[News] There is nothing we can do about Israel other than everything
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There is nothing we can do about Israel other than everything
Stephanie Guilloud
March 20, 2024
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NationalMarch-NW-292-1024x685.jpg
The Israeli and U.S.-funded genocide of Palestinians has catalyzed a
moment of global reckoning. This moment is an echo of 2020 when the
racial justice uprisings following George Floyd’s murder offered a
moment of reckoning in the United States.
The horror that Palestinians are enduring is beyond comprehension. As
the world witnesses the genocide in Gaza unfolding in real-time on
social media, many of us who are watching are saying – there is no
coming back from this. The experiment of the Israeli state is over.
Israel is showing the world that Zionism is an undistilled form of
Western imperialism that requires this level of slaughter to maintain
itself.
Police murdering Black people with impunity was not new or unique within
the U.S., nor is Israel’s intentional destruction and ethnic cleansing
new or unique to Palestine. Genocide is fundamental to how the West
holds power, and the brutal strategy is repeated, seen and unseen all
over the world.
The war on Palestine opens a stark faultline where more people see what
many people around the world have always known: the power systems that
dominate our daily lives – capitalism, colonialism, and imperialism –
require immense violence and brutality to keep going. People who have
survived and continue to live through the worst of the West’s
imperialist projects to displace people, steal land, and control
populations know this. They stand with Palestine because they know these
systems, and their struggles for liberation are connected. The current
genocide in Gaza is exposing these truths to multitudes, who may or may
not have experienced colonialism. In order to dismantle and transform
these violent systems, we need strong social movements.
*There is a rift*
In this moment, after 75 years of brutal occupation, Zionism is showing
the world what is necessary to continue its project: complete
annihilation of the Palestinian people. The Zionist system requires
white supremacy, direct violence, and monetary and political support
from the United States. In this moment, we are all implicated, and there
is a rift and an opportunity in that. People of conscience, particularly
those of us in the United States have a dual responsibility: to do
everything we can to stop the genocide /and/ to develop a longer-term
strategy that contends with the most fundamental questions of the U.S.
state, capitalism, Zionism, and rising fascism. The truth is we cannot
do one without the other.
People of conscience, particularly those of us in the United States
have a dual responsibility: to do everything we can to stop the
genocide /and/ to develop a longer-term strategy that contends with
the most fundamental questions of the U.S. state, capitalism,
Zionism, and rising fascism. The truth is we cannot do one without
the other.
Every moment in history includes particular details that create
different opportunities. In this moment, opportunities surface that
could advance a clear vision and pathway to either fundamental
liberation, as we call for a Free Palestine in the streets, or the
systems could fall towards a more consolidated and insidious control of
public and social life in every state on the planet. Both are already
playing out, whether we recognize it or not.
A key to charting our course forward is studying our own history. There
have been other rifts, other opportunities for global solidarity and
action. 9/11 in 2001 was such a rift. It was not the beginning or end of
empire, but the U.S. and its allies used that moment to launch two wars
– one on Iraq and one called the War on Terror, a permanent war that has
morphed to justify imperial attacks all over the world, domestic
surveillance in the U.S, and a legal and social framework informed by
Zionism and Zionist racism
<https://mondoweiss.net/2024/03/opposition-to-palestinian-rights-shaped-u-s-anti-terror-laws/>
against Palestinians.
We protested then. Over10 million people in 600 cities demonstrated on
February 15, 2003
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/15_February_2003_anti-war_protests>.
These unprecedented global protests were coordinated and instigated by a
call from thousands of people at the Social Movement Assembly at the
second World Social Forum in Brazil. People understood that there was a
rift and a danger, and we acted to prevent an imperial war for control
of land and resources justified by a lie of U.S. victimhood.
More recent history includes the rift of 2020. A public health crisis
compounded by white supremacist violence that showed itself in an
eight-minute video of George Floyd’s murder. That moment catalyzed
months of uprisings all across the United States. Young people were
brave, beautiful, creative, and powerful, calling out the whole system
of racism and brutality. We named the horror of police murders while
also naming the purpose and function of police to protect capital. Many
demanded the elimination of a system designed to incarcerate and
brutalize people, particularly Black people. But there was not a full
reckoning. We opened up the ground, but we were not able to undermine
the state and stop police murders that continue to happen on a daily basis.
*Today, we are witnessing another, potentially deeper rift.*
October 7 exposed not only Israel and Zionism but the Western colonial
imperialist project as a whole. The rift is a recognition that countries
like the U.S. and UK’s continued efforts to exploit, control, oppress,
and occupy many parts of the world, from Africa to Asia to South
America, are linked and require a genocidal, authoritarian fascism to
continue. Zionism, often misunderstood as a religious framework, is
actually a colonial, legal, and social framework that asserts Israel’s
right to exist at the expense of the Palestinian people and their land.
Massive numbers have mobilized in streets around the world in the last
five months in response to the Israeli attacks as movements have
mobilized in support of Palestine since 1948. But the forces aligned
with Zionism and fascism are also exploiting this moment and using it to
expand the police state in direct response to the movement energy that
is on the rise.
We are, again, protesting and mobilizing and disrupting and refusing to
be a part of this brutal slaughter, misnamed as a conflict. We
understand that this situation is a continuation of colonial genocide
for control of land and resources rooted in the lie of Israeli
victimhood. We are naming the role of the U.S., misnamed as
“complicity,” and understand that Israel requires direct and
unconditional support from the U.S. to continue its bombardment. At the
same time, we are recognizing the power of global solidarity as we
witness South Africa’s bold charge of genocide at the International
Court of Justice.
Civil society is splitting along lines made more explicit by Israel’s
genocidal war. InNorth Ireland, Palestinian flags are still flying in
Catholic neighborhoods
<https://thefunambulist.net/magazine/questioning-our-solidarities/ar-scath-a-cheile-a-mhaireann-na-daoine-under-the-shelter-of-each-other-people-survive>,
and Israeli flags fly beside the British as signs of clear allegiance –
occupied standing with occupied, occupier with occupier. In the U.S.
South, we see good old boys flying the Israeli and Confederate flags
side by side on their trucks, making a clear connection between white
supremacy and Zionism. At the same time, an AtlantaBlack church
dedicated their Christmas Eve service to Palestine
<https://mondoweiss.net/2023/12/at-a-megachurch-christmas-eve-service-outside-atlanta-a-call-for-a-ceasefire/>,
their pastor wearing a Palestinian keffiyeh scarf. In a profound act of
solidarity and humanity,thousands of Black pastors signed a letter
demanding a ceasefire
<https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/28/us/politics/black-pastors-biden-gaza-israel.html#:~:text=Hundreds%20of%20pastors%20signed%20open,hostages%20being%20held%20in%20Gaza.>
and challenging the Biden administration.
For the last 166 days, people have resisted in the millions across every
border, race, and language. There is an opportunity for U.S. social
movements to go big and go global. Not only is Israel’s war being
challenged by hundreds of non-Western nations and previously colonized
peoples, but the United States and the entire arrangement of Western
imperial and colonial power are being directly confronted. As Tony Karon
explained
<https://www.thenation.com/article/world/south-africa-icj-israel-genocide/>
in/The Nation/ in January: “Standing up for Palestine has become
shorthand for that global struggle to change how the world is ruled.”
The forces standing with Palestine are potential global allies to a
stronger U.S social movement, and if we are going to contend with
impending fascism, we have to move beyond protest towards more strategic
action that dismantles Zionism, truly aligns with Palestinian and global
liberation movements, and crafts a powerful position to counter and
rearrange the established order.
*We are at a crossroads*
In the wake of the racial justice uprisings of 2020, organizers asked
similar questions that we ask in this moment. Abolition of police and
prisons surfaced more widely as a strategic framework because of the
decades of groundwork laid by organizers and strategists who refused to
compromise or find a liberal stopgap out of the fundamental crisis of
state violence. Similar to contending with the entrenched reality of
Israeli occupation, the work to abolish prison systems and police is not
a reformist endeavor. Social control mechanisms are embedded in all
parts of the current power arrangement in Israel and in the U.S. Like
one of the abolition movement leaders,Ruth Wilson Gilmore
<https://www.documentjournal.com/2023/04/ruth-wilson-gilmore-abolition-geography-politics-literature-prison-reform-blm-tyre-nichols/>,
says, /“Abolition requires that we change one thing: everything.”/
Within an abolitionist framework, contending with the inherent violence
and social control of the state requires completely abolishing systems
of prisons, police, and surveillance. Though there are tactical reforms
that relieve conditions, the primary strategy of abolition is to end
that system and build something else. Similarly, there is no reformist
alternative to Zionism as a tool of Western power. And the corporate and
political actors within empire know it: “This is not a small issue. From
my perspective it’s not just about Israel,” the CEO of Palantir,
Alexander Karp, told a reporter
<https://fortune.com/2024/03/14/palantir-alex-karp-lose-staff-israel-stance/>
on March 14: “Do you believe in the West? Do you believe that the West
has created a superior way of living. Are you willing to admit you
believe that?”
Contending with Zionism requires a break with empire. In short:
there is nothing we can do about Israel, other than everything.
Contending with Zionism requires a break with empire. In short: there is
nothing we can do about Israel, other than everything.
The opportunity within this moment is to develop a sharper strategy that
activates the millions of people who see the faultlines and feel the rift.
*Zionism is a unifying force opening pathways for fascism*
Israel is a fascist state, and its relentless genocide is blasting open
more pathways for global fascism to establish itself. A growing number
of fundamentalists and authoritarians entrenched in white supremacy and
Islamophobia have been setting course across the globe over the last few
years. Most recently, Argentina voted in aTrump-like right-wing
president in November 2023
<https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/after-electing-right-wing-populist-milei-as-president-argentina-faces-uncharted-path>
who is a strong supporter of Israel,pushing a Zionist agenda
<https://www.trtworld.com/latin-america/fanatic-of-israel-what-is-driving-argentinas-president-elect-javier-mileis-obsession-15943848>,
waving the Israeli flag at his rallies in October, and making Israel one
of his first trips as president. In January, as Israel continued its
bombardment of Gaza, India’s fundamentalist authoritarian Modi
celebrated theHindu temple on the razed grounds of the Ayodhya mosque
<https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/1/22/indias-modi-opens-ram-temple-built-on-site-of-demolished-mosque-in-ayodhya>
in January, and Italy’s governmentpassed laws to protect public
expressions of fascis
<https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/19/europe/italy-fascist-salute-legal-court-intl/index.html>m.Senegal’s
president postponed elections
<https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/2/9/protesters-and-security-forces-clash-in-senegal-over-election-delay>,
jailed movement leaders, and sparked massive protests. These moves point
towards a growing fascist consolidation. Israel’s attacks are
emboldened, not just in Gaza but in the military and social violence
against Palestinians in the West Bank. The U.S.’s brutal attacks on
Yemen in response to their economic blockades in defense of Palestinians
show what the empire is willing to do to protect itself, even in the
face of global condemnation.
The conditions are set for Zionism to fuel fascism on a global level and
prevent social movements from rising in the United States. Zionism and
anti-Palestinian racism have been fundamental to the “war on terror”
<https://theintercept.com/2024/02/21/adl-palestine-terrorism-legislation/>
that started 20 years ago when 9/11 was used as a pretext for permanent
war. The U.S. createdlegal and social frameworks of “terrorism”
<https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/war-terror-continues-target-palestine-activists>
to undermine global resistance and to counter dissent, public speech,
and organizing in the United States. Zionism and the War on Terror have
been tools used to protect capital and also to attack resistance and
liberation movements, particularly those led by Black, Palestinian,
Muslim, and immigrant communities. Globally, the U.S. uses the threat of
“terrorism” to expand military outposts in every corner of the world,
and here, theFBI uses expanded surveillance to track Black anti-police
protesters
<https://theintercept.com/2019/10/29/fbi-surveillance-black-activists/#:~:text=The%20latest%20batch%20of%20FBI,the%20activities%20of%20individuals%20and>,
and Zionism becomes a tool to turn protest into terrorism.
*Zionism fuels state repression in the U.S.*
Zionism is a perfect vehicle for the expansion of the police state in
the United States. Both liberals and the extreme right in the United
States are using Zionism to advance a strategy that expands asocial base
for fascism <https://lrna.org/taking-the-offensive-to-defeat-fascism/>,
deepens control of public institutions, and sets the stage for
consolidation at the federal level, protected by the police state with
support from financial institutions, media, and higher education. Today,
legislationweaponizing the definition of antisemitism
<https://msmagazine.com/2024/02/04/the-politics-of-defining-anti-semitism/>
to equate it with anti-Zionism and stifle pro-Palestinian actions is
passing with bipartisan support. These attacks allow increased
constriction of public discourse and dissent, which will be legislated
at school board, university, city, state, and federal levels.
Beyond the explicit attacks against Palestinians and Palestine
supporters in the U.S., Zionism is also being used to roll back any of
the gains made from racial and social justice movements over the last
decade. In 2020, during the racial justice uprisings, the national
conversation about race and police was forced into a broader arena. Some
workplaces, universities, and organizations were pressured to institute
training or make concessionary changes in the form of Diversity, Equity,
and Inclusion (DEI) programs. That small gain (and weak response) to
structural and institutional racism in the U.S. has been undone in a
larger offensive right-wing play to control public discourse and
education. The rightwing’s first hit in this era was K-12 social studies
and U.S. history classes, using “Critical Race Theory” as the weapon. As
students and teachers challenge Zionism in this moment, the same
Manhattan Institute operators likeChris Rufo are weaponizing Zionism to
undo DEI
<https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2024-01-07/harvard-claudine-gay-christopher-rufo-diversity-equity-inclusion>
and basic structural and constitutional protections throughout higher
education systems
<https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/19/us/alabama-bill-bans-dei-public-universities-reaj/index.html>,
taking down Black leadership as they do it.
The university’s answer to the challenge of systemic racism is looking
more and more like intimidation and censorship. The state’s answer to
systemic racism and growing economic distress in the U.S. is police
expansions like Cop City combined with new forms of state repression,
which also has ties to Zionism.
Last summer, thousands of people in Atlanta organized to stop Cop City,
a $100 million police training facility set to be built on public land
and a fragile ecosystem. The decision to build Cop City was a direct
response to the racial justice uprisings in 2020. A way for Mayor Keisha
Lance Bottoms to “boost the morale” of a police force that was being
challenged for murder, brutality, and aggression that kills Black people
without consequences. Community organizations like Project South and
many others, engaged people on every block in our neighborhood, and
there was very little confusion as to why the city of Atlanta had
decided to build the largest urban warfare training compound in the
country. Organizers provided additional information about who was paying
for it – mostly us, with our public taxes. We informed people that Home
Depot, Wells Fargo, and other corporations were putting up the other
millions through the Atlanta Police Foundation. We asked – /Why do you
think that the banks are funding a police training center that includes
bombing facilities and fake apartment buildings to practice raids in our
neighborhoods?/ They answered – /Well, they’re preparing for something.
Sounds like they’re preparing for martial law. /
Beyond the direct brutality of the police, the boundaries of state
repression are being tested in many Southern political spheres, and they
are using Zionism and the current rift to do it. In Georgia, we are
witnessing the unique consolidation of a Republican supermajority at the
state level and a predominantly Black Democratic Atlanta City Council
working in lockstep to expand the police state. During this legislative
session, the state is passing multiple laws to criminalize protest while
the city uses public funds to build Cop City. On January 22, as the
Atlanta city council voted again to shut down a legitimate referendum
process to put Cop City on the ballot, the Republican congress, in
session not even a block away, passed abill that redefines antisemitism
to criminalize protest against Zionism
<https://projectsouth.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/HB-30-Fact-Sheet1.pdf>
anddropped a bill to expand RICO laws to criminalize actions based on
political affiliation and belief
<https://legiscan.com/GA/bill/SB359/2023>. The same body is hoping
toexpand
<https://www.acluga.org/en/press-releases/press-release-aclu-urges-georgia-lawmakers-reject-unnecessary-bill-expanding-georgias>
the definition of “terrorism” to include basic forms of protest.
When these laws go into effect – in addition to the anti-trans laws,
anti-abortion laws, and cash bail laws being passed across the South and
the U.S. – they will harm real people and reduce an already decimated
public infrastructure for health, education, and survival to a minimal
thread.
We are witnessing a consolidation of the ruling liberal and conservative
ideologies within U.S. power against the backdrop of Zionism. That
consolidation represents a threat as global fascism rises, but it also
creates an opportunity for social movements to challenge the whole
setup. What if our U.S.-based movements aligned more strategically with
the global upswell for Palestine?
*Palestine is a call for fundamental transformation*
The Palestinian struggle against Zionism reflects a challenge to the
Western world order. The Palestinians are located at a particular nexus
of colonialism and imperialism fueled by the guilt of the Western world
in the 20^th century and distilled by white supremacy and compounded by
Islamophobia in a post 9-11 21^st century world. To be in alignment with
Palestine directly implicates and upends that arrangement.
World nations are splitting along this rift and frontline: one set of
mostly Western nations in line with the U.S. supporting and funding
genocide and the other challenging Israel, Zionism, and Western empire
and standing in solidarity with Palestine.Brazil recalled its ambassador
<https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20240219-brazil-recalls-ambassador-to-israel-in-row-over-lulas-gaza-comments/>
to Israel in the last few weeks after President Lula called out Israel’s
genocide at the African Union Summit. Bolivia severed diplomatic
relations with Israel early in October, and Chile and Colombia recalled
their ambassadors and criticized Israel’s actions as war crimes, crimes
against humanity.South Africa’s case against Israel at the International
Court of Justice
<https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/2/20/israels-apartheid-must-end-south-africa-says-at-icj-hearing>
was rooted in a broader history and analysis of their own apartheid
regime and the global solidarity that supported its end. Global social
movements from Congo to Senegal to Kenya to New Zealand to Ireland are
connecting Palestinian freedom and the end to Israeli occupation to a
broader call for liberation.
The decades-long history of U.S.-based movement in solidarity with
Palestine creates the conditions for more meaningful possibilities in
this moment, exemplified by the overwhelming numbers of people showing
up in the streets, walking out of schools, disrupting political and
business gatherings, and divesting from Israeli products. Historic
movements like SNCC in the U.S. South
<https://snccdigital.org/inside-sncc/policy-statements/palestine/> in
the 1960s to the newer generation ofindigenous social movements
<https://ndncollective.org/right-of-return-is-landback/> and Black
liberation movements <https://www.blackforpalestine.com/> recognize the
significance of the Palestinian resistance to Zionism and Western power.
Social movements in the U.S. have a responsibility to deepen
people’s understanding of our collective stake in Palestinian
liberation in the context of all people’s liberation.
Social movements in the U.S. have a responsibility to deepen people’s
understanding of our collective stake in Palestinian liberation in the
context of all people’s liberation. There is an opportunity to connect
the resistance to a broader power analysis because of the unique
position of Palestine and our unique position within the United States.
Nylah Burton, a young Black journalist, writes that“bearing witness to
Israel’s genocide in Palestine has changed people forever”
<https://mondoweiss.net/2024/01/palestine-awakens-the-revolution/> and
is leading to a generation of people rejecting the West as a whole.
We could lose that opportunity if we do not connect people to meaningful
long-term actions. Many in the U.S. are new to this fight, coming to
consciousness at a moment when multiple crises are compounding in
catastrophic ways on every level: ecological, economic, and social. What
might be possible if we organized that base beyond mobilizations?
Additionally, we will have to build more creative strategies and sets of
tactics to contend with the 2024 elections. The hundreds of thousands of
protest votes of “uncommitted”
<https://apnews.com/article/uncommitted-biden-trump-war-15f96be36b4d5ac167c7ceda72fe65d1>
is a show of force and politicizes our refusal to accept the binary of
the terrible and not /as/ terrible. But we will have to work hard and
strategically to make that count and build a stronger position /after
/the elections, no matter what happens. The Democrats look set to lose
in a moment when it is also becoming more and more clear to more and
more people that no one is truly safer if they win.
*We are up against a global order, what if we acted like it? *
Israel cannot be reformed. Genocide is required to continue the Zionist
project. Fundamental transformation of the system is necessary to stop
it. That will require more than protest.
Global social movements and the Palestinian liberation movement will
determine their courses of action based on their specific sets of
conditions and visions. This moment requires the strategic and active
solidarity of U.S.-based movements, and we need to recognize our
position. Israel’s strength is unique in the world because of its
proximity and total reliance on the United States. /What is our unique
leverage?/
Genocide is required to continue the Zionist project. Fundamental
transformation of the system is necessary to stop it. That will
require more than protest.
We absolutely need convergences of public resistance wherehundreds of
thousands of people <https://www.palestine-studies.org/en/node/1654576>
gather in DC, Houston, Chicago, and Atlanta. We need demonstrations
where we see ourselves as agents of power in a time of intimidation. Our
ability to organize to shut down bridges in New York City, ports in
Oakland, and freeways in Chicago, Durham, San Francisco, and many small
towns shows us that we are not alone and demonstrates our disgust and
resistance from within the center of the empire. But mass mobilizations,
though they show us our numbers, our courage, and our connections, are
not sufficient to counter what is happening.
In the U.S., we have a responsibility to sharpen our tactics in line
with bigger global strategies and in opposition to the simultaneous rise
of the police state. Zionism is being used to fuel the expansion of the
police state in the United States through pushing state repression and
anti-protest laws. Is there a strategic defense to the rise of fascism
in the U.S. that also divests from Zionism on a global scale?
Let’s expose the players who are invested in a growing police state,
let’s reveal and dismantle the global deadly police exchange programs
like the Georgia International Law Enforcement Exchange
<https://prismreports.org/2023/11/14/stop-cop-city-gilee-palestinian-genocide/>
(GILEE) that trains U.S. police in Israel. Let’s shut down Atlanta’s
video surveillance system, which is one of the largest in the world,
using Israeli technology and connect that work to challenging laws that
turn our protests into felonies. Let’s dismantle the Cop Cities
<https://twitter.com/NationalSJP/status/1767762403117207782?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet>of
this country with an eye toward building a powerful social movement with
a clear-eyed view of the stakes and analysis of how local, regional,
national, and global systems operate.
There is an incredible opportunity to turn the eyes of the U.S. to the
imperial and occupation projects in Haiti, Sudan, Democratic Republic of
Congo, and at our own borders. Our actions should connect to existing
decolonization movements like Landback and Indigenous movements in the
U.S. and Canada to Puerto Rico, Hawai’i and beyond. We have an
opportunity to see ourselves in a broader context of the past decades of
resistance that got us to this moment and the current reality of
compounded crises across many global fields. We need to build out our
base by inviting people into generative processes to learn, prepare, and
take action within a coordinated plan.
What if every Free Palestine protest, city council ordinance, and
freeway block was coordinated to a broader divestment strategy? What if
a broad campaign to end Israeli occupation was connected to protecting
public space and defeating the expansion of using RICO laws to
intimidate organizers?
Public space is being eroded, and Zionism is the tool that is speeding
it up.Universities are once again sites of struggle
<https://www.newarab.com/analysis/us-campus-crackdown-pro-palestine-activism>
where students are criminalized and targeted by violence
<https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/nov/26/palestinian-students-shot-wounded-vermont>,
and faculty are fired or intimidated from teaching history. Let’s
mobilize our numbers to hold and assert our authority in public space
through families and children
<https://www.instagram.com/familiesforceasefirephilly/> calling for
ceasefire with kite flights, ignoring flag bans on soccer matches
<https://www.aljazeera.com/sports/2023/11/2/celtic-fans-green-brigade-palestine-support-israel-war-on-gaza>,
and organizing across university spaces to challenge and re-arrange the
structures that suppress freedom of speech, thought, and learning.
We need more than static town halls, we need ongoing assemblies where
community members analyze the situations we face and make decisions
about how to protect our schools, neighborhoods, and organizations.
Let’s build social movements rooted in our history and driven by a
younger generation that is showing itself to be rigorous, brave, and
forward looking.
*We are not just protesters. We are building a different world.*
We have an opportunity to reimagine a future of how the world works.
Millions have mobilized over these past five months to demonstrate a
tremendous expression of dissent to this current genocide for control of
land and resources justified by the lie of Israeli victimhood, a
parallel of the lie of U.S. victimhood after 9/11. And just like in
2003, when our massive, global protests did not prevent the Iraq war,
our massive, global protests are not stopping this genocide. To be
effective in engaging this moment, we need to connect our mass
mobilizations to organizing infrastructure that can contend for power.
To be clear, the public expression of dissent and being able to see our
own power in our numbers is necessary and significant. We just have to
be more strategic. And we have to be more intentionally global.
There is a rift. This call to action and strategy is a hopeful
intervention to come up with better moves. To build stronger, faster and
more sustained movement actions informed by the larger context and our
long-term vision. Let us be smart, which means seeing the path behind us
and the 20, 30 years of brave resistance that led to this moment. And
let us see 20, 30 years ahead, so that we imagine beyond the 2024
elections and toward our own liberation.
Let’s build up U.S. social movement forces in order to align with global
movements. Let’s follow the leadership of people in the Palestinian
Youth Movement <https://palestinianyouthmovement.com/about> and Black
young people who have been sharpening their practices for the last ten
years in the streets. Let the courage of Rachel Corrie in 2013
<https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/3/16/everybodys-fight-palestinians-hail-the-sacrifice-of-corrie-bushnell>,
the woman in Atlanta who set herself on fire wrapped in a Palestinian
flag, and the blazing death of Aaron Bushnell, an Air Force man from San
Antonio calling for a Free Palestine, embolden us to take bigger risks.
Let us assemble and decide to do more that connects our solutions to the
actual threat, to the fundamental arrangement of Western empire and the
fascist forces rising to protect it. Let us see our path in alignment
with the rest of the globe. With those who are already fighting these
repressions and horrors. Let us hear the call that Mohammed El Kurd in
his recent article “Are we indeed all Palestinians?
<https://mondoweiss.net/2024/03/are-we-indeed-all-palestinians/>”
implores us to contend with: /What are the pretenses that absolve us
from participating in history? . . . Because Gaza cannot fight the
empire on its own./
Let us use our leverage to stop this death march. Let’s show ourselves
who we are, what we really want, and what we’re willing to do to get it.
This is about rearranging the world. It’s our only way through.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Stephanie Guilloud*
Stephanie Guilloud is the Movement Organizing Senior Strategist at
Project South: Institute for the Elimination of Poverty and Genocide
<https://projectsouth.org/>based in Atlanta, Georgia. Guilloud brings
close to three decades of organizing experience and leadership in
Southern movement and global justice work. Stephanie co-created the
Organizers’ History site <https://www.shutdownwto20.org/> related to her
direct action organizing in 1999 to shut down the World Trade
Organization, and edited Project South’s People’s Movement Assembly
Organizing Handbook.
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