A Universal Palestinian Consciousness
Photo by Belal Khaled, August 24th, 2024
It is time for Palestinians delineate a consciousness needed to carve out their path towards liberation. No people seeking freedom have allowed their journey to liberation be drawn and demarcated by those untouched by the chains that shackle the hands of the oppressed. This is a call to unite those resisting - under one banner, under one mindset that ensures the fight is universal and encompassing of the ‘never again’ motto. Looking back at similar struggles for liberation, Palestinians have much to learn from our comrades, particularly in South Africa, for it is they who secured a monumental victory against apartheid in 1991 and continue on doing so, in their promise to resisting racial supremacy imposed by European imperialism on the lands of the global majority.
I write this piece in the wake of a genocide that has claimed the lives of an estimated 200,000 Palestinians and plunged millions into chaos and melancholy. As Europe’s settler colonies tempt to erase Palestinians from their ancestral lands, Israel’s genocidal campaign exposes the façade of human rights upheld by the international rules-based order and lays bare the genocidal foundations of the modern nation state - especially those of the settler colonies. As our people move to collect the bones of their loved ones, the need to ensure global solidarity is sustained grows ever more imperative as true to its record, Israel has repeatedly broken ceasefires - just last week Israel’s Energy Minister Eli Cohen ordered the stoppage of electricity transmission to Gaza. Human rights organizations and various governing bodies have condemned Israel’s actions as starvation tactics, tracing this act in part of Israel’s policy to commit genocide in Gaza.
Following October 7th, 2023, we have witnessed a profound awakening to the Palestinian condition, as Israel’s brutality unfolded in real-time, unfiltered by the usual mechanisms of media sanitization. Cameras and voice memos captured raw, unedited footage of the realities on the ground, forcing a reckoning with the scale and severity of the violence. Within 57 days, Craig Mokhiber, the former head of the United Nations Human Rights Commission, unequivocally identified Israel’s assault on Gaza as the ‘most clear-cut case of genocide.’ Even diplomats and human rights defenders - both within and beyond institutional frameworks - struggled to mount a defense for Israel’s actions, let alone impose the usual narrative distortions that seek to frame ‘the conflict’ as a contemporary dispute rather than a continuation of settler-colonial expansion.
Yet, this awakening did not come without its burdens. The onset of the genocide forced Palestinians and their allies not only to demand recognition of their suffering but also to shoulder the exhausting labor of educating the white gaze—explaining, as if it were not self-evident, why the bombardment of densely populated areas, where children make up more than 40% of the population, constitutes an atrocity. As well, in the absence of a coherent political leadership capable of coordinating a strategic response to the genocide, many of us turned to decentralized grassroots organizing. Much of this work became entangled in language designed not to empower but to placate, as too often our messaging humiliated both the martyr and the orator, as the latter was compelled to suppress their mourning in order to justify grief to an audience that demands persuasion before it acknowledges humanity.
In reflecting on our approach, this leaves us with an urgent, overarching question—not one that simply invokes history to explain the pain of the bereaved, but one that dismantles the passive role of the spectator, for to witness genocide idly is to further dehumanize the victim. In such circumstances, we must turn to the writers and thinkers who have resisted the dangerous vacuums of political power and narrative construction, drawing from their work the foundation for our liberation and our collective struggle against all forms of hierarchy.
Up steps Steve Biko, guide and mentor of the Black Consciousness Movement. Considered by followers of liberation theory as a decolonial philosopher, Biko was born in Apartheid South Africa and headed the South African Student Organization during its inception. His most recognized accomplishments are through his designation of the Black Consciousness Movement that sought to shift the mindset of South Africans from solely fighting for equality and justice onto a path that ensures longevity, where those seeking liberation are inspired to reclaim their intrinsic humanity, nurture an unyielding sense of self-worth, and mobilize as a unified force - a force that transcends racial categorizations to embrace a revolutionary, planetary humanism that defies the oppressive structures of power.
Embracing Biko’s vision that true liberation transcends the color of one’s skin, a Palestinian consciousness must be reimagined as a universal force, acting as a compass to dismantle the structures of racial hierarchy and colonial subjugation, wherever they may be. This consciousness is not confined to a narrow definition of ethnicity; rather, it is a dynamic, ever-evolving movement that centers the rights of the oppressed, the marginalized, and those routinely pushed to the periphery of global power.
In this vision, the struggle is not simply about reclaiming a homeland, but about forging a planetary humanism that unites all who resist injustice. Planetary humanism for our intents and purposes is a quote-on-quote pair of glasses that helps our vision transcends borders, embracing the shared dignity of every being and recognizing that our struggles for liberation are intertwined. It rejects the notion that freedom is a privilege reserved for any one people and instead insists that our collective future must be built on a commitment to anti-racism and global solidarity. This philosophy must be central to our Palestinian consciousness, redefining the fight not as an isolated national struggle but as part of a universal movement against all forms of oppression. Just like Steve Biko redirected the narrative of Black identity from one of mere pigmentation to a profound, anti-colonial assertion of self-worth, so too must a Palestinian consciousness rise - one that is rooted in the rejection of hierarchical oppression and that champions an inclusive vision of human rights for every marginalized community.
A common chant sung at protests around the world has been the infamous “we are all Palestinian.” Over the past 17 daunting months, I have been privileged to stand among diverse crowds, people of every race, religion, gender, and belief, and witness firsthand how Palestine has become a unifying bridge. It connects disparate communities, allowing them to share an energy long stolen by the global elite. This chant challenges the very foundation of the nation-state order by fragmenting the notion that identity must be confined to ethnic or racial categories. Instead, it unites us around a shared consciousness that resists the hierarchical structures which have marginalized Palestinians, Sudanese, Rohingyas, Congolese, Kashmiris, and countless others.
What is needed now is not the mere dissemination of talking points or structured infographics, but a rallying cry for Palestinians and their allies to come together. We must de-center Palestine as a mere geographic label as such thinking reinforces racial and ethnic divisions and instead reimagine it as a call for an ontological shift. This vision champions a planetary humanism that reclaims the intrinsic value of the land and rejects racial thinking from our moral calculus, forging a path toward inclusive liberation for all.
To civil society, to allies, to writers, to teachers, and to the protestor - it is time for us to ensure “never again” is not merely a phrase tied to the images of violence showcased by international organizations or media agencies, but a living, breathing commitment. A commitment to dismantle the structures that produce systemic brutality, to hold accountable every force that dehumanizes, and to forge a future where every act of oppression is met with unified resistance