On Palestine & Beyond
By: Dr. Nicole Caridad Ralston (She, her, hers)
We at Beloved believe that Blackness, Queerness and Intersectionality must be centered always. Period. Full stop. So it should come as no surprise that the team members who make up our organization have been supportive of Palestine. It should come as no surprise that we as an organization, a collective, are in support of Palestine. Organizations are living, breathing organisms that are made up of their people, and we stand by our people. Our team members have been marching in the streets, penning opinions on their personal social media, boycotting companies that are pro-Israel, and receiving support from our managers when clients have pushed back on their pro-Palestine stances. New Orleans, where we are based, has witnessed protest encampments at Loyola and Tulane, joining the hundreds of other college campus protests across the country. We stand with Palestine, we stand with our staff in support of a Free Palestine, and we stand with the students protesting for Palestine across this country. If you’re still surprised why a pro-Black, pro-Queer and pro-Women organization would be in support of Palestine or other atrocities that occur against Black and brown bodies that have been shoved to the margins, keep reading.
By now, the Zionist state of Israel has razed Gaza slaughtering to date, more than 31,184 Palestinians and injuring over 72,889, according to the United Nations. The latest Gaza health authority data indicated that at least 12,300 youngsters have died in the last four months, compared with 12,193 globally between 2019 and 2022. As for Israel, 260 Israeli soldiers have been killed in Gaza with 1,475 injured since the start of the ground operation, Israeli army data shows. The disparity between those numbers should give you pause. A big pause. If you still haven’t realized that Zionism (not Judaism) is a violent outgrowth of white supremacy culture; that covert & overt beast which rears it vicious head to devour Queer lives, disabled lives, Black and brown lives, women’s lives, and anyone else that threatens its legacy, then we ask you…. “WHY”?
Why were you so quick to believe that Israel had a right to defend itself with such violence that it destroyed entire generations and instilled trauma and grief on tens of thousands of families?
Why did you not do your own research on the matter or boycott the companies that were pro-Israel when presented with the opportunity?
Why did you not share information on your timelines, or with your families, on the matter of how whiteness once again was snuffing out brown lives who were only hoping to exist on a land that their ancestors had tilled and loved?
Why?
We can assume that there was such silence and refusal to call for a ceasefire from our elected officials because of the poison of white supremacy culture that is baked into this country’s DNA. Israel and the U.S are two colonial entities cut from the same tree. We hear people say “well that’s not pro-American to question your country like that?” To that we say, “what’s more American than demanding freedom for those who most need it? What's more American than consistently pushing our country to do better? Weren’t our founders supposed revolutionaries or were they wealthy white enslavers who designed this country to benefit the few?
“I love America more than any other country in the world and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually.” -James Baldwin.
It has always been Black and brown communities, women and LGBTQ communities, disabled communities and youth organizers, who have shed blood and tears to ensure this country lives up to its promises of freedom for all, for “life liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” But where were our country’s leaders when Gaza was being razed since October 2023? They were continuing to hold up the myth of white supremacy by allowing the Zionist state of Israel to blow Palestine off the map. So again, Beloved has stood with and continues to stand with Palestine.
This has been a difficult series of years since the global pandemic of 2020 in which, once again, the beast of white supremacy culture found a way to sink its fangs into American psyches. The beast convinced millions that they should not be concerned with the deaths of their neighbors because their personal choice of wearing a mask or being vaccinated far outweighed the mounting death toll. In the midst of the pandemic, white backlash against truth telling concepts like Critical Race Theory ballooned. The supreme court ruled against Roe v. Wade and Affirmative Action was ruled unconstitutional. Those of us fighting for social justice and racial equity have been tired. When the bombing of Palestine began in October of 2023, the groundwork had already been laid for Americans to turn a blind eye as it had already been turning its eyes away from Black and brown atrocities both at home and abroad. We live amongst the carnage that white supremacy enacts daily and yet many of us are still numb to it because we are comfortable. White supremacy culture lies in bed with capitalism which keeps us cozy and on our phones and purchasing shiny, new, electric vehicles while the cobalt that powers those phones & vehicles are provided off of the backs of enslaved children and displaced Congolese. In case you’re wondering…. We stand with Congolese laborers.
In our own country Black women continue to be threatened in labor and delivery rooms due to the legacy of racism in our healthcare system. Again, we stand with Black women and Black birthing persons.
So how do those of us who are pro-Black, pro-Queer and pro-Women keep fighting for the freedom of those who haven been systematically “othered”? On behalf of Beloved Community I’m imploring you to continue to do your own work to unravel your hesitancy to stand in solidarity with those who have been systematically denied freedoms, and we implore you to practice radical hope.
On doing your own work: ask yourself critical questions when presented with a genocide occurring on the global stage, “Why was the Israeli response so drastic? What is the history of Zionism? Who are the Palestinians and what is their history to Gaza? Why is the U.S consistently amongst the countries refusing to call for a ceasefire? What feelings arise in my body when presented with data and facts on how Black and brown bodies are discarded in the name of land or physical comforts?
On radical hope: Hope is a funny little thing isn’t it? In the metaphor of Pandora's box, Pandora opened the box and all the troubles of the world spilled out except for hope. Hope is good trouble. If we lose hope we will be overcome by the poisons of white supremacy culture and lulled into a state of complacency which is just as worse as actively fighting for whiteness. Radical hope asks us to keep moving forward, to aspire for more for our fellow humans. More freedom and autonomy for BIPOC, LGBTQ, women, youth, disabled communities, houseless communities, impoverished communities, etc. Hope implores us to dream up newer, sustainable solutions that still allow us to enjoy technological advances without the human cost of Black lives. Hope allows us to dream up a world where Israel is held accountable for the atrocities it has enacted on Palestinian lives. Hope implores us to keep going, and to remember that we aren’t the only ones in this fight. Radical hope is a gift, we must cherish it, and pass it on to others, onto Palestine and beyond.