MACKLEMORE DEFENDS DETAINED PALESTINIAN MAHMOUD KHALIL

On 22 March, rapper and activist Macklemore (@macklemore on Instagram) spoke out in support of the people of Palestine and Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia graduate, Syrian-born Palestinian activist and US permanent resident, who US authorities illegally arrested and detained over his pro-Palestine organising. The US State Department recently announced immigrants and those seeking visas would be rejected and deported for espousing supposed anti-Semitic viewpoints.

At an event called ‘Free Mahmoud!Free Palestine!’ at The People's Forum (@peoplesforumnyc on Instagram) in New York, the artist took listeners on a journey of what it was like for him, learning about the true history of Palestine, the systemic injustices and the fear of losing out on a livelihood for the possibility of being labelled 'anti-Semitic.’ However, he overcame that fear after he could no longer be silent in the face of Palestine’s oppression.

It's been nearly 77 years after the 1948 Nakba, when Zonist settler-colonial forces forced about 800,000 Palestinians off their land to establish the state of Israel. Between 1947 and 1949, Israel klled over 15,000 Palestinians through more than 70 massacres that destroyed 531 villages.

Many experts, including the UN, say Palestinians in Gaza live in the ‘world’s largest open-air prison.' Human-rights monitoring organisations have referred to Israel as an apartheid state, with Palestinians facing movement limitations, calorie and water restrictions, executions, arbitrary arrests, s*xual violence and other abuses. 

Macklemore reminded the world that the history of Palestine did not begin on 7 October 2023 and that US tax dollars that continue to fund Israel’s onslaught against Palestinians make those who choose to remain silent complicit in the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. 

Video credit: @btnewsroom (X)

Sources

https://peoplesforum.org/events/fight-for-our-rights-free-mahmoud/

https://www.globaljustice.org.uk/blog/2024/05/remembering-the-nakba-a-70-year-struggle-for-justice/

https://www.nrc.no/news/2018/april/gaza-the-worlds-largest-open-air-prison

https://www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-44124396

https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2017/5/23/the-nakba-did-not-start-or-end-in-1948

https://www.asawinstanley.com/2010/10/our-dreams/

https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20190420-why-zionism-has-always-been-a-racist-ideology/

https://www.ejiltalk.org/beyond-discrimination-apartheid-is-a-colonial-project-and-zionism-is-a-form-of-racism/

https://www.fidh.org/en/region/north-africa-middle-east/israel-palestine/israeli-apartheid-the-legacy-of-the-ongoing-nakba-at-75

https://www.icj-cij.org/node/203447

https://www.cfr.org/article/us-aid-israel-four-charts