25 years ago, I was part of the Palestinian negotiations team with Israel searching for peace. We prepared our files really well. We failed. 20 years ago, I was part of the UN and ICJ diplomacy, we got great resolutions. We celebrated. Israel and the US never implemented them. 

18 years ago, I was part of the team coordinating Israel’s withdrawal from the  Gaza Strip. Israel left it and turned it into a large prison. 8 years ago, I was part of the non violent Boycott Divestment and Sanctions movement, Israel, the US and the EU attacked it.

All above are strategies for freedom from occupation and apartheid- you as organizers and movement leaders know them. They failed to yet achieve decolonization as a tangible event despite multiple attempts over tens of years. It is sad. While some of these efforts are still ongoing, the current strategy used by Hamas and others is armed resistance.  Just like the South African black movement fighting apartheid, Palestinians want an end to Israel’s settler colonization, occupation and apartheid.

We are LCN members too and like you, we are organizers and leaders pursuing change to end current day slavery, to end colonization, to end injustice and to build a beautiful safe life. Not romantic and not naive, just hopeful and capable. We are the native people of our land and we will not go extinct. We are feminists who see the links between oppressors and their regimes. 

/Nisreen, Abdulrahman and Céline

Come to the urgent session to understand the story and not just slogans and memes:

• 75 years of Israel occupying Palestinians, according to the UN and ICJ (here and here)
• Israel runs an apartheid regime like that of South Africa (see the Amnesty report here ) 
• More than 5 thousand Palestinian political prisoners in Israeli jails (since 1948 more than a million prisoners- quarter population is terrorist- reasonable?)
• 2.2 million Palestinians locked up in Gaza for the past 17 years, unable to leave and constantly bombed.
• And 10,612 Palestinians killed by Israel in the last thirteen years alone and now imminent death threats at mass in Gaza. (b’tselem)
• Israeli settlements and expansion on Palestinian land (see map) 

Can you accept that there is a nation out there that deserves collective punishment? A subhuman one not worthy of freedom? One that does not have the right to resist? Israel wants you to believe that they are saving you from us.