Class 2: Forms of Resistance
Armed Resistance of Palestine
Armed resistance has always been an integral part of Palestinian resistance since the beginning. When living under a fascist settler colonial regime that restricts every aspect of your life, what options remain for oppressed peoples? In Palestine, activists are silenced and illegally imprisoned, while all forms of resistance from Palestinians are met with brutal Zionist violence aimed at crushing dissent and expanding colonial domination.
Armed resistance can be seen not just as a response but as the only viable recourse. The United Nations acknowledges the right of occupied peoples, including Palestinians, to resist occupation within the boundaries of international law. This support for the right to resist occupation is outlined in numerous UN resolutions and international legal principles.
However, language used to describe Palestinian resistance often mirrors colonial-era tactics of dehumanizing those who resisted colonization. Palestinians face similar misrepresentations to delegitimize their fight for liberation. Similar to how Native Americans and African Americans were mischaracterized to instill fear and justify their oppression, Palestinians face comparable misrepresentations to undermine their struggle for self-autonomy.
The Cradle of Resistance
To Palestinians, Gaza is known as the cradle of resistance. Seventy percent of Gaza's population are refugees from other parts of the 48’ lands. Despite having the right to return under international law, they have been continuously denied this right due to the ongoing illegal Zionist military blockade– effectively turning Gaza into a concentration camp. They are restricted from accessing their own sea, lack an airport due to the constant bombings, and face significant challenges leaving by land through the Egyptian border. Gazans are descendants of Nakba survivors whose families were either ethnically cleansed from their ancestral homes or slaughtered alongside thousands of others.
Naturally, they resist their oppressors who have subjected them to decades of unlivable conditions. Given the severe population density and extreme poverty, it is only rational to expect Palestinians in Gaza to rise up.
Palestinian armed resistance intensified after the Naksa. The tradition of armed resistance can be traced back to the 1936-1939 Great Arab Revolt against British occupation and increasing Zionist land theft. With the establishment of the PLO in 1964, armed struggle was deemed the primary method for achieving liberation. This approach persists today. Surveys consistently show that Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza strongly support armed struggle as a means to end the occupation.
Youth-Led Resistance
In recent years, young Palestinians have formed new resistance groups in the Occupied West Bank, particularly in response to the 2021 violence against Palestinians defending the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in Occupied East Jerusalem.
Since then, these resistance groups in multiple West Bank refugee camps have faced mass Zionist raids and mass murder operations conducted by the Zionist military.