The Red Nation stands with Palestinians in their struggle for decolonization and land back
As we write this, Palestinians face unrelenting and unprecedented settler violence. The Israeli army has warned 1.1 million Palestinians in Gaza to relocate south within the next twenty-four hours as Israel prepares to level Gaza with bombs.The Israeli apartheid regime has already cut off all food, water, and electricity to Gaza while carpet bombing residential buildings, markets, schools, health facilities, and mosques. Across the occupied West Bank residents fear the worst, with many trapped in their homes as armed Israeli settlers threaten pogroms against Palestinian families and the military prohibits any freedom of movement. Israeli officials promise to “open the gates of hell,” labeling Palestinians “human animals.”
Israeli-led massacres in Gaza have commenced with full support and aid from the US.
For the last two decades, 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza have been forced to live in a dense open-air prison, besieged by Israel in violation of international law. Two thirds of the population in Gaza are refugees that were forcibly displaced from other parts of Palestine. Half the population are children, and the vast majority are impoverished. Completely surrounded by a militarized barrier, Gazans are denied freedom of movement and regular access to food, water, and healthcare by a protracted Israeli siege. In 2018, the United Nations deemed Gaza “unlivable,” and since then Gazans have experienced multiple bombardments by Israel, intensifying an already untenable situation.
This is not a “conflict.” This is a deliberate act of settler colonialism and genocide.
Israel’s violent occupation of historic Palestine is typically framed as a “conflict.” This is a distortion of history that erases the actual truth: Israel cannot exist without the annihilation of Palestinians, whether this be slow or sudden.
Settler historians in the United States have long framed the history of US settler colonialism as a “conflict” between two equal sides: cowboys and Indians; settlers and savages. Dakotah scholar Elizabeth Cook-Lynn reminds us there are no two sides to a story of colonial dispossession and genocide. There is a clear perpetrator: the settler state. Settlers invade and destroy in order to replace. Like the US, Israel is a violent settler nation that should be condemned for its crimes against humanity.
Decolonization is the only form of justice for the crimes of settler colonialism. Those who advocate for Native liberation from US occupation must also advocate for decolonization in Palestine. And those who advocate for decolonization in Palestine must also advocate for Native liberation from US occupation.
It should be clear to tribal leaders and all Native people that we are on a parallel path with Palestinian people struggling for land back and decolonization. Native nations and people face the same settler colonial violence that has descended upon our Palestinian relatives. Two-hundred years of US federal Indian law forms the basis for the imperial foreign policy the US now uses to support Israel in its genocide of Palestinians. Let us not forget that Native water and land protectors have always been labeled as “terrorists” when defending our homelands from US colonial aggression.
While the US government and its allies clamor to beat the drums of war and annihilation, we remain inspired by the steadfastness of Palestinian people and committed to the righteous struggle for decolonization that Palestinians are waging in this moment. Our dreams of liberation are one and the same.
Calls to Action/Demands:
- All Native people, organizations, and governments should heed and adopt the Palestinian call to Boycott, Divest, and Sanction (BDS) Israel and all institutions complicit in Israeli apartheid and settler colonialism:
- https://bdsmovement.net/
- To learn more about BDS visit US Campaign for Palestinian Rights website:
- https://uscpr.org/activist-resource/boycott-divestment-and-sanctions/
- All Native people, organizations, and governments should issue solidarity statements and mutual aid for Palestine and Gaza: https://www.map.org.uk/donate/donation-details/484
- US out of Palestine–no more military aid to Israel: /content/images/2020/04/Red-Deal_Part-I_End-The-Occupation-1.pdf
- End the siege on Gaza
- LAND BACK and the Right of Return for Palestinians: https://ndncollective.org/position-paper/the-right-of-return-is-landback/
- Free all political prisoners: https://www.addameer.org/
- End the occupation
More Resources:
- The Red Nation (TRN) –
- https://therednation.org/the-liberation-of-palestine-represents-an-alternative-path-for-native-nations/
- The Red Nation Podcast Youtube Channel w/ Mohammad El-Kurd – https://youtu.be/XVfHu54Dy_A?si=YgNAW3B_j3XjUiwq
- The Red Nation Podcast Youtube Channel w/ Ali Abunimuh – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_1LAdCmarA&t=1583s
- Arab Resource Organizing Center (AROC) –
- US Campaign for Palestinian Rights (USCPR) –
- Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM) –
- Electronic Intifada –
- Harvard Palestine Solidarity Committee joint statement –
- NDN Collective Position –
- Samidoun: Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network –
Update 10/17/23:
The heinous massacre committed today by the Israeli army, bombing the square of the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City with a toll rising to 471 lives, has brought the atrocity to the level of 1948 Nakba. Our call is louder than ever to all Native and non-Native people, nations, organizations, and governments in the world to raise your voices and call an end to this genocide.
