On Sunday, June 5th, the Palestinians will once again demonstrate their resilience to the world by standing up and fighting back. And no, this is not a violent fighting back. They will not be bringing weapons, or training in combat. They are fighting back in the same way that the most remembered leaders of freedom struggles fought: through non-violence. This piece in Foreign Policy discusses how much mainstream discourse has blamed the oppressed for their oppression: that if the Palestinians would only choose non-violent struggle Israel and its allies would concede to their demands. Put simply, this claim is false. It is entirely disconnected from reality. Much of the tactics employed by Palestinians over the years have, in fact, been non-violent. But a violent response from the Israelis often turns them violent.
The First Intifada, of course, is the best example. For anyone who knows about the Intifada, I believe that the most ubiquitous image we have is that of children throwing stones at Israeli soldiers. First, stones thrown by children against an occupying army is not unique to the Palestinians. Consider stone-throwing against authority across the world– in Mexico, Kashmir, Germany. A Vietnamese man once told me that as a child he threw stones at American tanks as they rolled through his neighborhood. Second, the First Intifada was characterized more by its organized non-violent nature than its violence:
For the first few years, it involved many forms of civil disobedience, including massive demonstrations, general strikes, refusal to pay taxes, boycotts of Israeli products, political graffiti and the establishment of underground schools (since regular schools were closed by the military as reprisals for the uprising). It also included stone throwing, Molotov cocktails and the erection of barricades to impede the movement of Israeli military forces.
Third, what harm could possibly fall a solder, dressed like this from a child throwing a stone?
Still, the youth demonstrators who are planning Sunday’s March on Jerusalem are taking all the necessary precautions to prevent the children from throwing stones. During the May 15th march to Qalandiya, the youth organizers reported that the group of men who started throwing stones, inciting others to do so, then turned around and made arrests. They were infiltrators. And this is the Israeli media machine with which these organizers have to deal.
To drive the message about non-violent resistance home, and to push that message to audiences around the world, the youth have created the following promotional video, pumping it with images from India, Birmingham, Soweto, Berlin, Tunisia, and Egypt.
Remember on June 5th that the protests have been non-violent. And Palestinians are not waiting for their Gandhi. They are all Gandhi! Their non-violent movement is an organic, grassroots movement that is not waiting for a single leader. All young Palestinians are leading the movement. Stand in solidarity with the youth of Palestine, who want only to live in freedom and in dignity.
