Indigenous solidarity with Palestine w/ Uahikea Maile and Leanne Betasamosake Simpson

Nick Estes: So this is a special episode of the Red Nation Podcast. We are here with Leanne Simpson and Oakey Mele to discuss a letter that was signed by 132 Indigenous activists and intellectuals condemning the continued Israeli genocide ongoing in Gaza. By the time this airs, I'm sure the death toll will continue to mount pending a ceasefire. Yeah. But before we start, I just wanted to turn it over to— we can start with Leanne, if you wanted to just do an introduction and maybe why we put together this letter as Indigenous activists, intellectuals, and scholars.

Leanne Betasamosake Simpson: Sure. Ani kinewaya. It's so wonderful to be here and meeting this present moment with some of the fierce resistance that I think has gone into the last 400 years of Of resistance and of fighting colonialism on Turtle Island. And so I think myself, I was in Palestine in May as part of the Palestinian Festival for Literature, traveling around the West Bank and '48. I had a very visceral reaction to what I saw and the people that I was visiting with, the homes that I went into. It reminded me of being home. It reminded me—

Uahikea Maile: Right.

Leanne Betasamosake Simpson: of being on reserves and reservations. The settler colonialism was very familiar to me. I felt like I was— thought I was going to learn about Palestinian resistance and the Palestinian history, but what I learned was about myself. I learned about colonialism. You could see every stage of colonialism taking place in a very small geographic area at the same time. So it was like a collapsing of time in a way.

Nick Estes: Yeah.

Leanne Betasamosake Simpson: Seeing what my ancestors would've faced, knowing what I faced, but also very much accelerated and with one of the most powerful armies on the planet. So watching what happened on October 7th again was an education when I saw breaking through that wall in Gaza and feeling those first few seconds of freedom and what was possible. Because I think I didn't imagine that that was possible. And that was a teaching to myself.

Nick Estes: Yeah.

Leanne Betasamosake Simpson: To dream bigger and to find a way over all of those walls that colonialism sets up. But I also very quickly felt powerless and helpless, and I wanted to do something, but I didn't know what and I didn't know how. And so I went back to those really basic organizing tools from my early 20s of think of the people in your community that could help. that have platforms and that are solid supporters of Palestinian resistance. And so I reached out to the two of you to write a letter of solidarity that I felt like I could sign with every cell in my body, one that wasn't compromising, and one that my Palestinian comrades could read and feel like they weren't alone.

Nick Estes: Yeah, thanks so much for that, Leila. Ali Kadri, do you want to maybe add to that conversation?

Uahikea Maile: Aloha mai kakou. I grew up and was born into a military occupation in occupied Hawaiʻi. My father as well, my brother, my uncle, my 2 cousins, my grandfather, we were all born into a U.S. colonial occupation in the Hawaiian archipelago. And as a structure, it has oriented our lives. At the same time, it is a structure that also has extended a colonial relationship, a settler colonial relationship. And so these 2 things together for me have inundated in such pernicious and pervasive ways my entire existence, even here in so-called Canada and this settler state as a professor at the University of Toronto. That being said, the kind of colonial occupation that exists under Zionist settler colonialism of Palestine and Palestinians, as Liane already put it, is a different degree and accelerated kind. To see the breaking free of Gazans from the world's largest open-air prison, a containment site where a majority of the population of Palestinians are already made to be refugees, was an expression and a movement and a feeling of jubilation for that kind of freedom and liberation to actually occur. under an intense, brutal, murdersome Israeli military occupation. So in that jubilation, I was very energized by what— not to take away from that in particular, but what Kanaka Maoli, Native Hawaiians, Hawaiian nationals might learn in a similar way, like Leanne was suggesting, What might we learn from this liberation struggle? And at the same time, how might we stand in solidarity with Palestinians fighting for their freedom, for their liberation from that containment, from that occupation, from this system of apartheid, and from an ongoing genocide? It is incredibly important for me to sit in that position, especially in the context that in Hawai'i, we tend to exceptionalize ourselves as indigenous people under military occupation or experiencing settler colonialism. And it is an important agenda for me politically to align and bridge with others that are experiencing that same condition, those relations of domination. But also those structures of occupation. And so on October 7th, I made a public statement from Toronto to stand in solidarity with Palestinians, and I was completely demonized. My words were mischaracterized by conservative right-wing Toronto-based press. My colleagues at the University of Toronto sent emails to my department chair, likely calling for my sacking or at least disciplinary action. And I do not regret what I said because I believe in free Palestine just as much as I believe in free Hawaii.

Nick Estes: Thank you so much, both of you, for sharing those perspectives. I should also introduce myself. I'm playing podcast host, but haume takia pi. Te tāngō hī tika mi e lo. I am Nick Estes. I am Sicangu Lakota from the Lower Brule Sioux Tribe, also known as Kulichasha. And I'm a member of the Oceti Sakowin. And like Liane, I had attended PalFest, the Palestine Festival of Literature, back in 2019. And I remember arriving, first arriving through the airport in so-called Tel Aviv. Mm-hmm. the sort of rigmarole security checkpoint that you have to go through just to kind of get to Jerusalem. And then to get to Jerusalem that night, there were supposed to be Gazan poets who were supposed to read their poetry.

Leanne Betasamosake Simpson: Right.

Nick Estes: The poets were not allowed to attend a cultural festival. And so, I— there was a lot of things happening at that particular moment in time, but it really just hits you in the face right away when— when I first arrived in Palestine. The sort of the smells, you know, and somebody who was raised Christian, I was, you know, I was raised Christian and taught about, you know, the Holy Land and, you know, all these things. It was completely alienated from me. I had no— I didn't feel like it was a religious experience in that way in my sort of Christian upbringing. And I remember walking through the Holy City and feeling and seeing that, like, most of the people who were there, or a good majority of the people who were there, were tourists. Most of them were from the United States. Many of them were from parts of the country where they probably don't even acknowledge indigenous people exist. And it was just, it was such a profound kind of shift in my thinking. I always knew about Palestine. I started reading The Electronic Intifada when I was in when I was in college, an undergraduate, because I didn't— I was trying to follow what was going on with the Intifada, and I felt like the representations in the mainstream media were very distorted. And so Palestine, I didn't need to go to Palestine to be in solidarity. For me, it has always been a part of how I understood the rest of the world. And when, you know, going to see how people live under this military occupation, Yeah. Where there's constant checkpoints, freedom of movement is completely limited. It was so shocking to me because our territories of the Oceti Sakowin are so expansive. They're so large. They take up, you know, at least, you know, 4 or 5 states in the United States and even up into parts of what is now Canada. And this area of land is about the size of—

Leanne Betasamosake Simpson: Of—

Nick Estes: The state of New Jersey, right? And you can wake up in the morning, and this was the most kind of, I guess, nightmarish thing for me, was you could wake up in the morning and smell the sea breeze blow in in the morning and realize that the people who were living in Ramallah or the West Bank couldn't actually access the sea. They could smell the sea, right? So freedom was just over, you know, just through that checkpoint, And just over those hills, right? And that to me was such a profound sort of experience. And I think thinking back to our own history as Oceti Sakowin people and the place I currently live, which is Mni Sota Makoce, or so-called Minnesota, the immense amount of violence, the immense amount of genocide that was required to create the state of Minnesota, where there are still to this day removal laws that actually banish and prohibit Dakota people from existing in that state are so similar. Like, you know, Israel takes the model from Minnesota. They want to become Minnesota. They want to annihilate and completely remove Palestinians. And if you go back in time in 1862 and you read the newspaper reports, the ways that Dakota people were characterized as savage barbarians, as, you know, what we would call the T-word today, that their lands were ever diminishing. They were confined to a narrow strip, much like the Gaza Strip. I think it's almost— ours was just a little bit bigger, but it was meant to starve them out. It was meant to force them into submission to the point where they trespassed across those reservation borders and took action against the very people who stole their land, and how to this day, 2023, they are still not forgiven for their actions of resistance to exact life for themselves, right? That's how much hate, that's how much effort has gone into the disappearance of Dakota people. And their annihilation within the context of Minnesota. And so when Leanne reached out for this particular letter, I was watching the news and watching how every single organization, or many of the main organizations, many of the mainstream media was making Palestinians, if they were allowed to speak at all, ritualistically condemn, ritualistically condemn Things that, A, they were not responsible for. And there was no accountability whatsoever on the state of Israel for the 75-plus years of terrorism, of genocide, ethnic cleansing, displacement, whatever we want to call it, settler colonialism, and never an ask of the Zionists to engage in their project nonviolently. Because we know the only language they speak is violence. And so this call for me was a way to galvanize Indigenous consciousness and thinking around Palestine as central to our issues here, whether we're in the Pacific, whether throughout the world, wherever we find ourselves in the crosshairs of settler colonialism. A lot of people in Indian country or across the Indigenous world may not know much about Palestine. And so I thought this was going to be a kind of teaching moment and a conversation starter. So I want to open it back up to both of you in terms of maybe just reflecting on this current moment, in terms of what Indigenous people and Indigenous movements, Indigenous organizations, artists, intellectuals can do in terms of taking a stand against this genocidal campaign against Gaza, but also the continued colonization and dispossession of Palestine. So I'll turn it over to Uwa first, and then we can go to Liane.

Uahikea Maile: There are 2 things that I have been reflecting on to think about in conversation with you, Nick, and Leanne today in relation to the Indigenous solidarity statement for Palestine and Palestinians, especially that I've been developing recently, but much longer than that. And so the first is in Hawai'i, we have a connection to Zionism and the ways in which military support for the Israeli Defense Forces by one of the largest or the most wealthy men in the world, Larry Ellison, has actually landed and become wrapped up in settler colonialism in Hawaii. So Larry Ellison is the former CEO of Oracle, He is now the chief executive officer for technology or something like that, but has supplied the Israeli Defense Forces with tens of millions of dollars over the years and has been committed in his pursuit of data security and technologies in securing the Israeli state from the very beginning. Oracle is one of the largest data firms in the world. They have offices in Israel and elsewhere. So from the beginning, Larry Ellison has been a staunch supporter of Zionist settler colonialism, and most specifically funding the brutal Israeli Defense Forces that maim and kill and police and surveil and invade Not just in Gaza, but also the West Bank and elsewhere. He owns a Hawaiian island, Lanai, and that island has become a site for him to also host Benjamin Netanyahu, which he did in the past few years before he was back in his executive office. Hawaii cannot be an indigenous territory that harbors war criminals and genocidal maniacs like Netanyahu. And the only way that it is is because of Larry Ellison, his wealth, his power, and his influence. So that's one thing that we need to call more attention to in Hawaii. We cannot just, you know, sort of wish for wages and work from a person that harbors and entertains a war criminal like Netanyahu. In fact, we in Hawaii and in the Hawaiian sovereignty movement must continue to antagonize that particular relationship, that we are responsible and accountable to Palestinians in Palestine. So that's one thing that I've been thinking about. The other thing is, beyond Hawaii and Oceania and the Pacific, there is also a developing Zionism that has aligned itself with Israel. In the past few days in the United Nations, General Assembly, a ceasefire resolution was voted on. 14 countries voted against that ceasefire. And, you know, not surprisingly, Israel and the United States. So if we take those 2 away, there were 12 other countries that voted against the ceasefire, the ceasefire of Israel bombarding Gaza, Which continues today, displacing almost 1.5 million people, killing upwards of 10,000 via Israeli airstrike, and much more beyond just airstrikes, half of which are children, you know, bombing hospitals, bombing bakeries, bombing roads that the Israeli government has suggested those Gazans to flee into the Sinai Desert, to flee into Egypt, bombing those very roads, right? Yeah. 6 of those countries out of the 12, besides Israel and the United States, are Pacific Island nations: Nauru, Micronesia, Marshall Islands, Fiji, Tonga. These, these nations have also been invited to create embassies in Israel. There is a significant problem wherein Indigenous Pacific peoples' sovereign exercise of diplomacy is wrapped up in supporting colonial occupation of Indigenous peoples elsewhere. And that is another massive issue that we in the Pacific, as Indigenous peoples, must continue to interrupt and unsettle. And this is exactly why signing and continuing the work of Indigenous solidarity for Palestine is so Yeah.

Leanne Betasamosake Simpson: So I was thinking about just the ones that have gone before us speaking out about this issue of Palestine. So I'm thinking of Robert Warrior, I'm thinking of Kehulani Ka'anui, I'm thinking of Lee Miracle, and I'm thinking of some of the folks that Lee was organizing with in the 1960s and 1970s who were aligning themselves and speaking out then. I'm thinking of Yeah. Steven Salaita and his book, Internation, when he really made a compelling case for Indigenous studies, for scholars to include Palestine in our coursework, in our lectures, and in the canon. And I feel like in this moment, had we heeded that advice and we had aligned ourselves and we had done the study and we have built the networks And we had built the struggle, we would be much more useful in this moment. And so I think these moments show us the work that we should have been doing, and they show us the work that we need to be doing. When I look back to the last time I think Indigenous peoples were really mobilized in struggle collectively outside of more regional land-based pipeline sort of work, it was during Idle No More. And we don't have the sort of platforms.

Uahikea Maile: Right.

Leanne Betasamosake Simpson: And the organizing that we had during that time. And so that was very sad for me, but I think that this is a time with witnessing an in-progress genocide that our colonial government is participating in and funding. Now is the time to get our act together in a really serious way. And I think there's a tremendous amount of study and information, Haymarket making The Palestinian Books, free ebooks, Verso also doing that. The Red Nation has tons of resources. So there's lots and lots of resources for people to familiarize themselves and develop those critical thinking skills to be able to cut through the propaganda of the US and Canada and Israel. I think Indigenous people in Canada need to rethink Trudeau and reconciliation. And I've been saying this for years and years and years, but my God, abstaining from the ceasefire and showing more empathy on Twitter for Chandler Bing than the thousands of Palestinian children that are dead, that's unforgivable. And I feel like if you thought that he was serious about reconciliation, and I never did, But if you thought that, how he is conducting himself and representing Canada in this struggle is very indicative, I think, of where his ethics and morals lie in this. And I think Israel settler colonialism is often predictive of what will happen here when you mobilize to protect your land and your rights. And so I think that this is a really, really important moment for Indigenous people to be paying attention to, to be learning from. And I think back every time I've ever been involved in some kind of organization, we're talking about allies, we're talking about solidarity, we're talking about our other movements, how are they going to support us? This is the time for us to learn about solidarity by Working and standing behind Palestinian resistance movements. This is how you learn about solidarity is by aligning yourself and being ethically someone who is co-resisting. I think that it's really important, the work that we do now as we're moving forward. This isn't an issue that's going to get resolved really quickly. We've seen a lot of amazing mobilization. I was Yesterday there was 17 occupations in members of parliament across Canada. It was really coordinated and well put together, but hardly again any mainstream media. So I think what we do moving forward is really important in terms of how we are embodying our political and ethical traditions.

Uahikea Maile: Right.

Leanne Betasamosake Simpson: as Indigenous peoples, and I want my ancestors to be proud of me.

Nick Estes: Yeah, thanks for that. I just want to state before I say anything that I believe it was the Black freedom struggle that has done the most work in terms of making the connections. I know we're seeing a lot of organizations mobilize around Palestine solidarity, which is really excellent. But I remember in 2013, 2014, 2020, when all these major uprisings popped off, it was really the Black organizers who were on the ground in the streets really making those connections between Israeli occupation and apartheid as it was practiced in Palestine with the ways that the Police and the settler state, you know, they were using these terms, is used to curtail, suppress resistance movements in, you know, in North America. And it was really their voices, honestly, that made that connection. And I think we're seeing the fruits of their labor, not necessarily just in classrooms or at universities, but actually on the streets, right?

Leanne Betasamosake Simpson: Uh-huh.

Nick Estes: And I think one, you know, one thing I just want to kind of foreground is Indigenous peoples, and there's a lot of problems with recognition, 100% agree, but I think these kind of connections are important or were important in the 1970s. So Indigenous peoples were made a category in the United Nations Decade to Combat Racism, Racial Discrimination, and Apartheid, which began in 1974. So that was the first time they were recognized, and this was with the anti-apartheid struggle And the Palestinian liberation movement. Zionism as a form of racism was also part of the initial agenda, and that was later removed after the 1993 Oslo Accords. The decade also gave a platform for Palestinian rights. And US presidents from Jimmy Carter to George Bush have boycotted these programs on racism, most likely over the question, initially over the question of apartheid South Africa and Palestine. But this boycott included the 2 UN decades to combat racism and apartheid from 1974 to 1993. And I think that's an important kind of time period. And we know the US and Israel backed the racist South African apartheid regime when the rest of the world morally opposed it. The connections between South Africa, South African anti-apartheid movements, Palestinian rights, and indigenous rights cannot be nor should they be dismissed when we think about these histories. In 1977, the Treaty Council, or the International Indian Treaty Council, which was the international arm of the American Indian Movement, upon achieving NGO status, called for the end of the celebration of Columbus Day and declared instead the International Day of Solidarity and Mourning with Indigenous Peoples. The UN Committee on Racism, Racial Discrimination, Apartheid, and Colonialism passed the resolution, the support of many organizations such as the African National Congress and the Palestine Liberation Organization, who recognized the devastating legacies of European colonialism. In 1982, the Holy See attempted to kind of commemorate Columbus's voyage, and in protest, the entire African delegation at the United Nations got up and and walked out in an act of solidarity with the indigenous peoples of Americas. So it's important to point out that this sort of lateral solidarity, even though it exists in a very problematic institution like the United Nations, existed and helped pave the pathway to recognize indigenous rights. And again, not without its problems, but nonetheless, the conversations that happen amongst indigenous and Palestinian organizers at that time, like, went beyond just navigating international human rights law. There were many delegations sent to the United States who met with AIM activists, and likewise, many AIM activists who went to Lebanon and connected with Palestinian movements in refugee camps. So the reason why I bring this up in particular is to show that there's a long history that we have been miseducated about, because this is an anti-imperialist history, one that isn't looking to the NATO countries, isn't looking to Europe, isn't looking to the Anglo settler sphere for recognition, but is looking to the Global South, is looking to the continents of Africa, of South America, of You know, Asia for guidance and inspiration in how we actually implement a program of decolonization. But the first step that they took was one of solidarity. And I think that is the key sort of example. And I know there's a lot of— with Stephen Salaita's book Internationalism, he's looking specifically at the sort of cultural confluence of poetry, of literature, of articulating the experiences of Indigenous decolonization and settler colonialism within the context of Palestine and North America. There, I have a sort of another question, a follow-up question to that. And both of you feel free to chime in if you have comments. But I wanted to maybe think about what are the next steps? We wrote this letter and we asked People to sign on, which was great. And we got a lot of signatures. But we want to go beyond just a letter, and we've drafted a sort of statement or an action form to begin to think about how we, as Indigenous peoples throughout the world, can begin to show direct solidarity with the Palestine movement. And I guess I'll begin with Leanne, if you have some thoughts on that?

Uahikea Maile: I'll say a quick comment on this question to follow up with Leanne. About a week ago, a close colleague of mine, As'ad El-Abi, who's a professor at the University of Toronto, brilliant Palestinian intellectual, wrote a piece in Public Books called Our Siege Is Long, and he ends with Quite possibly the most unsettling questions, I think, for all of us, especially as non-Palestinian people and as people that are indigenous that live under conditions of colonial occupation. We should heed these words. And as Matt says at the end of this piece, We know who made the hell Palestinians live in today. Who will unmake that hell? And who will watch silently or cheer as its depths are made deeper and its people burn hotter? I, for one, as a Kanaka Maoli Hawaiian national indigenous person whose ancestors fought against the establishment of a belligerent military occupation in the Hawaiian Islands and settler colonialism of our archipelago will not allow silence or cheering in my community. And that includes in Hawaiʻi and with indigenous communities worldwide. And so if that is the standpoint for me, given this enduring history of resistance to settler colonial occupation that I'm accountable to in Hawai'i and simultaneously elsewhere because of my ancestors' actions, because of the kind of life that my family has been birthed into just like others elsewhere, then it is important to attempt to unmake that hell, because we know who is burning in it, and we know who is starting those fires. And I think, to go back to something Lan said, this is a really important pedagogical moment, not to take away from the material depths of that hell, but pedagogical moment for non-Palestinian Indigenous peoples all over the world.

Nick Estes: Yeah.

Uahikea Maile: To answer this question of how we will unmake that hell. So I've been really heartened, likewise, in Tkaronto, Dish With One Spoon territory, to see the bridges being built across Palestinian, Muslim, Arab, anti-Zionist Jewish, Indigenous, migrant communities. Yeah. In these direct actions, in these expressions of solidarity in public places wherein Toronto mayor, wherein MPs, wherein the premier of this province have referred to those public expressions as expressions of solidarity, not for Palestinians and their liberation from military occupation, apartheid, and genocide, but as expressions of solidarity with terrorism. Olivia Chow, Doug Ford, these are the conditions politically in which we live here in Toronto. And these are unacceptable because they're historically conditions and discourses and rhetoric that have been used on all of those people that I just mentioned. And now it is incredibly powerful to see those bridges being made here in this city to stand and protest and demonstrate in solidarity with people here as well, a large diaspora of Palestinian peoples that live in this city. What does it mean for us to stand up for them here as well as their families that are burning in that hell that Asmaa writes about? So that's one thing. Another thing is I'm incredibly heartened by some of the organizing in the Pacific, despite the fact that Pacific Island nations are voting in particular ways to, as I mentioned previously, at the UN General Assembly, to vote against the ceasefire, just embarrassingly so, peoples of these countries, and just like in Hawai'i, are demonstrating in support of our Palestinian relatives that live in Hawai'i, that live in New Zealand, And also those that are in Gaza. And so I'm thinking about the ways in which those grassroots organizations like Hui Aloha Aina, for example, in Hawaii, which is an organization, a political organization that was established in the 19th century along with another, Hui Kalai Aina, that fought against US annexation of Hawaii. And now there are chapters in Hawaii are reemerging in important ways to establish not just a radical politics against colonialism, but capitalism and for Indigenous internationalism. So these organizations are stepping up to the plate. And I think that in solidaristic ways, as allies to Palestinians and for Palestinian liberation, We need more. And so, as much as I'm heartened by the work that is currently in place, now is the time to be unflinching, to be unrelenting, and to be unapologetic, despite the fact that we face retribution and reprisal. Enough is enough, because as Asmat says, the silence continues to make these deep, hot depths burn people hotter. And I am unwilling to continue that and am working with others to unmake that hell.

Nick Estes: Thank you both for those perspectives. I just want to talk a little bit about the work of Indigenous solidarity with Palestine. Zionism is a settler colonial project that needs to be named. There is an intuitive feeling among the Anglo settler nations, such as the United States and Canada, for example, that we did it and it must be right. And because settler societies have a different mentality, we exterminated the Indigenous people, so there must be something right about it. Whether it's a superior civilization or ideological— other ideological justifications. But settler colonialism hasn't ended. Acts of apologies or so-called truth and reconciliation happen from the comfort of settler societies that have so thoroughly subjugated Native people through violence and genocide that they have no fear that symbolic acts change the socioeconomic or political realities of today. In other words, they don't challenge the colonial relation. In fact, they could be seen as a technology of colonial rule. There's something important, you know, there are some important caveats to this. Indigenous movements have also attacked the symbols of settler colonialism, such as monuments, sports mascots, and statues glorifying conquest. And have faced violent backlash, as we as a Red Nation have experienced. These actions may help elevate the consciousness of the Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples and our allies, but they don't radically alter the colonial relation. They are typically the first steps in a more political direction. And I don't want to minimize changing or abolishing sports mascots or changing language or doing these sort of symbolic acts. They do lead and they can lead to more radical change. But again, settler societies implement these sorts of things such as land acknowledgment, knowing that there isn't anything that they are necessarily giving up or fundamentally changing about the relationship to Indigenous people. For Palestine, however, we can see in today's discourse even the hint of Palestinian humanity earns one the label of antisemite. Slogans advocating social justice and dignity for Palestinians, such as from the river to the sea, have been roundly denigrated, dismissed, and condemned as racist. Palestinians are implored to resort to nonviolence in the face of mechanized weapons of war and bombing campaigns funded and backed by the most powerful sort of— the most powerful military force in world history. But the Israeli Zionist is never implored to colonize and to settle nonviolently, because we know the first words the Zionist state uttered was violence and dispossession. And it appears to be the only language it is capable of speaking to Palestinians. Palestinians and their supporters are ritualistically asked to condemn terrorism as bombs and bullets rain down on their homes, killing and displacing people in numbers that are equivalent and potentially, if not stopped, may exceed those killed and displaced during the Nakba of 1948. Israel is still dispossessing because they failed in the early stages of the 19— of 1948 to eliminate Palestinians as a people. That's why cultural boycott and divestment campaigns targeting Israeli institutions and businesses have a profound tangible impact on the socioeconomic and political realities on the ground. In other words, these things that may seem cultural or operating within the symbolic realm have more impact, because the alignment between the United States and Israel, for example, despite all the military aid and everything, is fundamentally ideological. So attacking that ideological basis is so important, and that's why the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions campaign has asked and organized with within the context of settler colonies like the United States. But such campaigns also undermine the legitimacy of the occupation and the success of Israel winning international legitimacy and recognition for their acts. In closing, I just want to read a poem that I wrote in the aftermath— or excuse me, Based on my experiences with the Palestinian Festival of Literature, which Liane and I have talked about and both participated in. I'm not a poet. Both Uwa and Liane, you're poets. So bear with me. The first thing I discovered in Palestine was that poetry measures distance. Bint Nakba, and don't you forget it, my grandfather warned me. Jehan Biseso read from her poem commemorating the Nakba's 70th anniversary in a basement, in a basement East Jerusalem theater. We were told that Gazan writers were not allowed to leave the world's largest open-air prison to participate in this year's Palestine Festival of Literature, or PalFest. They sent a video-recorded message of well wishes and regrets. How far was Gaza, I wondered? Our Indigenous territories seem large and vast, but Palestine seems so small on the map in comparison. The distance to Gaza is measured by security checkpoints, I was told, which can take hours or days to cross if one's lucky. And for millions, the right of return to one's homelands is measured by concrete walls, concertina wire, citizenship status, stamps on a passport, Arabic names, UN resolutions, the Israeli nation-state law, and families of Israeli settlers occupying Palestinian homes. In Ramallah, Omar Barghouti told us he was on his way to the United States to attend his daughter's wedding and to speak about the right to boycott one's occupiers. I told him to meet with American Indian leaders when he arrived, and that he was always welcome in our Lakota homelands as a relative and friend. Those words were useless, however, because days later, our occupier denied him access to our homelands. From Palestine, the distance to Turtle Island is measured by a passport, and whether one has the right to boycott an illegal occupation. This is one thing that Palestine taught me. For Palestinians, distances aren't measured by miles or kilometers. They're measured by settler laws, walls, and armed checkpoints. The Great March of Return was also a measure of distance. How far was one willing to travel for freedom? At what cost? Israeli snipers targeted the backs of knees to force amputation. as Gazans attempted to cross a perimeter fence. It's their right to return home under international law. Jahan's poem sticks in my mind. And if we lose our legs, we will crawl on our hands and elbows. Despite the distances we must travel for freedom, Palestine is always near my heart. Colonial time creates different temporalities. It speeds up and slows down. It's thick like mud weighing on the feet of the colonized, attempting to stick them in place in the past or in forever negation. The feet of the colonizer, on the other hand, are light and mobile. The colonizer's time is quick. A passport, the right skin color, the correct language— anything but Arabic— and an entitled jaunt grant fast access to a world Others only dream about: a sidewalk, an access road, air, an ocean. Yet the colony reality is meant to exaggerate time, to make its novelty on the historical stage seem as natural as the olive groves and rolling hills. Like the ocean or Gaza, the history of known freedom is just over that hill. Though it stretches far back into time, It is familiar to everyone. A poem, a song, a story, a stone. You can smell it. It's the fire that still burns in our hearts thousands of grasslands and sacred mountains away, where we also put our feet in the dirt, grasped our history, and said no. And we came crashing down on them like waves of history. Thank you.

Uahikea Maile: I'll just say something really quickly, because I don't know how to follow up with these 2, you know, really beautiful poems. But what I will say is, I've not been to Palestine, but Palestine has come to me. It's come to me in Tucoronto. It's come to me in Albuquerque. It's come to me in Hawaii. It's come to me at Mauna Kea. In the summer of 2019, a Palestinian delegation gave makana, or gifts, hoʻokupu, sort of ritual offerings, in a road that was blocked by our kupuna, our elders, and us at Mauna Kea to stop the Thirty Meter Telescope from being built. And there are many folks that lived there near the road on Hawai'i Island for months and months and months. And I was there from the very beginning for about 3 weeks. And during one of those weeks, my colleague Kehaulani Kawanui, who was mentioned earlier by Leanne, along with Cynthia Franklin, brought Yusef Al-Jamal and Rana Barakat to the access road, and they spoke about their work, Palestinian liberation, and Māuna Kea under conditions in which our very presence in that road was being actively criminalized. And we, including Rana, Yusef, Cynthia Keaulani, and myself, our elders, you know, hundreds of people, thousands of people, were being referred to as terrorists in some regard. Yeah. By the state of Hawaii. And it was in that moment that we saw who was there willing to put their bodies on the line in our struggle for freeing our mountain, our akua, our deities, our sacred place, and our people and our relationship to that place. And I want to keep that in my heart always and in my mind always when moving forward in considering how to unmake the hell for Palestine, even though I've never been there. And I want my, my hoʻa, my lahui Hawaiʻi, my comrades and the Hawaiian people to remember that moment too. And keep it in their hearts as we move forward in building this movement of Indigenous solidarity for Palestinians and a free Palestine. Who was there that day? Who gave hoʻokupu, these ritual offerings? And who was willing to show up and be responsible and accountable for us? Palestine has come to me. In more ways than I think I realized. And this is an important movement for us to build, Leanne, Nick, and the others that have signed on. So I'm really looking forward to continuing to build this movement in solidarity for a free and liberated, deoccupied Palestine. Thank you.