Solidarity with Palestine - A Radical Black Feminist Mandate: A Reading List
Photos (top, left to right): Beverly Guy-Sheftall, Toni Morrison, Angela Y. Davis, and bell hooks. (Bottom, left to right): Audre Lorde, June Jordan, Barbara Ransby, and another photo of June Jordan.
By Black Women Radicals
This reading list offers a brief primer on the radical Black feminist political mandate, which is solidarity with Palestine.
We, who believe in freedom, we as Black feminists who believe in freedom –– freedom from white supremacy, patriarchy, capitalism, transphobia, queerphobia, ableism, and other oppressions –– unabashedly believe in and stand in solidarity for a free Palestine.
As students of Black feminist politics and movements, we know and understand that our liberation as Black women, femme, and gender expansive people in the United States, in the belly of the imperial beast, is tethered to the liberation, freedom, and emancipation of all marginalized peoples around the world. We know that we come from long radical and revolutionary traditions of Black women and gender expansive organizers, educators, and activists who have and continue to be committed to the liberation struggles of oppressed and “Third World” peoples.
More specifically, and especially at this current juncture in Gaza and the West Bank, we know as Black feminists that our political commitments, mandates, and solidarity are bound up and intertwined with the liberation and self-determination of the Palestinian people.
According to reports, more than 2,383 Palestinians are dead and 10,814 are injured. The organization, Defense for Children International–Palestine has reported that at least 724 Palestinian children have been killed by the Israeli military since October 7th. This past Friday, October 12th, the Israeli army issued an evacuation order – by way of dropping leaflets – of more than 1.1 million Palestinians in northern Gaza, giving them only 24 hours to leave their homes and move to southern Gaza toward a “safe route.” However, when many Palestinians migrated to southern Gaza, the army bombed the south part of the Gaza strip – the only road in and out of Gaza – killing and injuring hundreds. Israel has cut off Gaza from electricity, fuel, food, water, and humanitarian aid.
According to Human Rights Watch, on October 10 and 11, 2023, the Israeli army used white phosphorus - which is a “chemical substance that burns at temperatures hot enough to melt metal” - in military operations in Lebanon and Gaza. The chemical agent is also known to cause fatal birth defects. The organization notes that the use of white phosphorus by the Israeli army violates international humanitarian law.
Moreover, not only has the Israeli military deployed airstrikes on hospitals, journalists, medics, and more, it has dropped more than 6,000 bombs on Gaza, as innocent people flee with nowhere to go.
The violence and humanitarian crisis we are seeing right before our eyes comes at the heels of an attack by Hamas, officially known as the Islamic Resistance Movement, on October 7th, where members from the group killed more than 1,400 Israelis and kidnapped hundreds of others. We do not condone the killing of innocent lives –– whether Palestinian or Israeli. However, while many media outlets have disseminated misinformation and portrayed a one-sided narrative about the attack, they do not discuss the political, historical, and present-day siege of Gaza by the Israeli military and the systematic violence, expulsion, poverty, displacement, Zionist settler colonialism, sexual and racialized terror, surveillance, Apartheid, and more that Palestinians have endured for decades since the Nakba.
Many media outlets are promoting the Zionist propaganda that Israeli lives are worth more than Palestinian ones by justifying the Israeli State's past and present collective punishment of Palestinians. For years, the Israeli State has ignored the protests, pleas, and outcries of Jewish, Palestinian, and Allied individuals and organizations alike, who repudiate the institutional subordination of Palestinians.
What we are seeing before our eyes is genocide. We charge genocide.
Throughout the years, Black feminists such as Angela Y. Davis, bell hooks, Audre Lorde, June Jordan, Toni Morrison, Barbara Ransby, Margo Okazawa-Rey, Beverly Guy-Sheftall, and countless others have made it crystal clear about their solidarity and commitments to Palestine. Many of us cite their work, but what we have seen and observed presently by many Black feminists who claim to have an abolitionist politic and praxis is silence.
We are calling you out.
You cite radical and revolutionary Black feminists who have made unwavering theoretical and political commitments to Palestine, but you refuse to be in solidarity yourselves. Just like many of us said about so many White and Non-Black People of Color who were silent during the uprisings against intersectional anti-Black state violence in the U.S., your silence on Palestine is complicity.
We will not be silent. We will not be complicit.
This reading list offers a brief primer on the radical Black feminist political mandate, which is solidarity with Palestine.
Black Feminist Writers and Palestine
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Black Feminist Writers and Palestine 〰️
Black Feminist Writers and Palestine
On Sunday, October 22nd at 5:30 PM ET/2:30 PM PT, Black Women Radicals hosted the online event, “Black Feminist Writers and Palestine.” This online event focused on the importance of the Black feminist literary and political canon and the mandate of Black feminist commitments to a free Palestine. Moreover, we will cite, discuss, and interrogate the long, extensive, and unwavering tradition of Black feminist educators, poets, writers, organizers, and more who have committed to being in solidarity with Palestine. Featuring remarks from: Clarissa Brooks, Angela Y. Davis, Breya Johnson, Briona Simone Jones, Dr. Beverly Guy-Sheftall, and Jaimee A. Swift.
Watch the playback here.
Radical Commitments
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Radical Commitments 〰️
Letters, Reflections, Speeches, and Statements of Solidarity
Oberlin College Commencement Speech by Audre Lorde, May 29, 1989
In this speech, Audre Lorde addresses the genocide of Palestinian people, nothing that: “Encouraging your congresspeople to press for a peaceful solution in the Middle East, and for recognition of the rights of the Palestinian people, is not altruism, it is survival.”
Photo Credit: Audre Lorde in Austin, Texas, 1980. Photo by K. Kendall. Wikimedia Commons.
A Letter from 18 Writers, signed by Toni Morrison, August 18, 2006
Toni Morrison, one of the most celebrated and critically acclaimed authors of our time, was one of 18 writers who co-wrote and signed a letter as a call to resist Israel's undeclared political aim: the liquidation of the Palestinian state.
The letter, which is titled, “A Letter from 18 Writers” was published on August 18, 2006 in The Nation and was a part of the magazine’s August 28, 2006 Print Issue.
Other signatories included: John Berger, Noam Chomsky, Harold Pinter José Saramago, Eduardo Galeano, Arundhati Roy, Naomi Klein, Howard Zinn, Charles Glass, Richard Falk, Gore Vidal, Russell Banks, Thomas Keneally, Chris Abani, Carolyn Forché, Martín Espada, Jessica Hagedorn
Barbara Smith: “Free, Free Palestine!”
Barbara Smith, co-author of the Combahee River Collective Statement (1977) speaks at Saratoga BLM May Day rally for Palestine (2024). Smith describes the movement to end the war in Vietnam when she was a student and parallels between organizing then and today’s vital student-led encampments all over the U. S. and around the world which call for divestment and the liberation of Palestine.
This statement was issued by a group of Indigenous and Women of Color feminists who participated in a delegation to Palestine in 2011.
Signed by Angela Y. Davis, Gina Dent, Beverly Guy-Sheftall, Barbara Ransby, and others.
Watch the Video: Palestine Statement: A Call to Action from Indigenous and Women of Color Feminists, 2021
This video is from reflective of the 10th anniversary of the above statement in solidarity with Palestine, with hundreds of presentations, articles, panels, and interventions later, to offer their Report Card reaffirming the relevance and urgency of re-telling stories of apartheid, ethnic cleansing, and settler colonialism and of Palestinian steadfastness, resistance and resilience.
Article: “A Virtual Reunion 10 Years Later: Indigenous and Women of Color Feminists reflect on historic delegation to Palestine” (2021) by Rabab Ibrahim Abdulhadi and Jade Musa
The Feminist Wire’s Forum on Palestine by Darnell L. Moore, January 26, 2012
The Feminist Wire’s (TFW) Editorial Collective Member, Darnell L. Moore returned from a trip to Israel/Palestine as a member of the first LGBTQI delegation to the Palestinian territories. He asked several US-based scholars, activists, and cultural workers, who also visited Palestine as members of US delegations, to offer critical reflections on their experiences. Part I of this forum included reflections from Beverly Guy-Sheftall, Katherine Franke, Lisa Weiner-Mahfuz, Roya Rastegar, Vani Natarajan, and Darnell L. Moore.
The Occupation Stole My Words, June Jordan Helped me to Relocate Them by Darnell L. Moore, March 24, 2016
Photo of Dr. Beverly Guy-Sheftall. Photo Retrieved from UNC Chapel Hill.
Statement in Solidarity with the Palestinian People of Gaza, 2014, signed by Angela Davis, Gina Dent, bell hooks, Amina Mama, Barbara Ransby, Beverly Guy-Sheftall, and Alice Walker, and others
Poetry
I was born a Black woman and now I am become a Palestinian
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I was born a Black woman and now I am become a Palestinian 〰️
June Jordan (1936-2002)
Apologies to All the People in Lebanon by June Jordan
Dedicated to the 600,000 Palestinian men, women, and children who lived in Lebanon from 1948-1983.
Moving Towards Home (1982) by June Jordan
Bocas: A Daughter's Geography by Ntozake Shange
Ntozake Shange (1948-2018)
ISAIAH
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ISAIAH 〰️
Jean "Binta" Breeze (1956-2021)
Photo: Jean Binta Breeze at Humber Mouth, 2007. Photo by walnut whippet. Wikimedia Commons.
Jean "Binta" Breeze (1956 – 2021) was a Jamaican dub poet and storyteller, acknowledged as the first woman to write and perform dub poetry. She worked also as a theatre director, choreographer, actor, and teacher. She performed her work around the world, in the Caribbean, North America, Europe, South-East Asia, and Africa, and has been called "one of the most important, influential performance poets of recent years".
“Her poem, “Isaiah” caused controversy when the campaign group Human Rights Watch barred it from a fundraising event because it was seen as too pro-Palestinian.”
In response to the poem, Breeze said:
Part of the poem (which you can read in its entirety), reads:
ISAIAH
de iyaman
bow im head as im humbly stan
an big Israel come clean
to remember what love mean
an retreat from a murderous scene
stop pushing others to where you’ve been
you of all should find genocide obscene
God just might let yah een
Here, she said that this verse meant:
Sources
capetown & palestine/ cannot speak the same language/ but we fight the same old men
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capetown & palestine/ cannot speak the same language/ but we fight the same old men 〰️
PODCASTS
This Week In Palestine: Prof. Barbara Ransby and Ali Abunimah discuss 'The Battle for Justice in Palestine, July 12, 2005.
The Battle for Justice in Palestine (Haymarket, 2014): Professor Barbara Ransby discusses this recent book with its author, Ali Abunimah.
Ali Abu Nimah, prominent journalist, author, and co-founder of the Electronic Intifada converses here with University of Illinois Professor of History, writer, and political activist Barbara Ransby. They discuss the ideas in this remarkable book.
Photo Credit: Barbara Ransby by Danielle Scruggs for The New York Times.
Articles
Photo Credit: Angela Davis at Oregon State University. 2019. Wikimedia Commons.
The articles featured below are written from authors from an array of backgrounds: Black Women , Queer, and Transgender, and Gender Expansive, People of Color, Palestinian, Jewish, Non-Black People of Color, and Allied People in Solidarity with Palestine. The themes of this articles range from solidarity, race and racialization in Palestine, Afro-and-Black Palestinian perspectives, feminism, abolition, and more.
Reading Audre Lorde in Palestine: Exploring Differences between Generative and Extractive by Rana Barakat
June Jordan’s Songs of Palestine and Lebanon by Therese Saliba
June Jordan’s Legacy of Solidarity and Love Remains Relevant by Sriram Shamasunder
“Moving toward Home: Women of Color Feminisms and the Lebanon Conjuncture” in A Shadow over Palestine: The Imperial Life of Race in America by Keith P. Feldman
Against the backdrop of Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon, Chapter Five locates Black poet-activist June Jordan’s “Moving Towards Home” amid intensive disputes amongst U.S. feminists about the differentiated lived experiences of racism, Zionism, and anti-Semitism. In doing so, it tracks the absent presence of Palestine in Women of Color feminisms.
Arab and Black Feminisms: Joint Struggle and Transnational Anti-Imperialist Activism by Nadine Naber
This essay explores the conditions out of which a diasporic anti-imperialist Arab feminist group came into alignment with the Women of Color Resource Center. It focuses on the history and leaders of the Women of Color Resource Center and its roots in the 1960s and 1970s people of color and women of color based movements in the United States in order to map alliances among black feminist thought, radical women of color movements, and Palestinian de-colonization then and now.
Reciprocal Solidarity: Where the Black and Palestinian Queer Struggles Meet by Sa’ed Atshan and Darnell L. Moore
Angela Davis on Black Lives Matter, Palestine, and the Future of Radicalism by Gaye Theresa Johnson and Alex Lubin
Putting the pieces together: Fragments of oral history in exile by Samah Fadil
What Preceded the Killings in Israel and Gaza Was Not “Peace” — It Was Apartheid by Kelly Hayes and Mariame Kaba
Only by abolishing colonialism will Palestine be free by Nada Elia
Whose Feminism? Palestine’s Feminism by Nada Elia
On Fatima Bernawi, Women's Struggle, and Black-Palestinian Solidarity by Elom Tettey-Tamaklo
Afro-Palestinians talk heritage and resistance by Jaclynn Ashby
Why Feminism? Why Now? Reflections on the “Palestine Is A Feminist Issue” Pledge by Loubna Qutami
Why this Black Woman Stands With Palestine by electra
Towards Justice: Deepening Black-Palestinian Solidarity & Global Struggle by Kristian Davis Bailey
Black-Palestinian Solidarity in the Ferguson-Gaza Era by Kristian Davis Bailey
Framing Resistance Call and Response: Reading Assata Shakur’s Black Revolutionary Radicalism in Palestine by Rabab Ibrahim Abdulhadi
“Solidarity with Palestinian Women: Notes from a Japanese Black U.S. Feminist” by Margo Okazawa-Rey in Activist Scholarship: Antiracism, Feminism, and Social Change (2009) by Julia Sudbury and Margo Okazawa-Rey
I’m Black and Palestinian, you scared? By Azmera Hammouri-Davis
Afro-Palestinians face ‘double the harassment and double the racism by Anjuman Rahman
Our Skin Color Drives Us: Black Palestinian Women Talk by Doaa Shaheen
Black and Palestinian Solidarities by Khury Petersen-Smith and Eve L. Ewing
From Palestine to the Black South, Abolition Journalism is Exposing Injustice by Natascha Elena Uhlmann
The Struggle for Palestine is Our Struggle by Solyana Bekele
The Vital Role of Afro-Palestinians in the African Diaspora by Halton Black Voices
In the heart of the Old City, generations of Afro-Palestinians persevere in the face of occupation by Mousa Quous
Palestine: Black Solidarity in a World of Anti-Black Racism by Tawana Honeycomb Petty
Palestine, Feminism, and the Pitfalls of Liberalism—in Germany and Beyond by Noor Blaas and Anna Esther-Younes
No, You Can't Be A Zionist and a Feminist by Mariam Barghouti
“My Struggle Embraces Every Struggle: Palestinians in Israel and Solidarity with Afro-Asian Liberation Movements” by Maha Nassar
I'm a Queer Palestinian. Here's How I'm Fighting for Liberation by Adam Haj
On Queer Palestine and the Intersectional Critique by Axmed Maxamed
What Ella Baker Taught Us About Ferguson And Gaza by Dorothy Zellner
Black Radical Silence on Palestine by Alaina Morgan
“To Build a New World”: Black American Internationalism and Palestine Solidarity by Russell Rickford
Columbia, you are failing your Palestinian, Muslim, Arab, Black, Brown, and Jewish student activists by Jewish Voice for Peace and Students for Justice in Palestine
PHOTOS: Israeli women who have stood up to the occupation for 26 years by ActiveStills
A visual history of Black-Palestinian solidarity by Salam Awad
Palestine: A Reproductive Justice Issue by US Campaign for Palestinian Rights
Growing Solidarity Beneath the Walls from Providence to Palestine by Gavirel Cutipa-Zorn
Interview: daughter of Frantz Fanon on Palestine solidarity by Adri Nieuwhof
End the occupation of Palestine
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End the occupation of Palestine 〰️
BOoks
Freedom Is a Constant Struggle: Ferguson, Palestine, and the Foundations of a Movement by Angela Y. Davis
Abolition. Feminism. Now. by Angela Y. Davis, Gina Dent, Erica R. Meiners, and Beth E. Richie
The Battle for Justice in Palestine by Ali Abunimah
Born Palestinian, Born Black and The Gaza Suite by Suheir Hammad
Guardians of the Mosque: African Palestinians of Jerusalem, Photography by Andrew Courtney.
“Born Palestinian, Born Black: AntiBlackness and the Womb of Zionist Settler Colonialism” by Sarah Ihmoud in Antiblackness, edited Moon-Kie Jung and João H. Costa Vargas
Black Liberation and Palestine Solidarity by Lenni Brenner and Matthew Quest
Black Power and Palestine Transnational Countries of Color by Michael Fischbach
Palestinian Women of Gaza and the West Bank by Suha Sabbagh
Queer Palestine and the Empire of Critique by Sa'ed Atshan
“A Call for Consistency: Palestinian Resistance and Radical US Women of Color” by Nadine Naber in Color of Violence: The INCITE! Anthology, Edited by INCITE! Women of Color Against Violence
Leila Khaled: The Poster Girl of Palestinian Militancy by Sarah Irving
Palestinian Women: Narrative Histories and Gendered Memory by Fatma Kassem
what you’re prepared to do on behalf of the Palestinian people
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what you’re prepared to do on behalf of the Palestinian people 〰️
Videos
Black Lives, Black Freedom and the Indivisibility of Justice, July 21, 2020, Hosted by The Arab and Muslim Ethnicities and Diasporas (AMED) Studies at San Francisco State University
Black Lives, Black Liberation, and the Indivisibility of Justice came about in the process of Al-Adab developing its most recent file on “The US in Depth,” with its urgent emphasis on making the current historical moment, focusing on Black liberation and Black freedom struggle. Black liberation and indeed anti-colonial, anti-racist and anti-imperialist US struggles have been understood and embraced by Arab readers/publics in a comparative and historically contextualized theoretical and activist perspectives. This roundtable seeks to address some of these issues and more.
Participants: Dr. Angela Davis, Dr. Beverly Guy-Sheftall, Dr. Dayo Gore, Dr. Gerald Horne, Dr. Robin D.G. Kelley, Dr. Rabab Abdulhadi
Radical Imagining: Afro, Indigenous, and Palestinian Futures, December 2020
The annual DC Palestinian Film & Arts Festival (DCPFAF) hosted a panel on “Radical Imagining: Afro, Indigenous, and Palestinian Futurism, weaving together what M. Asli Dukan calls “abolitionist futurisms”.
Archiving Black Palestinian Solidarity: Visions of Liberation, 1968-2021
This video is a presentation of archival material on key moments of solidarity between Black American and Palestinian political movements from 1968 to 2021. It is an updated version of a work-in-progress started in 2018 by students and faculty at the Center for Palestine Studies, Studio X Amman at Columbia GSAPP, and the Columbia Global Center| Amman. Advised by Lila Abu-Lughod and Nora Akawi and edited by Rahaf Salahat, the video was prepared for an event and panel discussion on "Black-Palestinian Solidarity, 1968-2018" at Columbia University. It was included as a collateral event of Qalandia International IV, whose 2018 theme was Solidarity.
Black Feminist Solidarity with Palestine
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Black Feminist Solidarity with Palestine 〰️
Archives
Third World Women’s Alliance (TWWA), Triple Jeopardy - Palestine
“Mid East Round-Up….A Palestinian Perspective” by Georgette Ioup (PDF) | Source: Women of Color Resource Flickr.
The Third World Women's Alliance (TWWA) was a revolutionary socialist organization for women of color active in the United States from 1968 to 1980. It aimed at ending capitalism, racism, imperialism, and sexism and was one of the earliest groups advocating for an intersectional approach to women's oppression. Members of the TWWA argued that women of color faced a "triple jeopardy" of race, gender, and class oppression. The TWWA worked to address these intersectional issues, internationally and domestically, specifically focusing much of their efforts in Cuba. Though the organization's roots lay in the Civil rights movement, it soon broadened its focus to include women of color in the US and women of the Third World.
ETHEL MINOR AND THE PALESTINE PROBLEM
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ETHEL MINOR AND THE PALESTINE PROBLEM 〰️
“Third World Round Up: The Palestine Problem: Test Your Knowledge” by Ethel Minor, SNCC Communications Director
Published in the June-July 1967 SNCC Newsletter, shortly after the June 1967 Arab-Israeli War. The article would be known as the SNCC Palestine’s Statement. Source: SNCC Digital Gateway.
The Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC): In the early 1960s, young Black college students conducted sit-ins around America to protest the segregation of restaurants. Ella Baker, a Civil Rights activist and Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) official, invited some of those young Black activists (including Diane Nash, Marion Barry, John Lewis, and James Bevel) to a meeting at Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina in April of 1960. From that meeting, the group formed the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). It was made up mostly of Black college students, who practiced peaceful, direct action protests. Ella Baker recommended that the group keep its autonomy and to not affiliate itself with the SCLC or other civil rights groups.
In 1967, Ethel Minor (November 9, 1938 – September 21, 2022), civil rights activist, journalist, and SNCC Communications Director, wrote the article, “Third World Round Up: The Palestine Problem: Test Your Knowledge”, which was published in the June-July 1967 SNCC Newsletter, shortly after the June 1967 Arab-Israeli War. The article would be known as the SNCC Palestine’s Statement. Born in Chicago, Minor was working as Malcolm X’s secretary when he was assassinated in 1965. An editor of SNCC’s Newsletter, Minor also edited much of Stokely Carmichael’s political correspondence, and edited “Stokely Speaks”, his collection of speeches.
Black Feminist Solidarity with Palestine
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Black Feminist Solidarity with Palestine 〰️
“Living Under Israeli Occupation”: Margo Okazawa-Rey Intercollegiate Women’s Studies Visiting Scholar
November 13, 2006
Feminist activist and scholar Margo Okazawa-Rey will present a lecture “Living Under Israeli Occupation,” Monday, November 13, 2006 at 4:15 p.m., in the Hampton Room, Malott Commons at Scripps College.
Based on her recent experience in Palestine, Professor Okazawa-Rey will address the daily existence of Palestinian women living under Israeli occupation, the impact of the U.S. and Israeli-led boycott of Hamas leadership, and U.S.-based activists addressing the conflict. She will also discuss her personal experience living in the Occupied Palestinian Territory as an American woman of color.
For nearly the past two years, Okazawa-Rey has been the Feminist Research Consultant at the Women’s Centre for Legal Aid and Counseling, with offices in East Jerusalem and Ramallah, where she is assisting in establishing a community-based feminist research unit and teaching feminist research methods to local women. Okazawa-Rey’s work in Palestine is an extension of her longstanding commitment to anti-militarist activism and to activist scholarship. She also is a professor at Fielding Graduate University and professor emerita of social work at San Francisco State University.
Source: Scripps College.
Black Feminist Solidarity with Palestine
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Black Feminist Solidarity with Palestine 〰️
The third Annual Walter rodney Speaker Series:
Pan-African/Palestinian Solidarities
April 23, 2015
Panelists: Beverly Guy-Sheftall, Jesse Benjamin, Bana Ghadbian, Ismail Khalidi, and Jasbiri X
Location: Atlanta University Center, Robert W. Woodruff Library
Maya Angelou Reads Rachel Corrie's Email
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Maya Angelou Reads Rachel Corrie's Email 〰️
Maya Angelou Reads An Email by Rachel Corrie at the Rachel’s Words event to honor the life of Rachel Corrie in 2012.
Source: “Maya Angelou stood with Palestinians, but Israeli military uses her for Black History Month hasbara” by Adam Horowitz
Poet, author, and civil rights activist Maya Angelou (April 4, 1928 – May 28, 2014) stood in solidarity with the Palestinian people when she honored the late Rachel Corrie (April 10, 1979 – March 16, 2003), a 23-year-old American peace activist from Olympia, Washington, who was crushed to death by an Israeli bulldozer on March 16, 2003, while undertaking nonviolent direct action to protect the home of a Palestinian family from demolition.
The video below was produced to be part of the Rachel’s Words event to honor the life of Rachel Corrie in 2012.
Leaving Olympia
An email by Rachel Corrie, January 2003
Maya Angelou is reading Rachel’s email in the video above.
We are all born and someday we’ll all die. Most likely to some degree alone.What if our aloneness isn’t a tragedy? What if our aloneness is what allows us to speak the truth without being afraid? What if our aloneness is what allows us to adventure – to experience the world as a dynamic presence – as a changeable, interactive thing?
If I lived in Bosnia or Rwanda or who knows where else, needless death wouldn’t be a distant symbol to me, it wouldn’t be a metaphor, it would be a reality.
And I have no right to this metaphor. But I use it to console myself. To give a fraction of meaning to something enormous and needless.
This realization. This realization that I will live my life in this world where I have privileges.
I can’t cool boiling waters in Russia. I can’t be Picasso. I can’t be Jesus. I can’t save the planet single-handedly.
I can wash dishes.
Source: Rachel Corrie Foundation
The Committee of Black Americans for Truth About the Middle East
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The Committee of Black Americans for Truth About the Middle East 〰️
An Appeal by Black Americans Against United States Support for the Zionist Government of Israel by The Committee of Black Americans for Truth About the Middle East (C.O.B.A.T.A.M.E.)
November 1, 1970 | Published in the New York Times
Sources: pgs. 106-109 of Black Power and Palestine: Transnational Countries of Color by Michael R. Fischback
Source: Black for Palestine
“On November 1, 1970, a hard-hitting statement titled, “An Appeal by Black Americans Against United States Support for the Zionist Government of Israel” by The Committee of Black Americans for Truth About the Middle East (C.O.B.A.T.A.M.E.) denouncing Israel, hailing the Palestinians, and opposing U.S. military aid to Israel appeared in a full-page advertisement in the New York Times.”
An excerpt of the statement reads:
“We, the Black American signatories of this advertisement, are in complete solidarity with our Palestinian brothers and sisters, who, like us, are struggling for self-determination and an end to racist oppression…We stand with the Palestinian people to their efforts to preserve their revolution, and oppose its attempted destruction by American Imperialism aided by Zionists and Arab reactionaries.”
“...We are anti-Zionist and against the Zionist State of Israel, the outpost of American Imperialism in the Middle East. Zionism is a reactionary racist ideology that justifies the expulsion of the Palestinian people from their homes and lands, and attempts to enlist the Jewish masses of Israel and elsewhere in service of imperialism to hold back the Middle East revolution…WE STATE that the Palestinian Revolution is the vanguard of the Arab Revolution and is a part of the anti-colonial revolution which is going on in places such as Vietnam, Mozambique, Angola, Brazil, Laos, South Africa, and Zimbabwe. Because of its alliance with imperialism, Zionism opposes the anti-colonial revolution and especially revolutionary change in the Middle East.”
“WE STATE that Israel, Rhodesia, and South Africa are three privileged white settler-states that come into existence by displacing the indigenous peoples from their lands.”
Read the full statement at Black For Palestine.
The Committee of Black Americans for Truth About the Middle East (C.O.B.A.T.A.M.E.) was co-founded by Paul B. Boutelle (who later changed his name to Kwame Montsho Ajamu Somburu), who served as chair; and co-chairs including writer Patricia Robinson; Lydia A. Williams, Adult Advisor of Youth Unlimited and members of the executive board of the American Committee on Africa; Gwendolyn Patton Woods, prominent civil rights activist, educator, and former national coordinator of the National Association of Black Students in Washington, D.C.; and attorney Robert F. Van Lierop.
Among the signatories of the statement included several Black women organizers such as:
Patricia Robinson, Writer, Co-Chairwoman of C.O.B.A.T.A.M.E.
Lydia A. Williams, Adult Advisor, Youth Unlimited, Co-Chairwoman of C.O.B.A.T.A.M.E.
Gwendolyn Patton Woods, Former National Coordinator of the National Association of Black Students, Co-Chairwoman of C.O.B.A.T.A.M.E.
Ella Little-Collins, (1914-1996), who led the Organization of Afro-American Unity after the assassination of her half-brother, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz (formerly known as Malcolm X).
Una G. Mulzac, (April 19, 1923 – January 21, 2012), was an African American bookseller and founder of the Liberation Bookstore, a prominent African-American bookstore specializing in political and Black Power materials and was located in Harlem.
Frances M. Beal and Maxine Williams, members of the Third World Women’s Alliance, a revolutionary socialist organization for women of color active in the United States from 1968 to 1980.
Florynce “Flo” Kennedy, radical feminist, lawyer, and founder of the Feminist Party and founding member of the National Black Feminist Organization.
Jacqueline Rice of The Third World Task Force of the Student Mobilization Committee.
Halima Agila Toure, Editor-at-Large of Journal of Black Poetry.
Delores Cayou, Secretary, Black Faculty Union, San Francisco State College.
Cynthia Chambers, Member of American Federation of Teachers and Vice-President of Black Resistance Party.
Winnie Mandela on Palestine
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Winnie Mandela on Palestine 〰️
Winnie Madikizela-Mandela in Solidarity with palestine
Sources: Reflections on Winnie Mandela's relationship with Palestine by Adama Munu
BDS South Africa and Africa 4 Palestine
Mother of South Africa and Stalwart Advocate for Palestine, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela Dies at 81 by Palestine Chronicle
Photo: Image of Winnie Mandela.
Winnie Madikizela-Mandela (born Nomzamo Winifred Zanyiwe Madikizela; September 26, 1936 - April 2, 2018), also known as Winnie Mandela, was a South African anti-apartheid activist and politician, and the second wife of Nelson Mandela. She served as a Member of Parliament from 1994 to 2003, and from 2009 until her death, and was a deputy minister of arts and culture from 1994 to 1996. A member of the African National Congress (ANC) political party, she served on the ANC's National Executive Committee and headed its Women's League. Madikizela-Mandela was known to her supporters as the "Mother of the Nation".
While many people focus on Nelson Mandela’s solidarity with Palestine, many overlook Winnie Mandela’s political commitments to Palestine as well. As Adama Munu’s notes in “Reflections on Winnie Mandela's relationship with Palestine.”
”Winnie believed that the struggles in South Africa during colonial rule were a reflection of practices taking place against Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank and was in direct support of what she believed was an extension of South Africa's fight against inequality, stating in 2004: "Apartheid Israel can be defeated, just as apartheid in South Africa was defeated."
“This comment came as she addressed a meeting arranged by a Palestinian solidarity organization in Lenasia, Johannesburg, and she was known to be a staunch supporter of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement.”
Shirley Graham Dubois and Palestine
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Shirley Graham Dubois and Palestine 〰️
On Imperialism, Neocolonialism, and Africa, A Speech by Shirley Graham Du Bois (1970), Speaking at UCLA
Source: Color Collective Press and Abolition Notes
Photo: Portrait of Shirley Graham (1896-1977), later Shirley Graham Du Bois, by Carl Van Vechten, taken July 18, 1946. Wikimedia Commons.
Sources: Text source and PDF Transcript of “Imperialism, Neocolonialism, and Africa” (1970), A Speech by Shirley Graham Du Bois by Color Collective Press and Abolition Notes:
“Shirley Graham Du Bois (November 11, 1896 – March 27, 1977) was an accomplished writer, educator, and activist who dedicated her life to fighting for civil rights, gender equality, and social justice. Born in Indianapolis, Indiana, she grew up in a family of educators and activists.”
“In the 1950s, she became involved in the Pan-African movement and worked to promote unity and independence among African nations from imperialist and neocolonial domination. In the 1960s, Shirley Graham Du Bois was an active participant in the civil rights movement and was involved in the organization of the 1963 March on Washington. She was a member of the Communist Party USA, which was considered a radical organization during the Cold War era, and openly criticized the United States government’s foreign policy and its involvement in the Vietnam War.”
“Despite facing criticism and even harassment from government agencies for her political views, Shirley Gra- ham DuBois remained committed to fighting for social justice and equality until the end of her life. She con- tinued to write and advocate for social justice until her death in 1977.”
“On Imperialism, Neocolonialism, and Africa” Speech (1970)
“After returning from Africa, Shirley Graham Du Bois gave this speech at UCLA organized by Nommo (university newspaper), the African-American Studies Center, the Black Student union at UCLA in 1970. In addition to speaking on imperialism, black liberation, and pan-africanism, she was a strong advocate for the rights of Palestinian people and spoke out against Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories.”
“Despite facing criticism and even harassment from government agencies for her political views, Shirley Graham DuBois remained committed to fighting for justice and equality until the end of her life.”
She continued to write and advocate for social justice until her death in 1977, leaving behind a powerful legacy as a writer, educator, and activist who dedicated her life to making the world a better place.”
Read the full transcript.
Source: Color Collective Press and Abolition Notes