[The following is a statement put forth by the Palestinian Feminist Collective on the ruthless violence that Israeli settlers and the state are employing in a series of attacks on Palestinians all over historic Palestine.]
A Love Letter to Our People Struggling in Palestine,
Your relentless will to remain on the land is a source of inspiration, perseverance, and fortitude. Once again, Palestinians from the far north to the far south of our homeland are defying settler colonialism’s attempts to partition land and people. From the Galilee to Gaza you reveal the geography of Palestine, in the face of military brutality and international impunity. State and settler violence and ethnic cleansing in Sheikh Jarrah and the Al Aqsa compound are not exceptions. They are part of an ongoing Nakba that has spanned Palestinian time and space since 1948.
To our Palestinian sisters, your steadfastness to hold ground, at the risk of injury and death, and against all odds is our fortitude. Gendered violence is core to settler colonial practice. We stand with you as you resist this masculinized and militarized colonization. We share in your pain from this renewed assault on Palestinian life and land. We are enraged as settlers wreak havoc and call for the death of our people. We stand vigilant as you withstand airstrikes in Gaza, and stun grenades, tear gas, skunk water, rubber bullets, and the desecration of our sacred sites in Jerusalem, no less during the month of Ramadan. We stand with you as you resist the media’s violent erasure of the Palestinian struggle.
Your labor has taught us for generations: Palestine is a feminist issue. Love guides our methodology for liberation. We affirm life and implore feminists everywhere to speak up, organize, and join the struggle for Palestinian liberation. We call for an immediate halting of the theft of homes in Sheikh Jarrah, Silwan, and beyond, and an immediate halting to the airstrikes on Gaza.
To our people throughout Palestine, we are with you. You are protecting a future where Palestinians everywhere can live without fear of colonial violence, a future where our children and our homes are safe, a future free from colonial containment and incarceration, a future where we can freely practice our spiritual worship.
We are rising up across cities in the heart of U.S. empire, that has fed the colonization and dispossession of the Palestinian people. Our vision for a radically different future is based on equality, justice and life-affirming interconnectedness. We honor your voices, perseverance and sumoud, and promise to continue our joint struggle for justice and liberation in Palestine and the shataat.
In struggle,
The Palestinian Feminist Collective
[This letter was originally published on the Palestinian Feminist Collective Facebook page on 14 May 2021.]