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So once the information was known about the Hamas massacre, immediately the racist right wing media produced a story about a member of BLM and members of color in congress voicing support for Palestine. In the effort to maintain white supremacy by trying to get the government to declare all non whites who oppose the system of white supremacy in America terrorists, or as enemies of America, I have seens a lie posted by various "colorblind, never seeing race, democrats only use race," Republicans about black support for Hamas. Support for Palestine is not support for Hamas. Every Palestinian is not a member of Hamas. So here is an article from the black perspective, because it seems that members of the right in this forum either do not have an understanding that the experience of blacks and whites in America is an example of polar opposites or don't want to recognize this reality.
You Want to Understand Black Americans’ Solidarity With Palestine?
Black Americans know colonization when we see it
If you’re wondering why some Black Americans have expressed solidarity with Palestinian people in Gaza, you should consider this slice of American history, ranging from the final years of chattel slavery until the early days of the Reconstruction era. Abraham Lincoln, the country’s 16th President, who signed the Emancipation Proclamation, didn’t have a modernist view of racial equality that many would imagine. Most notably, Lincoln said, “I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races — that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermingling with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which will ever forbid the two races living together on terms of… political equality.” Yikes. Despite Lincoln agreeing that slavery should be abolished, he did not believe Black people could ever coexist in America with White people, a notion many endorsed at the time.
In 1856, Linccon became a member of the American Colonization Society. Those who joined this organization shared Lincoln’s belief that Black people could not co-exist in America as equals to White people. After all, they reasoned, since Europeans forcibly removed Black Americans from their homelands in West and Central Africa, that is where they should return. This idea was presented as an alternative or a condition of abolition; they wanted to force Black Americans to migrate, to leave the country they were born in, which they fought to secure. By 1822, the American Colonization Society successfully established a West African colony. While the creation of this colony displaced and disrupted Indigenous tribes, by 1847, this land “became the independent nation of Libera.”
When local indigenous tribes vehemently resisted initial attempts to purchase land to establish this colony, a “Navy officer in charge, Lieutenant Robert Stockton, coerced a local ruler to sell a strip of land to the Society,” which gave them the leverage to solidify the colony, and ultimately spread its original borders. While Indigenous tribes continued to attack the new colony, they “built fortifications for protections,” and the capital of Liberia, Monrovia, was named to honor President James Monroe, a man who enslaved at least one hundred and seventy-eight African people in America. What does this have to do with Palestine, you may be asking?
Now, to the matter between Israel and Palestine.
According to AJ+ News, a platform that uses digital storytelling to promote “human rights and equality, holding power to account, and amplifying the voices of the powerless,” posted a video explaining that “Israel and Gaza are not two countries at war. Gaza is a territory under siege, where every aspect of life is controlled by Israel.” This sounds very similar to how White Southerners sought to control Black Americans after chattel slavery ended by creating Jim Crow laws, or Black Codes, that cast them as second-class citizens and limited their sociopolitical power and upward mobility.
Adam Hamze wrote in a 2016 Huff Post article there are ten things Palestinians can’t do because of the Israeli Occupation. Some of the most disturbing points Hamze mentioned were that Palestinians in Gaza “can’t control the flow of goods and supplies” or even “control their access to water.” Additionally, Palestinians are not free to travel across borders and or have “the same due process rights of citizenship.”
Another shocking limitation is that Palestinians in Gaza are not “equally protected by labor laws and live under curfew, which doesn’t allow them to stay out late. “Gaza residents call their home the world’s largest open-air prison. Over 1.8 million people live here on just 365 square kilometers of land. The population of Gaza — two-thirds of them younger than 25 — live in one of the most densely populated places on earth.” When you intentionally deprive people of resources, poverty, and desperation blossom, and so do extremist groups, who exploit the fact that traditional methods of mediation have failed to recruit.
After a recent attack from Hamas, a terrorist organization that’s been at odds with other Palestinian leadership in the Gaza Strip, Israel has responded by declaring war.
“According to the United Nations, roughly 6,400 Palestinians and 300 Israelis have been killed in the ongoing conflict since 2008, not counting the recent fatalities.” Sadly, following any attempt to criticize Israeli policy, someone is bound to call you anti-Semitic. However, this is a false dichotomy. You can oppose Israeli Occupation and anti-semitism at the same time.
You Want to Understand Black Americans’ Solidarity With Palestine?
Black Americans know colonization when we see it
If you’re wondering why some Black Americans have expressed solidarity with Palestinian people in Gaza, you should consider this slice of American history, ranging from the final years of chattel slavery until the early days of the Reconstruction era. Abraham Lincoln, the country’s 16th President, who signed the Emancipation Proclamation, didn’t have a modernist view of racial equality that many would imagine. Most notably, Lincoln said, “I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races — that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermingling with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which will ever forbid the two races living together on terms of… political equality.” Yikes. Despite Lincoln agreeing that slavery should be abolished, he did not believe Black people could ever coexist in America with White people, a notion many endorsed at the time.
In 1856, Linccon became a member of the American Colonization Society. Those who joined this organization shared Lincoln’s belief that Black people could not co-exist in America as equals to White people. After all, they reasoned, since Europeans forcibly removed Black Americans from their homelands in West and Central Africa, that is where they should return. This idea was presented as an alternative or a condition of abolition; they wanted to force Black Americans to migrate, to leave the country they were born in, which they fought to secure. By 1822, the American Colonization Society successfully established a West African colony. While the creation of this colony displaced and disrupted Indigenous tribes, by 1847, this land “became the independent nation of Libera.”
When local indigenous tribes vehemently resisted initial attempts to purchase land to establish this colony, a “Navy officer in charge, Lieutenant Robert Stockton, coerced a local ruler to sell a strip of land to the Society,” which gave them the leverage to solidify the colony, and ultimately spread its original borders. While Indigenous tribes continued to attack the new colony, they “built fortifications for protections,” and the capital of Liberia, Monrovia, was named to honor President James Monroe, a man who enslaved at least one hundred and seventy-eight African people in America. What does this have to do with Palestine, you may be asking?
Now, to the matter between Israel and Palestine.
According to AJ+ News, a platform that uses digital storytelling to promote “human rights and equality, holding power to account, and amplifying the voices of the powerless,” posted a video explaining that “Israel and Gaza are not two countries at war. Gaza is a territory under siege, where every aspect of life is controlled by Israel.” This sounds very similar to how White Southerners sought to control Black Americans after chattel slavery ended by creating Jim Crow laws, or Black Codes, that cast them as second-class citizens and limited their sociopolitical power and upward mobility.
Adam Hamze wrote in a 2016 Huff Post article there are ten things Palestinians can’t do because of the Israeli Occupation. Some of the most disturbing points Hamze mentioned were that Palestinians in Gaza “can’t control the flow of goods and supplies” or even “control their access to water.” Additionally, Palestinians are not free to travel across borders and or have “the same due process rights of citizenship.”
Another shocking limitation is that Palestinians in Gaza are not “equally protected by labor laws and live under curfew, which doesn’t allow them to stay out late. “Gaza residents call their home the world’s largest open-air prison. Over 1.8 million people live here on just 365 square kilometers of land. The population of Gaza — two-thirds of them younger than 25 — live in one of the most densely populated places on earth.” When you intentionally deprive people of resources, poverty, and desperation blossom, and so do extremist groups, who exploit the fact that traditional methods of mediation have failed to recruit.
After a recent attack from Hamas, a terrorist organization that’s been at odds with other Palestinian leadership in the Gaza Strip, Israel has responded by declaring war.
“According to the United Nations, roughly 6,400 Palestinians and 300 Israelis have been killed in the ongoing conflict since 2008, not counting the recent fatalities.” Sadly, following any attempt to criticize Israeli policy, someone is bound to call you anti-Semitic. However, this is a false dichotomy. You can oppose Israeli Occupation and anti-semitism at the same time.
