June 21, 2007

You Got my Back?: Coalition Building between Black Americans and Palestinians

Posted by kameelah rasheed at 12:30AM

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I was born a Black woman

and now

I am become a Palestinian

against the relentless laughter of evil

there is less and less living room

and where are my loved ones?

It is time to make our way home.

--an excerpt from Moving Towards Home , June Jordan

June 2007 marks the 40th anniversary of the Israeli occupation of the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights. May 2007 marks the 59th anniversary of the Nakba ("the catastrophe"), which saw the mass deportation of a million Palestinians from their cities and villages, massacres of civilians, and the razing to the ground of hundred of Palestinian villages in order to create the exclusive Jewish state of Israel. While many Jewish Israelis (and Jews throughout the diaspora) celebrate the Nakba as their independence, Palestinians and concerned people throughout the world mark this date the as the beginning of a disastrous chain of events that have made Palestinians sojourners in their own land.

On the 15th of May 2007, 22 Black American professors, writers, religious figures, and other leaders issued a call to Black America to join in the June 10 March and rally, and break the silence on the injustices faced by the Palestinian people. The open letter addresses the similarities between the struggles of Black Americans and Palestinians, the dangers of censorship and the need for greater collaboration between Black Americans and Palestinians. While this letter is both important and timely, it does not address the hurdles to coalition building.

We can talk until we are blue in the face about the similarities between Apartheid South Africa and the State of Israel, or about how both Palestinians and Black Americans are forced to inhabit the margins of society. However, such comparisons, which often linger at the level of abstraction, cannot alone build coalitions. Jordan Flaherty, a Hurricane Katrina survivor makes an excellent point when she writes:

I I think that, if we are truly serious about a collaboration between Black America and advocates for a free Palestine, then pro-Palestinian groups in America need to make a serious commitment to being an outspoken ally on issues important to progressive Black folks. Ultimately, this is the work of coalition building. I believe it is important that advocates for Palestinian human rights are not just asking for support, but also offering it.

In talking about being against Israeli Apartheid, we should be also talking about apartheid in the US. We should talk about the ways in which funding is cut for social programs in the US while funding is increased for the Israeli military. We should talk about how Black people from New Orleans were dispersed throughout the US post-Katrina and are fighting for their "Right of Return." We should talk about how Arabs in the US are recently facing some of the racial profiling that Black folks here have always experienced. We should talk about how the Bush administration shows its contempt for democracy at home by disenfranchising Black people, and how it shows its contempt for democracy in Palestine by refusing to speak to the elected Palestinian government.

And, in speaking about these issues, we should not just be paying lip service, but actually commit to working on this with our organizations. [...] They should come out to protests and other events initiated by the Black community - not to recruit, but to show principled support.

I could not agree with Ms. Flaherty more. I think that the hesitancy of the Black community to get involved with the Palestinian Solidarity Movement has to do with lack of information about the issue, but moreso with a fear that the Palestinian Solidarity Movement's committment to Palestinians struggles will not extend itself to a concern for the daily struggles of Black folks. I think it is a legitimate fear, but am not sure it is the best principal to work from in the social justice movement. The ephermal question of whether "you got my back" will haunt social movements and solidarity action unless we begin to make the critical linkages between the struggles we champion and those we don't. And beyond making these connections, we must act in productive ways that create more than superficial, event-based coalitions.

The strength of the Palestinian solidarity movement is not built on asking for support from other social movements in divestment campaigns or seasonal boycotts; rather, it is built on forging lasting partnerships that do more than address the Palestinian struggle as a microcosm, but address the matrices of marginalization, repression and neo-colonialism articulated throughout the world. The strength of the Palestinian Solidarity Movement is being able to look beyond Palestine. Looking beyond Palestine does not imply a denial of the unique conditions of Palestinians, it urgently begs an internationalist approach that makes us active in all struggles against oppression and not solely those affecting Palestinians. While we cannot champion every cause, or toyi-toyi at every protest, we can take those extra steps to attend a Palestinian Solidarity rally, speak at a church rally on police brutality in Oakland or even start our own youth-based Black-Palestinian Solidarity movement (wink-wink).

Other resources (courtesy of EndtheOccupation.org)

The African Palestinian Connection By Rami Nashashibi IMAN Executive Director and Co-Founder Ph.D. Candidate Sociology/ University of Chicago

From Black America to Palestine There are two major traditions that have dominated African-American thinking on the issue of equality and justice for Blacks in the United States: one is the Black self-development position, and the other is the demand for immediate civil rights through integration. These two positions are usefully represented in their more modern refined versions in the works of Harold Cruse and Cornel West, as discussed by Elaine Hagopian

Two Walled Cities: Jerusalem and Johannesburg, Apartheid and Palestine" At a 1 December 2006 Palestine Center briefing, William Fletcher discussed the similarities and differences between Israeli-occupied Palestine and apartheid-era South Africa focusing on the logic, objectives and strategy of settler states. He also addressed the opposition to Jimmy Carter's new book, Palestine Peace Not Apartheid, and urged a continued mobilization around the issue of Palestine.

How to get involved:

End the Occupation Campaign

Boycott Israeli Goods Campaign

Electronic Intifada

If Americans Knew