolution and movement building, children can serve as an ever present reminder that we must keep faith alive. They serve as a reminder for how far we’ve come, or haven’t, in our personal growth and struggle. If anything, children will deal with the aftermath of the fallen empire longer than adults will. Children all over, including Lama and Hind in Gaza, had no choice being born into a world that is crumbling and shaking. They had no choice, just like we had no choice. None of us had a choice, but we are all here. So what are we going to do, give up? Continue to live in the same destructive interpersonal patterns? Just like the oppressors want us to? We owe it to each other, and to children especially, to do deep emotional work to strengthen our capacity for collaboration with folks more vulnerable than us. Let us allow children to hold up the mirror to our egos. They can reflect the worst and best parts of us. We can gaze into the mirror, find ourselves within the reflection, and look back at ourselves with love. One thing I know for sure, is that revolution will only be possible as long as we feel love for ourselves and each other.
Protest demonstration at Am’ari refugee camp, Khamis ‘Awad, age 13
Background art used in this spread were created by Palestinian children during the first Intifada in 1987.
The harvest, ‘Issa ‘Yacoub, age 12
Israel is the West’s solution to the conflict between Jews and white supremacy. While many Jews are not white, the popular Jewish image that Israel claims to protect is founded in its participation in society as a European state. Regardless of how its citizens identify, the Israeli state is a European invention and thus it operates as a European state. Its origins are in a series of political maneuvers by European leaders between the late 19th and early 20th century, the most decisive of which was the Balfour Declaration, which proclaimed Britain’s support for creating a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Israel competes in Eurovision, their soccer team plays in the European conference, and Israel is an associated state of the EU. These are all things that would have been impossible for Jews of the 19th and early 20th century because they were stateless ethnic Others. Israel claims to solve this problem, but instead of forcing Europe to systemically include people who aren’t white and Christian, it has allied itself to western imperial powers, rendering Judaism as a tool to be harnessed for expanding Western imperial control.
For as long as “Europe” has existed, it has had the goal of homogenizing everyone within it in order to maintain its image as pure, white, and civilized. The Spanish inquisition, the displacement of Scandinavia’s Sami people, France’s hijab ban, and the Holocaust have all been part of this project. The creation of Israel by Europe has nothing to do with the liberation of Jews, and everything to do with the liberalization of ‘The Jew.’ With a colonial state backed by Western powers to represent the Western image of Jews, Western states could avoid radically changing their political structure to include Jews and other Orientalized peoples while still disparaging the undeniable evil that came out of the Holocaust. Israel allows the liberal West to see itself as charitably fighting against tyranny when really all Israel does is neutralize the Jew as a threat to western hegemony and exploit Jewish identity to reap a twisted from of reparations whereby since Jews were colonized, victims of genocide, and displaced, Israel now gets to do the same to Palestinians.
It’s really frustrating to see fellow Jews turn their back on our Palestinian siblings. By supporting Israel, we give up so much of our Jewishness. Our opposition to fascism, values of liberation, and morals of acceptance, love, and self-determination are all squandered by Israel. As for non-Jews supporting Israel: we don’t want a colonial ethno-state. We are not protected by it. We are not served by it. Israel only serves the West, and making actual Jews do the same is not the service it supposes itself to be.
What’s happening in Gaza is not a two-sided battle. This is not the Jews vs. the Palestinians. It is an oppressive regime causing incalculable suffering falsely in the name of Jewish security and a responding resistance movement. Obviously war is terrible; innocent deaths are terrible. No one is saying otherwise. Our resistance to Israel does not come from a place of hate for the Israeli citizens that have suffered from the violence their state is perpetrating, but rather from a place of solidarity with the tens of thousands of Palestinians that have been killed by Israel, with the millions that have lost their homes to the Israeli occupation, and with the billions worldwide that have suffered at the hands of settler colonialism and apartheid—a pair that symbiotically produce Israel. If not for both, there would be only Palestine.
Our resistance to Israel is our call for peace because Israel is an inherently violent state. When we said “Never Again” we meant it. And despite that, Israel seems to think it’s allegiance to the West does more for Jews than the radical liberation movement that Palestinians have been mounting for decades. We denounce Israel’s fallaciousness and instead assert the truth: the greatest hope for Jewish liberation lies within the liberation of Palestine. We understand that when your liberation becomes bound up in another’s oppression, you will never be free—so we strive for liberation of all peoples, starting right now with Palestine and ending with nobody. Free Palestine!
Art by Ricardo Levins Morales
Feb. 21, 2024 (presented at Jewish Perspectives on the Israeli War on Palestine Forum)
peterbohmer@gmail.com | sites.evergreen.edu/peterbohmer
My Jewish background and responsibility cause me to support the Palestinian struggle against the Israeli occupation of Palestine including Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Since 1973, I have actively opposed U.S. military aid for Israel, and been in solidarity with Palestine.
I mourn the deaths of over 30,000 people murdered in southern Israel and Gaza over the last 19 weeks, 1200 in Israel, mainly by Hamas, 30,000 Palestinians in Gaza and 400 Palestinians in the West Bank. 12,500 children have been killed by Israel. Per capita, that would be 2 million children killed in the U.S. 25 Palestinians have been killed for each Israeli. There are also eight thousand Gazans under the rubble from the Israeli bombings.
My parents grew up in Vienna, Austria. The German Nazis invaded in spring 1938. My dad was incarcerated by the Austrian Nazis and frequently beaten. He was imprisoned for being “political” and Jewish. He was released after four months. My parents escaped a few days later to France.
My parents wanted to leave Europe because they expected an imminent Nazi invasion of France. They were finally admitted to the U.S. in June 1939. My grandfather and many relatives were killed in concentration camps.
Antisemitism has been prevalent all over Europe and to a lesser extent, the U.S. It continues today although less systemic. Many Jewish people as a response have seen their liberation and fair treatment as integrally connected with the liberation of all people, e.g., Karl Marx, Rosa Luxemburg, Noam Chomsky, many socialist Jews, in the civil rights and anti-apartheid movement and Palestine Solidarity movement.
Because of this history of oppression, I grew up believing Jewish people wouldn’t oppress others. I was naïve. Most Jews in Israel and globally support a Jewish dominated state; one where Palestinians are systematically displaced and treated less than equal within Israel; and less than human on the land Israel occupied in 1967. When you take someone’s land or enslave them, as what also happened in the U.S., the dominant group justifies it.
Zionism also means the right of return for anyone around the world who is Jewish while hundreds of thousands of Palestinians and their millions of descendanrs
who were expelled from Israel’s 1948 created borders aren’t allowed to return. Most of the population of Gaza were forced out of Israel in 1948 and their children and grandchildren live there. A Jewish dominated State where Palestinians have lived for millennia is Jewish supremacy.
I am anti-Zionist which is fundamentally different from anti-Jewish. The Israeli government, many Republican and Democratic Party leaders and most Jewish groups in the U.S. try to undermine criticisms of Israel and support for Palestinian self-determination by calling criticism of Israel, antisemitic. Zionism means a Jewish State where the laws, educational system and major institutions favor Jewish people, and Palestinians are second class or non-citizens. Antisemitism is real and has grown because of the Israeli invasion. It should be opposed but don’t allow Zionists to define you as antisemitic because you are Anti-Zionist.
Apologists claim the focus on Israel’s human rights violations is antisemitic because other countries commit worse violations, e.g., Saudi Arabia. This isn’t antisemitic; it is important that Israel be criticized. Rather than lessening our condemnation of Israel, let’s increase our denunciations of other violators. No country today is a worse violator than Israel. “The number of people facing possible starvation in the Gaza Strip in the coming weeks is the largest share of a population at risk of famine identified anywhere since a United Nations-affiliated panel created the current global food-insecurity assessment 20 years ago” (Stephanie Nolen, New York Times, January 12, 2024). According to Robert Mape, a military historian, “Gaza is one of the most intense civilian punishment campaigns in history” (Julia Frankel, Associated Press, January 11, 2024). The impending Israeli invasion of Gaza is likely to kills 10’s of thousands more Palestinians.
It is urgent we in the U.S. oppose the ongoing and growing Islamophobia and racism towards Palestinians and the repression of pro-Palestinian voices in our government, universities, and mass media. Let’s support all whose jobs are being threatened because they are speaking up. Of course, oppose antisemitism but don’t minimize Islamophobia.
It’s not an exaggeration to call the Israeli occupation, apartheid; and Gaza an open-air prison that has become a concentration camp. Violence and displacement by Israeli settlers and the IDF of Palestinians have increased in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Groups such as Amnesty International, and the Israeli human rights group, B’Tselem use these terms although we seldom find them in the mainstream media or by U.S. politicians.
This doesn’t justify the killing of Israeli civilians, but history didn’t begin with what happened on Saturday, October 7th but with British colonialism and the 1948 Nakba (forced removal of Palestinians) and Israeli occupation of the rest of Palestine after the 1967 war. Moreover, Israel’s revenge, mass murder, starvation and collective punishment of Palestinians including the 17-year blockade of Gaza is a war crime and will not bring security to Jews.
All Israeli governments, Labor, Likud, Netanyahu, and the recent Israeli social movement that opposed the Netanyahu government’s increasing authoritarianism are rejectionist. They don’t accept Palestinians as equals, nor Palestinian self-determination, neither in the past nor present.
Whether it’s one state or a real two state solution, it must center economic and political justice and equality for all, especially but not limited to Palestinians. This includes the right of Palestinians to return to inside the 1948 borders that Israel imposed. I believe most Palestinian groups, including Hamas would accept this (see, Hamas Contained by Tareq Baconi). Israel should also pay reparations.
Since 1967, the U.S. has supported the illegal, immoral occupation of the West Bank, the annexation of East Jerusalem. The U.S. has since October 7th, including yesterday, February 20th, vetoed UN resolutions calling for a permanent cease fire and negotiations. The U.S. provides $3.8 billion dollars of military aid annually and has committed to continue this through 2029. Biden has proposed an additional $14 billion of military aid to Israel with little opposition in Congress. His administration is sending additional weapons without getting congressional approval.
Rather than supporting a cease fire now and negotiations, the Biden administration by its actions given Israel carte blanche to continue its invasion of Gaza with no conditions put on US aid. It has become an Israel and U.S. war against Palestine and its allies.
The more we actively support the end of the Israeli occupation and U.S. support for Israel, the more we have the right to criticize the Hamas killings and taking of over 200 hostages. The hostages should be freed, but so should the many thousands and rapidly growing number of Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
I differ from the few groups who justify the October 7th murder of Israeli civilians by the Hamas led attack. But let us not center and focus primarily on October 7th and minimize what Israel did before and after that day. The killing of Israeli civilians, especially those and their descendants who fled the Nazi control of Europe is wrong. Many of them were not granted permission to immigrate to other countries because of antisemitism and had no place else to go but Palestine. This does not justify the forced displacement of Palestinians but makes Israel somewhat different from other settler colonialism.
I am critical of those who ignore or worse, support the mass Israeli killing, directly by massive bombing and ongoing military invasion. Also, indirectly by blocking most food, water, electricity, fuel and medical supplies from getting in. To defend Israel’s genocidal policies by calling it self-defense or collateral
damage is horrendous. The Israeli starvation of the Gazan population, the forced displacement of 90% of its population and the resulting spread of contagious diseases and the destruction of hospitals will cause far more deaths this year than the bombing and shootings. The planned Israeli invasion of Rafah is likely to kill tens of thousands of Palestinians. It is an Israeli war on the people of Gaza, not mainly Hamas.
On January 12th, South Africa presented its case charging Israeli with genocide against Gaza to the International Court of Justice (ICJ). South Africa documented the various elements needed to make the legal case that Israel’s policy was genocidal, i.e., 1) Israel’s intent to destroy a group of people; and 2) Physical acts that carried out this intention. 50 countries signed on. The ICJ made a finding there is a real possibility of genocide and Israel must stop its attacks until the case is decided. This ruling strengthens the case for a permanent cease fire and the end of US military aid to Israel. (For the full text, see Jewish Voice for Peace.)
Israel claims a Zionist State is the only security for Jews around the world. Long run security cannot be based on the oppression and domination of another people. People will rise up. The Hamas attack of October 7th shows the limits of this immoral strategy of Israel. Even if Israel destroys Hamas, oppression breeds resistance and Israel will eventually be defeated. Moreover, this security state strategy moves Israeli people further to the right and more racist.
For moral and political reasons, the security of Jewish people and Palestinian people requires the end of the Israeli occupation and justice for all Palestinians.
A global movement for a permanent cease fire now and ending the Israeli siege of Gaza is growing. There were coordinated protests all over the world on January 13th, 2024. In the US, 400,000 protested in Washington DC calling for a cease fire and the end of U.S. military aid to Israel. In Olympia, thousands have marched.
Let’s get involved! Israel could not continue its war on Palestinians without U.S. government military support. Expose and challenge US corporations like Boeing, Raytheon, and Lockheed-Martin that have profited from the sale of billions of dollars of weapons to Israel, paid by our taxes. Support the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) Movement!
Educate yourselves, friends, family, workplace and community about Israel’s settler colonialism and ethnic cleansing of Palestine. Speak up! It’s our responsibility to do what we can to change U.S. policy. Minimal demands are for an immediate and permanent cease fire, an end to the Israeli siege of Gaza, no increase in U.S.
military aid to Israel and freeing Israeli hostages in Gaza and Palestinians prisoners held by Israel. Contact me to get more involved.
I hear Palestine-Israel is too complicated to take a position on, there is no solution because Israelis and Palestinians are equally victims. An insightful response at Evergreen by Khader Hamide, a leading Palestinian activist, “Palestinians are losing their land, and lives and Israelis are losing their humanity.”
A common slogan among Jewish people is “Never Again”, which they usually restrict to Jews. The Nazi genocide against Jewish people was horrific but so was and is the holocaust against African people, Native and indigenous people, Palestinians, and others. Let us mean by “Never Again” for All People. That is the moral and strategic position.
Thank You!
I’m from Miami, Florida and my family is half Sephardic and half Ashkenazi Jewish. Despite growing up amongst a suffocating congregation of anti-Castro Cuban expats and virulent Jewish Zionists, I have been lucky to be in community with many Anti-Zionist jews. I am grateful for this opportunity to share a message from my community.
Judaism is not Zionism: we repeat this to each other and to the deaf ears of an empire. Yet there clearly are ties between the two. One such connection is that for us, being Jewish means we have a special imperative to be anti-zionist. Being Jewish must mean being anti-Zionist, or else judaism means nothing. Or else we cede Judaism to the death-machine of Israel; we become complicit not just in occupation and genocide but also its exploitation of jewish pain. If we betray our Palestinian comrades, we betray ourselves and our faith.
The United States war machine has doubled down on the stance that “Anti-zionism is anti-semitism,” in community with NATO criminals like Germany and the UK. To quote a legendary anti-semite, “Accuse the enemy of that which you are guilty,” said Josef Goebbels.
I refuse to cede any ground to this sick lazy lie. That lie can become fear that sticks in our throats making us hesitate to speak. It can become a poison that makes us preface our solidarity with a statement about October 7 as if that is when this struggle began, and we must reject it with our entire being. Judaism as a religion has obviously predated the invention of Zionism by a cool couple thousand years. And it bears mentioning that there are more Christian Zionists in the world than there are Jews of any ideology, by a measure of about 30 to 1. They too rely on anxiety over charges of antisemitism to conceal their ecstasy at slaughter to their own delirious apocalyptic ends.
Yet it is the Palestinians who have had to spend the last 75 years being forced to atone for an antisemitism that is not theirs. Somehow these people are endlessly at fault for the European crimes of the Shoah- and are continually coerced to perform the precise distinction between being against colonialism and not Judaism itself when the state of Israel insists it stands for all Jews.
I often return to a piece by Palestinian journalist and poet Mohammed El-Kurd, from his essay “Jewish settlers stole my house. It’s not my fault they’re Jewish” which was written at the end of September 2023, just weeks before the onslaught of recent violence that Palestinians are facing. As I write this in February of 2024, Gaza has been mercilessly destroyed into near obliteration and the remaining 1.4 million Palestinians have been kettled into Rafah where the US led coalition of bombs continues to rain down on them. And yet without even the most recent and devastating campaign of ceaseless Israeli violence, El Kurd writes:
“I have zero interest in memorizing or apologizing for centuries-old tropes created by Europeans, or in giving semantics more heft than they warrant, chiefly when millions of us confront real, tangible oppression, living behind cement walls, or under siege, or in exile, and living with woes too expansive to summarize. I’m tired of the impulse to preemptively distance myself from something of which I am not guilty.”
El-Kurd also emphasizes how crucial it is to provide land restitution to Palestinians, and their right of return is a central tenant for future justice. For the white supremacist settler state, land theft and mass displacement are their primary tools, and we take heed from our Palestinian comrades in solidarity in our fight against them.
Solidarity is a concept we’re familiar with, me and my community, and while we’ve participated in solidarity in different ways throughout our lives, most of us have not ever had to live the word. Solidarity means assuming risk, embracing discomfort, showing our faces, attaching our names to our convictions, challenging our kin, decolonizing our minds. Solidarity means stepping into danger with purpose. Anything less isn’t solidarity, it’s just the consumption of suffering.
We must therefore be steadfast in our commitment against the global hegemonic order that enshrines the US and its benefactor Israel as stewards of the world’s socalled morality. I invite you to join me and instead reject the lie that to be Jewish is to need the protection of an insatiable murderer. Take this stance without the fear of allegations of antisemitism, without offering it any quarter. Only then can we
clear the space for what REALLY matters: the Palestinian struggle against apartheid and colonialism, against genocide. Join in this global movement against the pernicious ideology of white supremacy that Zionism is so transparently based on, sitting atop its crumbling foundation of flagrantly disproven race science, rotten to its core. This core is something that can never be reformed, and there is no room for any so-called “liberal” Zionism in our movement. There is nothing for us there, and no one should be afraid to speak this uncontroversial truth- that Zionism at its essence is simply racism.
Join me as I uplift the demands of our Palestinian comrades: Ceasefire now, ceasefire permanently, end the siege on Gaza, release all Palestinian prisoners from Israeli prisons, end the occupation, end US aid to Israel. Palestine must be free, a freedom beyond our imagination fiercely and joyfully defying the walls that have been built around it.
Design by Fatma Abu Owda [Hamama], Gaza
Embroidery by Hanan Al-Behery [Karatiyya], Gaza
Working people around the world have mourned the tragic loss of life in Israel and Palestine”… this statement marked the launch of the National Labor Network for Ceasefire (NLNC) a few weeks ago. As with the whole crisis, everything in our responses can feel “a little too late”… as in “can’t we move faster, have more impact??” But this development in the US labor movement is very significant and hopefully will – with other efforts – have an impact (hopefully right away). The labor movement – with its complex history and broad, diverse membership – has a complex profile in matters of war and international justice. But it has at times stood firmly and proudly on the justice-seeking side of history… such as when the ILWU (International Longshore & Warehouse Union) refused to unload ships from South Africa, in a dramatic show of solidarity with the anti-apartheid struggle.
NWHC calls for an immediate ceasefire, human rights, immediate restoration of material aid, and the release of hostages. They assert that this move is unprecedented in the history of labor organizing. Over 9 million union members are represented in the unions (national and locals) that have signed on; this reflects over half of all union members. Their launch connects with an online discussion of union activists hosted by Democracy Now’s Juan Gonzalez on February 22 (recording available online).
This move from dedicated human rights and anti-war activists in labor is very strategic… with activists from the National Education Association, National Nurses United, Flight Attendants, Postal Workers, and others. They’re determined to get President Biden to listen to a substantial part of his base – and to take immediate action to end the bloodshed and misery.
For more information check out the United Electrical Workers’ press release from February 16, 2024, and go to the NLNC website.
Whereas,
The ongoing Israeli-Palestinian loss of countless lives, widespread suffering for civilians;
Whereas,
The United States government an active role in arming the Israeli engaged in a siege against Gaza, zations like Amnesty International, the Israeli group B’Tselem have
Whereas,
War is union business, and American Electrical, Radio, and Machine international allies of the AFL-CIO
Congress, the Trades Union Congress of Trade Unions, and Federation have called for a
Whereas,
On March 16th, 2003, while Gaza, Rachel Corrie was killed born and raised in Olympia green State College. Rachel was be killed in this occupation. our members serve students is Rafah, in the south of Gaza. the pursuit of peace and justice;
Lin Nelson, retired teacher Evergreen State College, union member of United Faculty of Evergreen (WEA), former board member Rachel Corrie Foundation
Whereas,
Israeli-Palestinian conflict has resulted in the widespread displacement, and immense government and military contractors play Israeli military, which is currently Gaza, which human rights organiInternational, Human Rights Watch, and have called a humanitarian crisis;
American unions like the United Machine Workers of America (UE), and AFL-CIO such the Canadian Labour Congress (in the UK), the Irish and the International Trade Union just peace; providing humanitarian aid in killed by the Israeli military. She was and was a student at The Everwas the first American civilian to AFSCME represents TESC, and like Rachel. Olympia’s sister city Gaza. Our communities are linked in justice;
We recognize that all civilians must be protected in accordance with international humanitarian law and international human rights law, and deploring in this regard the heavy civilian casualties and widespread destruction of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Whereas,
A ceasefire is a crucial first step towards creating the conditions necessary for a negotiated, just, and lasting resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict;
Therefore be it resolved,
That WFSE Local 443 calls on the TLM CLC and AFL-CIO as well as WFSE Council 28 and AFSCME International to join us in support of an immediate ceasefire in the conflict and equal rights for Palestinians and Israelis.
Be it further resolved,
That WFSE Local 443 commits to raising awareness among its members about the humanitarian impact of the conflict, the importance of respecting international law, and the need for a peaceful and just resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. WFSE Local 443 calls for solidarity with fellow Unions and Locals in this regard.
The following list of documentary movies, that are freely available on Youtube, can provide a relatively quick learning curve, individually or in groups, with a minimal amount of time. At the end of this film list there is a very solid list of alternative sources to the mainstream media. Some are Jewish sources, some are Arab, and some are neither. All are time tested for credibility and historical reliability. See playlist of films at http://bit.ly/palestinemovies
Imperial Geography- Palestine and Israel with David Barsamian (2002 - 28 mins) Short, concise history of the region by the founder of Alternative Radio. “To grasp the complexities of the struggle between Arabs and Jews in the region, we need to know the maps…. The media often say that the clash between the Palestinians and the Jews is “as old as the hills.” This is a fabrication. The conflict is really less than a century old and really develops with clarity after World War I. The role of the Great Powers, especially Britain and France in engineering the current situation is the focus of this program.”
Edward Said: On Orientalism, Sut Jhally, Sanjay Talrejo (1998 - 40 mins) Based on his book Orientalism, “Said argues that the Western (especially American) understanding of the Middle East as a place full of villains and terrorists ruled by Islamic fundamentalism produces a deeply distorted image of the diversity and complexity of millions of people who live in such a vast region…. such perceptions, and the consequent cultural representations, have served, and continue to serve, as implicit justifications for the colonial and imperialist ambitions of the European powers and of the U.S….”
Peace, Propaganda and the Promised Land, Bathsheba Ratzkoff, Sut Jhally (2003 - 80 mins) “Combining American and British TV news clips with observations of analysts, journalists and political activists, Peace, Propaganda & the Promised Land provides a brief historical overview, a striking media comparison, and an examination of factors that have distorted U.S. media coverage and, in turn, American public opinion.”
Five
Broken Cameras, Emad Burnat and Guy Davidi
(Available Free on YouTube, 2013- 1hr. 26 minutes)
“Nominated for an Oscar, 5 Broken Cameras is a deeply Personal first-hand account of life and non-violent resistance in Bel’in, a West bank village where Israel is building a security fence….”
Roadmap to Apartheid, Anna Nogueira, Eron Davidson, and Alice Walker
(Available Free on YouTube, 2012, 1 hour, 34 minutes)
Ana Nogueira is a white South African and Eron Davidson a Jewish Israeli…the producers take a close look at the apartheid comparison often used to describe the Israeli-Palestinian conflict…. There are many lessons to draw from the South African experience relevant to conflicts all over the world. This film is as much a historical document of the rise and fall of apartheid, as it is a film about why many Palestinians feel they are living in an apartheid system today...
Checkpoint: The Palestinians After Oslo, Tom Wright and Therese Saliba, two members of the Rachel Corrie Foundation (1997 - 58 minutes). Also see Tom Wright’s Video Archive on You Tube
“1997 Documentary about Palestinian life in the wake of the Oslo “peace” agreement, as settlement building expands, the Palestinian Authority takes over some areas, and the Israeli occupation worsens.”
PALESTINE CHRONICLE- www.palestinechronicle.com
ELECTRONIC INTIFADA- https://electronicintifada.net/ JEWISH VOICE FOR PEACE- https://www.jewishvoiceforpeace.org/
Excellent Jewish Website for actions and analysis. Read “THE WIRE” IF NOT NOW-
https://www.ifnotnowmovement.org
Excellent Jewish Website. See especially the “Liberation Syllabus” for many books for adults and children and various works of art.
MONDOWEISS- https://mondoweiss.net/
Excellent Jewish website for analysis and podcast.
ALJAZEERA- https://www.aljazeera.com/
First (1996) independent Arab news channel based in Qatar. News on Middle East, Global Politics, and other issues.
COMMON DREAMS-
https://www.commondreams.org/ DEMOCRACY NOW-
https://www.democracynow.org/ Available online and on Olympia KAOS radio 89.3 at 9am
Jot
Palestine Action of South Sound (PASS)
Coalition meets every other Monday
Next meeting: 7pm - Monday March 4 220 Union Ave SE, Olympia
All are welcome!
web: palestineactionsouthsound.ghost.io
