Mohammed El-Kurd, the young Palestinian poet and activist made famous because his home near Jerusalem was stolen by a guy from Long Island who looks like a slightly more unkempt Captain Caveman, recently found himself in yet another scandal. (Any vocal Palestinian with name recognition is destined to live a scandalous existence.)
During an Israeli Apartheid Week event at Duke University, somebody asked what the slogan “from the river to the sea” means for Israeli Jews. El-Kurd reportedly answered, “I don’t care. I truly, sincerely don’t give a f….” The audience “roared its approval.”
Unsurprisingly, accounts of this exchange (among others) stirred vigorous reaction. Legions of people accused El-Kurd of the usual stuff: terrorism blah blah blah antisemitism yada yada yada promoting violence dum dum dum. Legions of people also came to El-Kurd’s defense, sometimes philosophically, sometimes on principle.
Let’s leave aside the exact wording of the exchange, which is at least partly disputed. I’m not offering a report on events at Duke University that evening and El-Kurd has proved incredibly capable of speaking for himself.
Suppose that El-Kurd did say what was attributed to him. It might seem like a blithe or callous reaction, but in reality a vital sensibility informed his recalcitrance. Many of us who speak to U.S. audiences about Palestine have almost certainly wanted to say something similar during a Q&A. I’ve seen it happen on at least a few occasions.
The question “but what about the Israelis?” presents itself as innocent, perhaps even crucial, but its underlying rhetoric is insidious. It informs the audience that Zionism must be affirmed before the Palestinian can speak of liberation.
The question “but what about the Israelis?” presents itself as innocent, perhaps even crucial, but its underlying rhetoric is insidious. Anyone with experience among the colonized will understand why: it transforms discussion of Palestine into a referendum on Israel’s primacy, which again puts the Palestinian in a subordinate position. It informs the audience that Zionism must be affirmed before the Palestinian can speak of liberation.
A dismissive response to that question is less a statement of indifference about the fate of Israeli Jews than an unwillingness to defer analysis of Palestine’s national question. It indicates that the speaker will not prioritize the settler’s comfort at the expense of the native’s well-being. It also refuses to validate the imagined violence of the native. The dismissive response is so controversial in part because it demands a kind of introspection and humility the settler is ill-equipped to practice.
The dismissiveness suggests that no easy answer is on offer. Decolonization isn’t meant to be leisurely. It’s not a riddle with a precise solution. It portends serious changes that beneficiaries of Zionism are loath to acknowledge. It will permanently alter the relationship between Israeli Jew and Palestinian Arab. It won’t be “peaceful” as imagined by liberals of the dominant culture. But it does aim to create a world far better than the one brought about by colonization.
The settler’s insecurity is not equivalent to the native’s liberation. The two phenomena needn’t be discussed in tandem, as if a secure colonizer is more apt to good behavior. We cannot arrive at the problem of Palestinian dispossession—never mind a solution—by humoring the same old majoritarian vanity. Certain questions, like the one at Duke, tacitly stipulate that the settler is unwilling to sacrifice any meaningful advantage in order to make the native’s life better.
Palestinians in North America are constantly asked to placate and appease the settler. Even if we wanted to, it’s an impossible task.
Palestinians in North America are constantly asked to placate and appease the settler. Even if we wanted to, it’s an impossible task. Nothing we say will satisfy them. Without drawing a clear line, they’ll have us hemming and hawing until we promise to go away altogether.
We shouldn’t overlook the environment in which these exchanges occur. Palestinian speakers regularly suffer hostility in the lead up to their events without a scintilla of concern from those demanding security for Israelis. (You can bet that anyone who asks about the future of Israeli Jews was complaining to university officials a few days earlier.) Local Zionist groups campaign to prevent Palestinian guests from speaking. Their campaigns often go national and so Palestinian speakers will have been defamed across multiple platforms before even hitting the dais. (This is certainly true of El-Kurd.) The power imbalance is severe and so the Palestinian speaker might want to be assured of the Zionist’s good intentions before addressing hypothetical dangers.
We can’t know exactly what El-Kurd meant with his response, but it’s not difficult to understand his motivation: he was there to talk about Palestine, not to validate tired acts of Zionist projection. Maybe he didn’t want to address the topic in that particular moment, in front of that particular audience. Maybe he was upset at being asked to assure the safety of the same people determined to make his life miserable. Maybe he was saying that he truly, sincerely doesn’t give a fuck about the approval of white Americans. And maybe, just maybe, there was an element of requital in his answer: here, have a bit of that anxiety you force us to endure every waking moment.
Don’t misunderstand the episode at Duke: Palestinians are always up for a good debate. It’s an activity at which we excel. We have no need of defamation and snitching. The facts are at our disposal. We are happy to talk. We are accustomed to telling stories in unfriendly settings. Just don’t ask us to guarantee the settler’s peace of mind when we know damn well that it can be accomplished only by our disappearance.
This article was originally published on Steven Salaita’s website on April 9, 2022.
Thanks for this excellent analysis by Steven Salaita.
The well-documented pattern of many decades shows that when Israelis talk they are merely stalling and deflecting attention so they can steal more land.
It is now well understood that their accusations of anti-Semitism are primarily false smears to avoid addressing the facts being raised (and character assassinate the messenger). It’s also well understood that their “legal” system is not based on justice, but on an alleged story from 20 centuries ago which grants them the right to steal land and murder the inhabitants. Their entire “civilized” engagement with the world on this matter is fraudulent.
The Palestinians face an insidious censorship problem, as Salaita explains well. But that is just the surface of a well-known deeper problem. And the Palestinians face this problem not only in the US, but also in Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Germany, and France.
Steven, thanks so much for this. Your ability to see through the deflections and pivots that are designed to hijack the conversation and insist – INSIST – on foregrounding the actual point is necessary and refreshing. Your analysis and your passion are essential, and your scalpel style doesn’t hurt, either. Looking forward to whatever you write next.
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Palestine’s Widening Geography of Resistance: Why Israel Cannot Defeat the Palestinians | UPROOTED PALESTINIANS: SALAM ALQUDS ALAYKUM (wordpress.com)
“Palestine’s Widening Geography of Resistance: Why Israel Cannot Defeat the Palestinians” April 13, 2022 by Ramzi Baroud.EXCERPT:
“There is a reason why Israel is insistent on linking the series of attacks carried out by Palestinians recently to a specific location, namely the Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank. By doing so, the embattled Naftali Bennett’s government can simply order another deadly military operation in Jenin to reassure its citizens that the situation is under control.
“Indeed, on April 9, the Israeli army has stormed the Jenin refugee camp, killing a Palestinian & wounding ten others. However, Israel’s problem is much bigger than Jenin.
“If we examine the events starting with the March 22 stabbing attack in the southern city of Beersheba (Bir Al Saba’) – which resulted in the death of four – & ending with the killing of three Israelis in Tel Aviv – including two army officers – we will reach an obvious conclusion: these attacks must have been, to some extent, coordinated.
“Spontaneous Palestinian retaliation to the violence of the Israeli occupation rarely follows this pattern in terms of timing or style. All the attacks, with the exception of Beersheba, were carried out using firearms. The shooters, as indicated by the amateur videos of some of the events & statements by Israeli eyewitnesses, were well-trained & were acting with great composure.
“An example was the March 27 Hadera event, carried out by two cousins, Ayman & Ibrahim Ighbariah, from the Arab town of Umm al-Fahm, inside Israel. Israeli media reported of the unmistakable skills of the attackers, armed with weapons that, according to the Israeli news agency, Tazpit Press Service, cost more than $30,000. (cont’d)
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“Unlike Palestinian attacks carried out during the Second Palestinian Intifada (2000-05) in response to Israeli violence in the occupied territories, the latest attacks are generally more pinpointed, seek police & military personnel & clearly aimed at shaking Israel’s false sense of security & undermining the country’s intelligence services. In the Bnei Brak attack, on March 29, for example, an Israeli woman who was at the scene told reporters that ‘the militant asked us to move away from the place because he did not want to target women or children.’
“While Israeli intelligence reports have recently warned of a ‘wave of terrorism’ ahead of the holy month of Ramadan, they clearly had little conception of what type of violence, or where & how Palestinians would strike.
“Following the Beersheba attack, Israeli officials referred to Daesh’s responsibility, a convenient claim considering that Daesh had also claimed responsibility. This theory was quickly marginalized, as it became obvious that the other Palestinian attackers had other political affiliations or, as in the Bnei Brak case, no known affiliation at all.
“The confusion & misinformation continued for days. Shortly after the Tel Aviv attack, Israeli media, citing official sources, spoke of two attackers, alleging that one was trapped in a nearby building. This was untrue as there was only one attacker & he was killed, though hours later in a different city.
“A number of Palestinian workers were quickly rounded up in Tel Aviv on suspicion of being the attackers simply because they looked Arab, evidence of the chaotic Israeli approach. Indeed, following each event, total mayhem ensued, with large mobs of armed Israelis taking to the streets looking for anyone with Arab features to apprehend or to beat senseless.
“Israeli officials contributed to the frenzy, with far-right politicians, such as the extremist Itamar Ben Gvir, leading hordes of other extremists in rampages in occupied Jerusalem.
“Instead of urging calm & displaying confidence, the country’s own Prime Minister called, on March 30, on ordinary Israelis to arm themselves. “Whoever has a gun license, this is the time to carry it,” he said in a video statement. However, if Israel’s solution to any form of Palestinian resistance was more guns, Palestinians would have been pacified long ago…”
“somebody asked what the slogan “from the river to the sea” means for Israeli Jews.”
Israeli Jews are perfectly capable of speaking for themselves. And they have plenty of space to do so. Why the **** would anyone expect a Palestinian to speak for them?