Chicago, IL – The U.S. Palestinian Community Network (USPCN) commemorated the Nakba, “Catastrophe” in English, which marks the ethnic cleansing of over 750,000 Palestinians, and the massacre of thousands more, by Zionist militia groups in 1948, in the wake of the establishment of the settler colonial state of Israel. Palestinians and their supporters all around the world remember the Nakba every year on or around May 15.

On May 14, USPCN-New York member Suzanne Adely moderated a webinar with George Khoury, a Nakba survivor and longtime Detroit-based organizer, and Rasmea Odeh, the famous former Palestinian political prisoner who, after a politically-charged prosecution that was an attack on her organizing and the Palestine national movement as a whole, was deported from the U.S. in 2017.

After George Khoury told his powerful Nakba story, Rasmea Odeh provided a historical analysis and talked about Palestinian resistance to Israeli colonialism. Both emphasized the need to continue organizing for justice and liberation, especially in the U.S., which provides Israel over $5 billion of military and other aid per year. The U.S. under Trump has taken even more extreme steps to support the racist state, like moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, accepting Israel’s declaration of full sovereignty over the Golan Heights, which is stolen Syrian land, and proposing the “Deal of the Century,” a sham peace plan that ignores all Palestinian rights.

“The Nakba taught me that whatever is taken by force, it must be taken back by force, and thus we need to organize and tell our people: Your history was denied, your future was denied. The only way to get liberation is to organize,” stated Khoury at the end of his speech.

Odeh added to Khoury’s statement: “We will accept nothing less than our right of return, and to create a democratic state on our land.”

The next day, USPCNs Chicago chapter organized a Palestinian Car Caravan, in which 75 cars and over 100 community members and allies participated.

The caravan started in Chicago’s southwest suburbs, home to one of the largest communities of Palestinians and Arabs in the U.S., and drove to the Federal Plaza in downtown Chicago, where U.S. Senators Dick Durbin and Tammy Duckworth have offices.

Simultaneously, USPCN organized a Twitter storm, asking supporters to call their Representatives in the U.S. Congress and demand that they support the No Way to Treat a Child bill (HR 2407), which calls for Israel to stop the detention of children, and take action to end the blockade on Gaza now.

One Palestinian from Chicagoland, who is a descendant of refugees barred from returning to their homes that were stolen in 1948, declared, “The Right of Return to our homes is a must! We will never forget. We will keep on organizing and fighting until we are able to return home.”

#ChicagoIL #InJusticeSystem #OppressedNationalities #Palestine #SpecialCoverage #MiddleEast #PeoplesStruggles #alNakba #Antiracism #PoliticalRepression #RasmeaOdeh #USPalestinianCommunityNetworkUSPCN

Chicago, IL – More than a 1200 joined together November 22, at the hall of the Chicago Teachers Union, to refound the National Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression. The newly refounded Alliance will center its efforts on building the fight against police crimes and for community control of the police, and it will campaign for the release of political prisoners and the wrongfully convicted.

Longtime leaders of the Black liberation movement, Angela Davis and Frank Chapman, along with elected officials, trade unionists, and other progressive activists addressed the packed rally that opened the conference.

#ChicagoIL #StudentMovement #OppressedNationalities #PeoplesStruggles #AfricanAmerican #ChicanoLatino #PoliceBrutality #RacismInTheCriminalJusticeSystem #PoliticalPrisoners #PoliticalRepression #RasmeaOdeh #ChicagoAllianceAgainstRacistAndPoliticalRepression #NationalAllianceAgainstRacistAndPoliticalRepression #ConferenceToRefoundTheNationalAlliance

Freedom Road Socialist Organization joins with people around the globe in condemning the German authorities for trampling on the rights those who fight for the liberation of Palestine. On June 22, the German government banned prominent Palestinian writer Khaled Barakat from speaking at an event against Trump’s “deal of the century.” This outrageous act come on the heels of the German government’s preventing a speech by the Palestinian leader Rasmea Odeh, and her subsequent deportation.

The Israeli occupation Palestine is being challenged by the growing struggle of the Palestinian people, and a rising tide of anger across the Middle East. The brutality and callous cruelty of the occupation has led to a turn in public opinion internationally and the growing isolation of the Israel. So, the Western governments that back Israel have a problem. It’s hard to defend an entity that uses snipers to maim and kill protesters. Or that brutalizes kids. Or that carries out sexual assaults against women as a matter of policy. Fair-minded people reject these kinds of things, so the governments of Europe and the U.S. have adopted a “kill the messenger” approach.

What we see in the U.S. and Europe is an attempt to criminalize those working to free Palestine. Organizations that fight for freedom, such as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), are wrongly labeled as “terrorist.” There are attempts to put legal restrictions on those who advocated boycotts, sanctions, and divestment from Israel.

We in Freedom Road have some direct experience with this repression, having faced FBI raids and attacks from a grand jury, in part because of our support for Palestine. We continue to support the battle for Palestinian liberation, and we are proud to stand in solidarity with anyone who is being hit with repression and for those who are making contributions to this just cause.

No amount of repression in the U.S. or Europe will change the fact that the Israeli occupation will certainly come to an end. From the river to the sea, every inch of Palestine will be liberated.

Stand with those who stand for a free Palestine!

#Germany #Palestine #PeoplesStruggles #RasmeaOdeh #MiddleEast

New York, NY – A crowd gathered at The People’s Forum on June 9 to hear Rasmea Odeh and Suzanne Adely speak on the repression of the Palestinian solidarity movement by the United States and Israel. Rasmea Odeh is a famous Palestinian woman leader who has dedicated her life to the Palestinian struggle and liberation of her people. She was a former political prisoner of Israel, and had her human rights violated. Odeh later became the target of political repression in the United States in 2013, after FBI raids and grand jury subpoenas targeting the Antiwar 23 were defeated.

Leading up to the event, pro-Israel right-wingers attempted to stop Rasmea Odeh from speaking. They made many calls and sent emails to the People’s Forum with slurs and threats against Rasmea Odeh and the Committee to Stop FBI Repression NYC. The People’s Forum refused to pull the plug however. Thru teleconferencing, Odeh talked to her New York supporters about her hard-fought U.S. deportation case and her current organizing efforts for Palestine Liberation.

Collin of the Committee to Stop FBI Repression NYC introduced the event, speaking about the “Justice for Rasmea” campaign from 2013-2017, “Rasmea stood strong against this repression, and activists won real victories by organizing to support her. Not only did activists force the first judge to recuse himself for having direct ties to one of the businesses targeted in the crimes for which Rasmea was framed, but her defense committee also helped get Rasmea out of solitary confinement while her case was on appeal.”

Collin then introduced Rasmea Odeh by teleconference. Odeh spoke about the recent repression in Germany, where she was scheduled to speak at a cultural center in the Berlin district of Kreuzberg. The German Interior Ministry invoked the Residence Act to block her from speaking and sent police to shut it down, including following her and harassing her afterwards.

During the New York event, Odeh spoke and answered audience questions for 30 minutes. Then Suzanne Adely, an international solidarity activist, labor lawyer, and Arab American, hosted a lively question and answer session about Rasmea Odeh and other cases of political repression. She touched upon Sami Al Arian, Claudia Jones, the LA 8, Mazzen al-Najjar, and others. Adely highlighted how groups continue to organize despite facing an onslaught of political repression from the U.S. government.

The event ended with the announcement that CSFR NY joined the National Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression ( read here) and will continue to organize against political repression and police harassment in New York City.

#NewYorkNY #Palestine #PeoplesStruggles #PoliticalRepression #RasmeaOdeh

The actions of these governments blatantly reflect their racist anti-Palestinian and anti-Muslim views. But we want to draw attention to the underlying reason for their targeting of Rasmea. The attack on her right to speak is deeply tied to U.S. and German support for the Israeli apartheid and settler colonialism in Palestine. Moreover, the attack on Rasmea reflects these countries’ imperialist strategies for control of the Middle East. By the same token, these governments are clearly acting out of fear – fear that when Palestinian women and activists like Rasmea speak up, it chips away at such countries’ grasp on Palestine and the surrounding region.

The attacks on Rasmea and Palestine also relate to political repression taking place across the globe. Germany, the U.S. and Israel are attempting to silence Rasmea for the same fundamental reasons that the Duterte government has murdered and attacked activists and human rights defenders in the Philippines; that the U.S. government is trying to forcibly install a new government in Venezuela; and that the NYPD’s Strategic Response Group is surveilling and harassing leaders and activists in the Black Lives Matter movement. The imperialists who are in power are clearly afraid that people like Rasmea might inspire others to rise up and fight back against the racist and oppressive system in place.

We want to send a message to these imperialist powers, to say that fighting back is exactly what we plan to do. It is imperative that we fight back against this unjust system that tries to silence Palestinian women like Rasmea. We demand that Rasmea Odeh be permitted to speak in Germany, and we demand an end to state repression against all Muslim women, and all Palestinians who have boldly raised their voices against the imperialist and colonialist powers that are oppressing people across the world.

Activists are not terrorists! We stand in solidarity with Rasmea and all Palestinian people in their struggle for liberation.

-- NYC Committee to Stop FBI Repression

#NewYorkCityNY #AntiwarMovement #Palestine #WomensMovement #PeoplesStruggles #PoliticalPrisoners #politicalRepression #Antiracism #RasmeaOdeh

Rasmea Odeh, an historic figure in the Palestine national movement, is being threatened by German authorities with denial of her right to speak in Germany, as well as attempting to take away her visa.

The Chicago Alliance once again expresses our complete solidarity with our dear sister, Rasmea, and with her beloved Palestine. For a number of years, the Alliance and the U.S. Palestinian Community Network marched together to defend Rasmea from the political trial that she was subjected to by the U.S. Dept. of Justice; and the Palestinian organizations that Rasmea helped to lead marched together with the Black community in Chicago in our struggle for an end to police crimes by calling for community control of the police.

In 2014, I saw the Palestinian people in Ferguson, Missouri, expressing their solidarity with Black people there who had risen up to demand justice for Mike Brown, the innocent young Black man who was slain by a white police officer. That uprising reignited the Black liberation movement in the U.S.

I said then and I say again today that Black people and Palestinians have a future together. In Chicago, we face a police department that occupies our communities, as Palestinians are occupied by the Israeli military. Hundreds of Blacks and Latinos in Chicago were tortured by cops into confessing to crimes they did not commit, just as Rasmea was tortured in 1969 into such a confession. The Palestinian people are fighting for their liberation since their land was taken from them in 1948. Black people have been fighting for our liberation since we were stolen from Africa centuries ago.

Let Rasmea speak!

#ChicagoIL #OppressedNationalities #PeoplesStruggles #AfricanAmerican #PoliticalRepression #RasmeaOdeh #FrankChapman #ChicagoAllianceAgainstRacistAndPoliticalRepression

Freedom Road Socialist Organization sharply condemns the decision by German authorities to prevent the respected Palestinian leader Rasmea Odeh from speaking in Berlin, March 15. According to reports we have reviewed, German police accosted Rasmea outside the hall where she was scheduled to appear, surrounded the venue with hundreds of cops, and handed her documents that canceled her visa. Police then followed Rasmea, demanding she go to another part of the city, and harassed her as she did so.

These acts of political repression were preceded by a noisy campaign by the U.S. and Israeli ambassadors and the right-wing media against Rasmea’s appearance in Germany. This repression should be opposed by everyone who cares about justice and democratic rights.

Rasmea Odeh was a long-time leader of the Palestinian American community in Chicago, until she was arrested on trumped-up charges, stripped of her U.S. citizenship and deported. Rasmea had done nothing wrong. Her real ‘crime’ in the eyes of the U.S. government was her commitment to ending the Zionist occupation of Palestine.

Rasmea is in fact is a hero whose lifetime of struggle embodies the hopes and aspirations of the Palestinian people. Freedom Road Socialist Organization has worked tirelessly in the past to oppose any act of repression against Rasmea and we will continue to do so now.

The forces of reaction who want to criminalize those who embrace Palestine’s freedom are doomed to failure. Support for Israel is waning. The Palestinian liberation forces, along with a growing camp of resistance in the Middle East, are growing stronger.

Let Rasmea speak her mind! End U.S. support for Israel! Freedom for all of Palestine!

#UnitedStates #PeoplesStruggles #RasmeaOdeh #PoliticalRepression