One year since the start of the livestreamed US-Israeli genocide against 2.3 million Palestinians in the occupied and besieged Gaza Strip, our people, fragmented by colonialism, stands united in resisting the genocide and the underlying 76-year-old regime of settler-colonialism and apartheid. We call on the global solidarity movement and every conscientious person worldwide to escalate BDS pressure and isolate apartheid Israel and its complicit institutions like never before, in all domains and all platforms. Here is guidance on what to prioritize in international solidarity efforts:
1) Contextualize the Genocide in 76 years of Ongoing Nakba
Let’s remember to contextualize this genocide within Israel’s regime of settler-colonial apartheid, which has since the 1947-49 Nakba gradually worked to exterminate the Indigenous people of Palestine through an ongoing Nakba of massacres, ethnic cleansing, siege, destruction, mass incarceration, and theft of land. This regime, the root cause of violence and oppression, has to be dismantled.
Like in other settler-colonial contexts, the constant goal of Israel and the Zionist movement has always been “maximum land, minimum natives,” which requires the elimination of the Indigenous population. Even the so-called “moderate” Israeli opposition leader in 2016 said: “My principle says maximum Jews on maximum land with maximum security and with minimum Palestinians.” Israel’s genocide in Gaza and its atrocious attacks in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, must be seen in this light.
2) Highlight Ending Complicity as a Moral (and Legal) Obligation
The governments, as well as many corporations and institutions, of the colonial West, particularly the US, Germany, UK, and European Union, have enabled Israel’s genocide, shielding it from international accountability and targeted sanctions. Redoubling efforts to end this complicity in crimes, especially in the crime of crimes, is not a charitable act. It is a fundamental moral and legal obligation.
The International Court of Justice this year ruled on January 26th that Israel is plausibly perpetrating genocide in Gaza, and on July 19th that its occupation is illegal, and that it is practicing apartheid against Palestinians. Effectively, the ICJ has made it clear that BDS “is not only a moral imperative and constitutional and human right, but also an international legal obligation,” as stated by former senior UN human rights official Craig Mokhiber.
3) Recognize the Rising People Power and Enact Strategic Radicalism
The fact that the US-Israeli genocidal axis has continued this genocide for a year despite global condemnation and pressure should not obscure what we have collectively achieved in this period of exceptional struggle and the unprecedented, sustained wave of strategic solidarity mobilizations:
The sea change in building people power, in enacting our strategic radicalism, is isolating Israel’s genocidal regime and complicit international corporations and institutions like never before. Mainstream Israeli analysts are already predictingthat Israel’s regime of settle-colonialism and apartheid “may not celebrate its centennial”!
This people power has helped to preempt Israel’s even worse carnage and devastation, including thwarting the actual implementation of its plan for mass ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.
Grassroots power and discourse to demand justice as well as concrete policy measures and actions, including sanctions, to end genocide, have led governments (especially in the Global South), local councils, and an increasing number of sovereign funds to cut their complicity with and even impose sanctions on Israel in an unprecedented way.
This is by far the worst, bloodiest chapter in the history of the Indigenous Palestinian people’s struggle for liberation. Yet, solidarity pressure across the world for months on end has not only given Palestinians hope but also forced corporations and institutions to start limiting, hiding, or in some cases denying their complicity. This is a substantial indicator of the tipping point nearing. Only by further mobilization can we reach it.
4) Build Hope to Counter Despair and “Genocide Fatigue”
Despite our year long, persistent, strategic efforts to escalate solidarity, to end the genocide and challenge its root causes, including through peaceful disruption of business-as-usual, we have not succeeded in stopping the US-Israeli genocide. So what hope do we have?
Some complain of “genocide fatigue.” Let’s remember that Palestinians, especially in Gaza, don’t have the luxury of “genocide fatigue,” as Israel continues to massacre, starve, forcibly displace and exterminate our people. Palestinians have never given up hope in our decades-old resistance to Israel’s ruthless regime of oppression. This is hope rooted in our people’s insistence on our continued existence in our homeland, in our resistance to the structures of colonial oppression, and in the inspiring growth of the global solidarity movement and its impact.
Also, as the writer Nadeem Aslam says, “Despair has to be earned. I personally have not done all I can to change things. I haven’t yet earned the right to despair.” We are calling on you to never give up hope, never stop building BDS pressure to end the complicity of your government, city, institution, corporation, or even trade union in Israel’s unspeakable horrors. We ask you to persist, unless you have exhausted all possible means to end complicity.
5) Link Israel’s Genocide to the Global “Might Makes Right” Era: Never Again is Now!
The world has never witnessed a livestreamed genocide before, one that is shamelessly enabled and justified by the US and other colonial Western powers. Not only are we facing extermination at the hands of the US-Israeli axis, but unless stopped, this axis may relentlessly destroy the tenets of international law as well, pushing humanity to a “might makes right” era unseen since World War II, and relegating UN institutions to the dustbin of history.
In October, days into Israel’s genocide, Colombian President Gustavo Petro warned of the “unprecedented rise of fascism, and therefore, to the death of democracy and freedom. … Gaza is just the first experiment in considering us all disposable.”
In other words, “never again is now,” as our Jewish partners have said. This means that humanity’s most urgent priority now is to end Israel’s genocide, while recognizing that justice for the Palestinians intersects and is intertwined with struggles for racial, climate, economic, gender, and social justice.
6) Remember: Our Agency Makes the Dawn Rise
“Will the dawn ever rise again after all this darkness?” is a question Palestinians repeatedly ask ourselves in the face of Israel’s genocide. Rather than just waiting for an answer, though, we are exercising our agency and creating our own destiny, with the support of tens of millions around the world who are standing in meaningful solidarity with our liberation struggle.
As an integral part of the Palestinian liberation movement and the most effective form of international solidarity with our struggle for emancipation, justice, equality and dignity, for our refugees’ return and reparations, the BDS movement with its massive global network has for almost two decades been an indispensable catalyst in bringing that dawn’s rise closer than ever. We channel our grief and our rage to build more people power worldwide that can end the complicity of states, corporations and institutions in Israel’s regime of oppression, accelerating the rise of our dawn.
7) Escalate Solidarity and Challenging Complicity to the Next Level of Impact
This is a US-Israeli genocide, for sure, but it is built on decades of international complicity, direct and indirect, that have provided it with what even the meek UN Secretary-General calls “total impunity,” giving it license to launch the world’s first livestreamed genocide in history. Every state that has armed, funded, or justified Israel’s atrocities, every corporation, institution, media outlet, investment fund that has continued business-as-usual with Israel or with its complicit institutions is complicit. They all share the responsibility for the genocide and must be held accountable.
Depending on your context, we suggest starting commemoration activities, protests, and peaceful disruptions of all business-as-usual on October 1st, building up momentum to escalate pressure as the Israeli genocide in Gaza reaches one year of ongoing horror.
To build on the strength of our movement, here are some of the actions that have been most effective, principled and strategic in channeling our boundless rage and grief into action that can meaningfully support the Palestinian liberation struggle:
Shut it down! Peacefully disrupt genocide enablers, from setting up student encampments pressuring universities to divest and end academic complicity, to occupying government buildings, to interrupting complicit institutions like FIFA and genocide-enabling media outlets (WSJ, NYT, BBC, etc.), to trade union and community activists blocking weapons companies, to school walk-outs, etc.
Make Corporations Cut Complicity! Apply the context-sensitive pressure of popular boycotts, strategic divestment drives, broad intersectional coalitions including with large trade unions, strategic litigation, and/or effective shareholder activism, activists and allies can make complicit corporate giants, like Intel, Chevron, Amazon, Google, HP, Caterpillar, HD Hyundai, Carrefour, McDonald’s, FANUC, Siemens, PUMA, AXA, and others cut their complicity or end it altogether. It’s been done … repeatedly!
Block the Boat! Whether you’re a group of activists, trade unionists, or conscientious politicians, take action to stop Israel-bound ships and military cargo through protests, pickets, lobbying governments, legal action, “bureaucratic” measures, or media campaigns. Malaysia has banned all Israeli and Israel-bound vessels from docking at its ports; Colombia has banned coal exports to Israel; the Spanish state and Namibia have revoked docking rights to complicit vessels; dock workers in India, Belgium, Italy, Catalonia, and elsewhere have organized to block the complicit boats; and legal teams have filed court cases. Activists in Cyprus, Greece, Italy and Morocco have called for blocking ships carrying weapons to Israel.
No Tech for Genocide or Apartheid! Tech workers: organize from within the tech sector to build power to end the complicity of companies, such as Amazon, Google, and Microsoft, directly enabling Israel’s genocide and automating its apartheid. Activists are organizing grassroot consumer boycotts of HP and pressuring their workplaces and schools to drop contracts with BDS targets; activists in city councils, unions and institutions are organizing divestmentcampaigns from complicit tech companies including Intel, Palantir, and Cisco; shareholder activists calling for an investigation of the security and fiduciary risks associated with investing in an “armed conflict” zone.
Apartheid-Free Zones! Declare churches, businesses, community and cultural centers, unions, sports clubs, etc. Apartheid Free Zones (AFZ), making use of the latest AFZ organizing guide and toolkit, and inspired by the hundreds of AFZs and Apartheid-Free Communities all around the world, from Italy to South Africa, from Mexico to the US and Japan. Examples include the city of Belém (Brazil) declaring itself Israeli Apartheid Free, and the cities of Liège (Belgium) and Barcelona (Spanish State) have suspended all institutional ties with Israel over its violations of Palestinians rights.
End cultural complicity! Mobilize collective pledges, boycotts and actions by artists, musicians, filmmakers and writers, as well as arts organizations and unions, to isolate apartheid Israel’s complicit cultural sector. Go beyond slogans, building real cultural power and challenging the censorship, racist erasure, and dehumanization that enable Israel’s livestreamed genocide, as Palestinian filmmakers have recently said.
Pressure Governments to End Complicity and Impose Sanctions! Organize broad intersectional coalitions and/or create an advocacy/lobby group to pressure parliamentarians, diplomats, and government officials to respect international law and end all complicit relations with Israel, whether trade, military, scientific, financial, cultural or otherwise, that may constitute complicity in war crimes (including illegal settlements), crimes against humanity (including apartheid), and genocide. This entails countering anti-Palestinian legislation and policies (including anti-BDS repressive laws), tabling motions that end illegal and complicit relations, and considering strategic litigation against government officials. Keep following Palestinian civil society’s policy guidance and demands here.
But please remember, without credible, sustained and growing grassroots power, our greatest ethical and legal advocacy efforts cannot lead to actual policy change!
8) Make your City, Institution or Union more Ethical!
Organize strategic and intersectional campaigns to pressure investment/pension funds and institutions (city councils, universities, churches, hospitals, cultural institutions, trade unions, etc.) to adopt ethical procurement policies (EPP), and ethical investment policies (EIP), if applicable, that exclude companies implicated in grave human rights violations anywhere. These guidelines can then be applied to exclude companies involved in Israel’s genocide, apartheid, military occupation and settlements.
Among many inspiring examples are the city councils of Hayward and Richmond in California (US); the Derry City and Strabane District Council (North of Ireland); Bologna City Council and Emilia Romagna Regional Council (Italy); as well as the City of Sydney(Australia). The cities of Oslo (Norway) and Ghent (Belgium) have announced an end to trade in goods and services produced in illegally occupied areas.