In late March, a delegation of nineteen prison, labor, and scholar-activists from the United States traveled to Palestine. We were the first U.S. delegation to Palestine to focus specifically on political imprisonment and solidarity between Palestinian and US prisoners. During our ten-day trip, we heard the stories of a diverse group of Palestinians who daily resist land confiscation, house demolitions, restrictions to water access, restriction of movement, summary executions, and mass imprisonment. In the face of Israel’s system of racialized terror, Palestinians uphold their commitment to “sumud”–a concept with historical ties to the Palestinian liberation movement defined as “steadfastness” or standing one’s ground on the land with dignity — as a form of resistance.
A central feature of the Zionist colonial project is political imprisonment and their hope that this will break the Palestinian struggle. Over 800,000 Palestinians have been imprisoned since 1948 and prison seems to be a commonality in the lives of almost all Palestinians. In order to link the voices of US-held political prisoners with global struggles for self-determination and liberation, we published a pamphlet of statements from US Political Prisoners in solidarity with the liberation struggle of the Palestinian people. With the assistance of Birzeit University’s Institute for Women’s Studies, the pamphlet was translated into Arabic, printed, and we were able to distribute approximately 500 copies throughout our trip.
You can see the entire pamphlet here:
-The Freedom Archives
