By Will Hodgkinson
October 17, 2024

Boston

Nearly 200 Indigenous protesters and their allies gathered outside Park Street Station in Boston on Oct. 12 to demand that Massachusetts immediately designate the second Monday in October as Indigenous Peoples Day.

An Indigenous-led coalition of United American Indians of New England (UAINE), the North American Indian Center of Boston (NAICOB), Cultural Survival, the New Democracy Coalition, Workers World Party-Boston and Italian Americans for Indigenous Peoples Day organized the Oct. 12 action, which bolsters the longstanding effort to demolish the cult glorifying Christopher Columbus, whose lifework was characterized by conquest, slavery and genocide.

Columbus, a Genoese soldier of fortune sponsored by the late-feudal Spanish monarchy and its mercantile creditors, captained the 1492 voyage. After landing, he and his crew enslaved, tortured and slaughtered many of the Indigenous peoples of the Caribbean. Columbus’ killing spree initiated slavery and prepared the way for the transatlantic slave trade and the genocidal system of capitalist extraction and settler colonialism that Indigenous nations continue to resist worldwide — from Turtle Island to Palestine.

Years of heroic Indigenous-led activism have forced the Massachusetts government to make incremental concessions. Last May 28, the Massachusetts Senate passed an amendment that appointed a commission to redesign the racist state flag and seal. The Commission will announce the redesign after one year, during which time the old anti-Indigenous emblems will remain in place.

Other unfulfilled, longstanding demands of the Indigenous Legislative Agenda to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts include passing a bill to outlaw racist school mascots; incorporating Indigenous history into public school curricula; expanding educational opportunities for Indigenous students; and protecting Indigenous artifacts and funerary items. Massachusetts likewise still refuses to proclaim the second Monday in October Indigenous Peoples Day. (maindigenousagenda.org)

Jean-Luc Pierite (Tunica-Biloxi), president of the Board of Directors of NAICOB, said: “As long as there is a sun in the sky, our people will continue. We will continue to walk; we will continue to march; we will continue until all of us are free, all of our Indigenous people. … We are demanding an end to Christopher Columbus Day. No more!”

Pierite continued; “We will not continue to uplift a rapist, a genocider. We will not continue to uphold the settler-colonist system that has terrorized our lands for centuries. We will continue to march, and we will continue to dismantle these systems that have held our people. No more!”

In her remarks, Rosalba Solis (Maya) highlighted the resilience and persistence of the thousands of Indigenous cultures that have existed for millennia on the continents now known as the Americas. She urged the crowd to learn from, honor and continue to show solidarity with Indigenous nations in their ongoing struggles for self-determination and sovereignty.

Reverend Kevin Peterson of the New Democracy Coalition demanded that Boston change the name of Faneuil Hall, which honors colonial-era Boston merchant Peter Faneuil, who trafficked enslaved human beings. Peterson went on to call for reparations for centuries of enslavement and racial oppression. The “incandescent” campaign for Indigenous Peoples Day, he said, “inclines our minds towards justice.”

As demonstrators crossed Boston Common, they chanted: “Indigenous Peoples Day, now!”; “No justice on stolen lands!”; and “From Turtle Island to Palestine, occupation is a crime!”

Demonstrators back striking hotel workers

The march ended at the deluxe Hilton Boston Park Plaza hotel where UNITE HERE Local 26 workers are striking to demand living wages and expanded benefits. Ed Childs, a longtime Local 26 and WWP member, explained that major Hilton investors Blackrock and Fidelity profit from the weapons sold to the Zionist state and from the theft and exploitation of Indigenous lands around the world.

Childs said: “These are the colonists around the world and here at home. So your struggle is our struggle, and our struggle is your struggle!”

Roused by Childs’ words, the demonstrators joined the Local 26 picket line en masse. Chanting “make them pay!” they circled the block, on which is also located the Israeli consulate, alarming police and Hilton rent-a-cops.

Back in front of the hotel, organizers honored the struggle for Palestinian liberation. Last year’s Indigenous Peoples Day rally took place Oct. 7, the day of the Al-Aqsa Flood, when Hamas fighters attacked Israeli garrisons in a world-historic rebuke of the oppressive violence of the Zionist state, the complicity of the U.S. empire that supports it and the entire global order of settler colonialism and imperialism.

After 370 days of Palestinian resistance to the genocidal Zionist terror campaign, Palestinian organizers continued to emphasize the need for solidarity and actions to support the liberation of Palestine. Ahmad Kawash, co-founder of the Palestinian House of New England, noted that Indigenous peoples of Turtle Island have experienced, and continue to fight against, the same strategies of genocidal dispossession and displacement Palestinians are resisting in Gaza.

‘We demand land back!’

Lea Kayali, a Palestinian Youth Movement organizer said: “I come to you all in a state of mourning, but not in a state of despair. Because to be Indigenous is to embody the word ‘sumud,’ a word in Arabic that means steadfastness. To be sumud is to insist with our bodies and our spirits that we will resist colonialism with every moment of our lives. … It is the strength of this movement of five centuries of anticolonial struggle that is a promise of liberation. … From Turtle Island to Palestine, we demand Land Back and nothing less!”

To close the rally, demonstrators joined hands to participate in a traditional round dance to commemorate Indigenous Peoples Day and give expression to the ongoing resistance and resilience of Indigenous peoples around the world.

Jean-Luc Pierite said, in his closing remarks on the strike line: “We are here for all our [Indigenous] relations. We are here for our workers. We are here! Make them pay! Land back!”