January 16, 2024

The original statement can be found at araborganizing.org.

The Arab Resource & Organizing Center (AROC) holds the Israeli regime entirely responsible for all unfolding violence we’ve witnessed across historic Palestine. In the face of such violence, we recommit ourselves to the struggle for freedom and justice in Palestine, in our region and globally.

Recent events did not occur in a vacuum but as a result of unrelenting colonial aggression. For the last two decades, 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza have been forced to live in a dense, open-air prison, besieged by Israel in violation of international law. Two-thirds of the population in Gaza are refugees who were forcibly displaced from other parts of Palestine. Half of the population is unemployed, and the vast majority are impoverished and are denied regular access to food, water and health care by the Israeli siege.

Completely surrounded by a militarized barrier, Gazans are denied freedom of movement. In 2018, the United Nations deemed Gaza “unlivable,” and since then, Gazans have experienced multiple bombardments by Israel, intensifying an already untenable situation.

The apartheid regime has cut off all food, water and electricity to Gaza and has engaged in carpet bombing of residential buildings, markets, schools, health facilities and mosques. Across the occupied West Bank, residents fear the worst, with many trapped in their homes as armed Israeli settlers threaten pogroms against Palestinian families, and closed military checkpoints prohibit any freedom of movement.

Israeli officials promise to “open the gates of hell,” labeling Palestinians “human animals,” and the massacres in Gaza have commenced with full support and aid from the U.S. government.

Over the past 75 years, Israeli violence has structured every aspect of Palestinian existence. From systematized land seizures to routine airstrikes, from arbitrary imprisonment to military checkpoints, enforced family separations to targeted killings, Palestinians have been forced to live in a state of death, both slow and sudden.

All forms of resistance — peaceful and otherwise — have been brutally repressed by the Israeli regime. Even the most moderate international human rights organizations have labeled Israeli apartheid’s structural and military violence as genocidal. Here in the U.S., Palestinians in the diaspora — along with our allies — have been met with hate, violence, slander, criminalization and blacklisting.

Today, Palestinians are entering uncharted territory, facing the most brutal Israeli violence in history. Many have asked why the Palestinian people have not been met with the same solidarity that came so easily to the people of Ukraine. The coming days will require a firm stance against colonialism and a renewed commitment to ending the brutal occupation.

While the U.S. government and so many of its allies clamor to beat the drums of war and annihilation, we remain inspired by the steadfastness of our people, and we remain committed to the righteous struggle for freedom, justice and self-determination.

We call on all to boycott Israel. We call on institutions to divest from Israel. We call on the U.S. government to sanction Israel and end the billions in military aid. We call on our community and allies to take action to stop the ongoing annihilation of Palestinians by demanding an end to the siege on Gaza, an end to the occupation, freedom for political prisoners and an end to U.S. aid to apartheid Israel.

The current violence could end immediately if those in power took even a small step toward the right side of history.

While we understand the feelings of despair, confusion and fear that may be gripping our families, friends and community, we take this moment as an invitation to recommit ourselves to the revolutionary roots of Palestinian liberation — where the struggle to abolish apartheid, Zionism and fascism in our homeland is one and the same with an international struggle for economic and political democracy, for education and health care for all, for the right to relations to land, for social justice, gender justice and climate justice, shaped in the interests of working people.

We fight for the day all peoples in historic Palestine and all peoples of the world can live in dignity and peace.

End the War on Gaza! Free Palestine! Long live international solidarity!

AROC envisions powerful and liberated Arab communities living with freedom and self-determination, from the Bay Area to our homelands. We are abolitionists, feminists and internationalists who believe that the liberation of SWANA (South West Asian North African) people is inextricably tied to the liberation of all oppressed people.