IANA Blog- October 2023

 Blog

Happy October,

For those that don’t know, October is one of my favorite months, not just because of Halloween, but it’s also my Birthday month along with the Birthday month of Fela Kuti and the month of Nigerian Independence Day and the anniversary of the Black Panther Party.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t fully enjoy my Birthday week, especially with what’s going on in the world that week. In case you missed it, the Israel-Palestine “conflict” has gotten more intense although it’s been like that every year. If you don’t know much about the Israel-Palestine “conflict,” there is definitely a good Google search to learn more about it, especially since it would take me forever to explain the conflict, so I’ll just keep it short and sweet…a story of settler colonialism, ethnic cleansing and imperialism; the involvement of Palestinians having their land taken away by Israel. In other words, Israel=Bad Guys, Palestine=Good Guys, while the media is doing what they do best, depicting Israel as the Victims and Palestine as the Villain, and people are saying this war is over religion when it’s actually over power and money.

Speaking of the media, all week, especially on the news, there was multiple coverage of Palestinian political military organization Hamas and Palestinians fighting back against Israel. After that, I saw everyone talk about Israel and were like “Poor Israel,” and “Pray for Israel,” but not say anything about the victims of Palestine or the fact that Israel stays bombing Gaza, leaving thousands of Palestinians having to fear for their damn lives. Not only that, I saw everyone on social media showing their support for Israel, especially celebrities.

 I saw reality TV star Kylie Jenner get owned on Instagram for showing support for Israel, I saw boxer Floyd Mayweather on a plane with resources planning to help Israel, I saw NBA player Amar’e Stoudemire attack Black Lives Matter for not standing up to Israel, but hasn’t said anything about the violence happening to Palestine. I saw LeBron James show his support for Israel, which is so ironic, because back in 2020 during the Pandemic and the George Floyd uprisings, LeBron was shown on TV and social media reading The Autobiography of Malcolm X. I’m pretty sure we all know he probably didn’t read that book, because if he did, he would know that Malcolm X was against Zionism. Seeing these celebrities, especially these Black celebrities speak on the conflict reminds me of what Malcolm X said about them: “Show me in the White community where a singer is a White leader or a Trumpet player is a White leader. These aren’t leaders. These are puppets and clowns that have been set up in the Black community by the White community and have been made celebrities and, usually say exactly what they know the White man wants to hear.”

The most memorable moment (but not in a good way) of the month to me so far was seeing actor Mark Hamill, famous for playing the legendary Luke Skywalker in the legendary Star Wars films, show his support for Israel. Another sad form of irony, seeing a man who portrayed one of the greatest fictional freedom fighters in Science Fiction and in all of Pop culture, and in those films, he helps defeat the Galactic Empire. Now, you see him support the equivalent of the Galactic Empire…you hate to see it…especially considering George Lucas based Star Wars off the Vietnam War and the Galactic Empire was based on Nazi Germany and Imperialism.

I saw many people who claim to be liberal say they support Israel and are against Palestine or say they “want peace” or say “both sides are bad,” without doing actual evidence. I did see other people, especially those that are Pro-Palestine, call them out by using Malcolm X quotes about the media and on Zionism and White liberals. There was Malcolm’s quote about the media: “The media’s the most powerful entity on Earth. They have the power to make the innocent guilty and make the guilty innocent and that’s power. Because they control the minds of the masses.”  It’s pretty obvious Malcolm X’s quotes, especially in the media, get very relevant every year.

What really baffled and frustrated me about the response to the Israel-Palestine conflict was the response from some Black people on social media. Not all, because I’ve definitely seen many of Black people show support for Palestine, but unfortunately I saw some basically say “Fuck both sides. We have our own problems,” or say “Palestinians didn’t do anything for Black people, so why should I care?” I also saw Black people who are Pro-Black or Pan-African or have Malcolm X as a profile picture say they only care about what’s going on with “Black people,” or say they care about “Africa and Africa only.” Seeing that made me shake my head and facepalm a lot. 

Look, I’m not stupid…Anti-blackness is everywhere. Anti-blackness is in the media, it’s here in the U.S., it’s in Europe, it’s even in Africa, of all places. Yes, there is an Anti-blackness problem among non-Black people, whether it be White, Latino, Asian or Arab people (who were Africa’s first invaders), so I understand why some Black people feel this way, especially involving Israelis and Palestinians, but there were so many problems I had with some of Black people’s responses:

1. You claim to be for Black people or Pan-African, but you don’t realize that there are a lot of Afro Palestinians there, especially in Gaza. One of the most famous Afro Palestinians was Fatima Bernawi, an Afro-Palestinian freedom fighter who was a leading figure in the Palestinian Freedom Movement in the 1960s, and was of Nigerian descent through her father. There are also Ethiopian Jews in Israel that are being sterilized and facing racism and mistreatment over there.

2. Like I said before, you have Malcolm X or Huey Newton as your profile picture or you’re quoting him on your social media page, but you also say “Fuck Palestine.” If you’re a fan of Malcolm X, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, Kwame Ture, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, Angela Davis, Dr. Huey P. Newton, the Black Panther Party, James Baldwin, George Jackson, Muhammad Ali, Peter Tosh, Thomas Sankara, Toni Morrison, Desmond Tutu, or Nelson Mandela (who I mentioned a couple blogs ago was friends with Yasser Arafat), then you would actually support Palestine, because they did.

3. You say Palestinians never supported Black people, but there’s always been solidarity with Black people and Palestinians that goes back to the 1960s. Palestinian resistance fighters were working with Huey Newton when he went to Lebanon in 1980. As mentioned before, Yasser Arafat was friends with Mandela and, along with other Palestinians, was in solidarity with Mandela as he was fighting Apartheid in South Africa. Palestinians, along with others around the world were in solidarity with Black Americans as the George Floyd uprisings were happening in 2020. They still have that mural of George Floyd in Palestine, so Palestine supported Black people during the Black Liberation Movement, the Anti-Apartheid Movement and the Black Lives Matter Movement.

4. During the Black Lives Matter protests in Ferguson, Missouri, Palestinians were assisting people protesting in America on how to fight off policing methods and deal with tear gas.

5. I’ll say it again, Palestinians, along with everyone else were part of the Anti-Apartheid Movement in South Africa. This was happening while Israel was supporting Apartheid.

6. Speaking of George Floyd, the same U.S. Police that harass, torture and kill Black, Brown and oppressed people here in the U.S. are the same police that are trained by the Israeli Defense Forces.

7. For those that are fans of hip hop, especially Political hip hop, there are many hip hop artists that made songs about or mentioning Palestine such as Black Thought from The Roots, Yasiin Bey aka Mos Def, M1 from Dead Prez, Boots Riley from The Coup, Shadia Mansour who is known as the “First lady of Arabic hip hop,” Iraqi British rapper Lowkey and British-Nigerian rapper Santan Dave.

8. Once again for those who are advocates for Pan Africanism who want to know why they should care, Zionists have been involved in trying to sabotage the many liberation movements in all parts of Africa, from South Africa to Libya. As the All-African People’s Revolutionary Party states, “Defeating Zionism is a necessary part of liberating Africa.”

Oh yeah, Joe Biden is now going to give more money to Israel while Americans still struggle…American tax money by the way, either way, the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer.

This is my opinion, so I’ll just say it…if you claim to be a fan of Malcolm X, Angela Davis, The Black Panthers, Nelson Mandela, or any of the Freedom Fighters that I listed above, or a fan of any Freedom Fighter, but you’re also like “Fuck Palestine,” you’re just a walking contradiction and all you’re doing is trivializing their struggles and legacy and the ones that are dead would be disgusted with your take. Change that Profile pic of Malcolm X to “hypocrite” because that’s what you’re looking like right now. Also, caring about issues between Black people and Africa (as we should) shouldn’t prevent us from caring about other human rights issues.

While I see other people fall for the misinformation about the Israel-Palestine “conflict”, I’m going to be on the right side, with the oppressed. I’m not gonna make excuses and say I’m “conflicted” like some people or “not choosing a side.” Hell, even calling it a conflict or a war is wrong, let’s call it like it is, it’s Genocide of Palestinians. I’m with Palestine. As Fannie Lou Hamer said, “Nobody’s free until everybody’s free.”