True to This not New to It
Black Southerners for the Liberation of Palestine
📸: “Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) 1967 Article on Palestine & formal Statement, Digital SNCC Gateway”
Mirror Moment: Generational Freedom
Southern Black Folk are true to standing for liberation not new to this. There is a long-standing history of Black Southerners, Black Folk in the Diaspora, and Black Feminists supporting the movement to free Palestine. SNCC was organized in 1960 & known for working with community members to amplify grassroots organizations in the Deep South. SNCC published an article in its June-July 1967 Newsletter entitled “Third World Round-Up: The Palestine Problem: Test Your Knowledge.” An excerpt from the article can be seen in the photograph above. The article was written by Ethel Minor with the intention of encouraging conversations about the occupation of Palestine. This article was an icebreaker, published without the approval of higher-up SNCC leadership, to SNCC’s formal/official statement on Palestine which was published in a letter on August 15, 1967.
Still, many of the points that Minor wrote in the article were reiterated in the August 1967 official statement. However, the formal statement also added contextualization to the history of the occupation of Palestine.
It is up to us, this current generation, to further strengthen our solidarity with Palestine. Not only must we further strengthen our solidarity because it is within our organizing lineage, but to borrow from poet June Jordan Palestine is a part of a two-part moral litmus test (the other part being LGBTQ+ Rights).
As Pulitzer Prize Winner Poet Gwendolyn Brooks wrote in her poem entitled “Paul Robeson,” “we are each other’s harvest: we are each other’s business.” Part of the foundation that D.O.T.S. was founded on is a radical Black Feminist tradition, that requires that one must continuously bear witness. The link to a superb reading list about the history of Black Feminists supporting the cause for liberation for Palestinians ( beautifully curated by Black Women Radicals) can be explored here. Lastly, Black Women Radicals hosted a moving webinar entitled “Black Feminist Writers & Palestine” that featured Clarissa Brooks, Angela Y. Davis, Breya Johnson, Briona Simone Jones, Beverly Guy-Sheftall, & Jaimee A. Swift. The webinar was recorded and can be viewed here.
Keep amplifying posts from Palestinians
Keep educating yourself & Community
Haymarket Books is offering three free e-books about how to move toward a free Palestine here
Keep protesting
Keep turning to your Poets
Safia Elhillo (Information about Palestine & Sudan)
Hanif gave an amazing interview about Palestine, Islamaphobia, & more on Youtube
Keep bearing witness & being moved enough to do something about…
Sudan
Haiti
Democratic Republic of the Congo
Palestine
Keep bearing witness & being moved enough to do something until Sudan is free, Haiti is free, the Congo is free, until we are all free
Keep bearing witness & being moved enough to do something until from the river to the sea Palestine is free 🍉!