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A Lesson in Silence: Reflections on Life as a Palestinian-American on Campus
By George Abraham
My story begins on a Monday night, huddled in a chair on Parrish Beach, fist trembling, clenching my tear-soaked kufiyya. It is an ordinary April evening, and yet again, I am reminded of what it means to be a Palestinian-American on this campus. I just got out of an event hosted by the Swarthmore Students for Israel (SSI) in which a film titled “Crossing the Line 2: The New Face of Anti-Semitism” was screened. The film portrayed a variety of out-of-context, angry Palestinian activists, along with a series of mostly white Jewish students reacting to how “oppressed” they felt by the angry activists bombarding them with statistics and demonstrations on the systematic erasure of Palestinian culture.
I could write an entire article about the problematic, one-sided, racist, Islamophobic content of the film, but this is not the intent of my article. After the film, SSI members called one of the students involved in the film via Skype (Daniel Mael), and we proceeded to have an “open discussion” on the film’s content. SSI members helped facilitate the discussion, but the end result was an offensive lack of closure and solidarity. In other words, I did not thinking this event provided an outlet for constructive dialogue on anti-Semitism in the Israel-Palestine movement (or the issue of the Israel-Palestine conflict in general).
Over the past few months, Swarthmore has made me painfully aware of my ethnicity as a Palestinian-American. In fact, there have only been two spaces in which I felt moderately comfortable sharing my views on the issue of Palestine: Munazamat al-Amal and OASIS.
Munazamat al-Amal is a group representing Greater Syrian culture (i.e. the region containing Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Jordan, Iraq, etc.), and it takes a firm pro-Palestinian political stance. As a leader of al-Amal, one of my questions to Mael was about how Palestinian movements can be anti-Zionist, but not anti-Semitic (because the film and speaker conflated these two terms throughout the event). This question was not even remotely addressed except for when Mael accused Palestinians of “bullying” Israel by presenting Israel as the sole actor in the oppression of Palestinians (something which very few people in the pro-Palestine movement actually think).
What the Swarthmore community needs to understand is that being anti-Zionist and anti-Semitic are two very different things: the former implies criticism of specific genocidal and sectarian actions committed by the state of Israel, and the latter implies hatred of Jews or supporting the oppression of Jewish people. Invalidating anti-Zionist or pro-Palestinian demonstrations as “anti-Semitic” not only trivializes the oppression that Palestinians encounter on a daily basis, but it is also antithetical to the very important cause of combatting anti-Semitism itself. I agree that there should be no tolerance of anti-Semitism in Palestinian demonstrations; if anything, Palestinians, as an oppressed people, should stand in solidarity to combat anti-Semitism. However, condemning our work as Palestinian activists as inherently anti-Semitic normalizes the type of oppression Palestinians encounter on a daily basis.
That being said, what can Swarthmore do to promote truly open, fruitful conversation on the issue of Israel-Palestine? One answer is to continue its active support of artistic spaces, such as OASIS. OASIS (Our Art Spoken in Soul) is the spoken word poetry collective on campus. I am a performer and board member for this organization, and ever since the Israeli military’s invasion of Gaza last summer, my poetry has re-focused to play more of an activist-driven role.
Other than al-Amal, OASIS has been the only space in which I have felt comfortable talking about Palestinian issues. As many people who attended our showcase know, I have written poems ranging from personal narratives such as my family’s experience or nightmares on systematic oppression, to larger issues such as pinkwashing and the entire concept of a narrative capturing Middle Eastern “reality.”
I was able to bring these poems to the College Union Poetry Slam Invitational (CUPSI) a few weeks ago. CUPSI was an essential experience because it allowed me to connect with other Arab artistic activists and hear lots of critical response and dialogue, responding to the Palestinian issues I discuss in my work. However, I fear that administrative support for OASIS and CUPSI will become increasingly scarce in the coming years, despite OASIS’s role as a necessary resource for marginalized voices on campus and its integral role in the development of my Palestinian identity.
At the end of the meeting, SSI leader Nat Frum advertised another Anti-Semitism event as important because “it deals with an issue that Swarthmore has been surprisingly silent [on].” It is not my place to comment on the validity of this statement, given that I am not a member of Swarthmore’s Jewish community and so I have no idea what various groups have done to combat Anti-Semitism. However, I cannot help but reflect on this choice of words: “surprisingly silent.” If there’s anything the Swarthmore community has been “surprisingly silent” on, it’s the systematic erasure of Palestinian culture; it’s the fact that Students for Peace and Justice in Palestine (SPJP) is hailed as the legitimate voice for the Palestinian cause on campus when, in reality, all Palestinians on campus who were in SPJP have lost patience with it and left; it’s the fact that the last student to stand up for Arab culture on this campus was made fun of all over Twitter; it’s the fact that an Arab cultural group has been non-existent during my entire time here at Swarthmore.
The intent of this article is not to attack any individual group or person, but rather, to serve as a call to action. In the short term, al-Amal will be planning some sort of demonstration before the end of the semester, and if anyone is interested in helping with this, I urge you to either email me (gabraha1@swarthmore.edu) and/or come to our meeting next Monday night at 8:00 pm in the Intercultural Center. In the long term, moving into the end of this year and start of next year, I am interested in having al-Amal serve as an open space for discussion on Palestinian peace issues, in a way that is cathartic yet sensitive to participants. If anyone would like to be kept in the loop regarding al-Amal’s development moving forward, please don’t hesitate to reach out.
On a slightly different note, regarding issues this campus has been “surprisingly silent” on, I am also interested in resurrecting some sort of Arab cultural society on campus, and if this is something students (Arab, Arab-American, or non-Arab) would like to see, please reach out so I can keep you informed regarding these conversations. I would love to discuss ways at making these aforementioned goals a reality so that Arab culture and Palestinian human rights issues will no longer be something Swarthmore is “surprisingly silent” about.
Source: daily.swarthmore.edu