Khaled Barakat Mixtape

Khaled Barakat: I feel sorry for you guys having to listen to someone whose English is not so great, but I will try my best. My name is Khaled Barakat, and I'm a Palestinian. I was born in Palestine, raised in Palestine. I was born after 1967 occupation in a village in the West Bank, about seven kilometers north of Jerusalem. And it is really important to realize that when you're born under an occupation or colonization, and I know that the indigenous native population and nations in Canada understand this very well and relate to this very well, is that you are under a power that doesn't understand anything about you, your language, your culture, your relationship to the land. They don't understand how rooted you are in this land and they don't understand the social structure of your society and how your relationship also to the environment and the surroundings. So because colonization and occupation have one major reason, and that is expansions and theft and blunder and hegemony. Occupation doesn't happen. for a reason, colonization happens for reasons, and native and indigenous and national liberation movements around the world understand this very well. And if I can claim that the vast majority, if not all, national liberation movements around the world have met colonizers with some kind of, let's negotiate, let's talk, let's have peace. At the early stages, of colonization, before people resolve to arms and to violence, and before people take that path of liberating their land with their own hands because people, they exploit all possibilities and they find that the colonizers is not interested in peace and they're not interested in negotiating. They're interested in making this nation slaves, that they work in their factories, they build their roads, they serve the masters in their houses, they become for colonizers and occupiers. And so the reaction of people is naturally resistance. Resistance is a very natural thing to do. If you don't resist, something is wrong with you. Somebody comes and take your land and take your house and confiscate your life and you don't resist, that's a problem. So resistance is existence. It becomes that's how you exist. And I remember when I first went to school in my first grade, my friend told me that there is the Star of David in our books. So you see all Palestinian children taking the first page of their notebooks because it has, the military council and the civil administration with the Star of David, which meant for us the Israeli occupation. That's what it means for Palestinians. So the first act as a child is that you do that because, and I was really touched by the comrade comments about his grandmother. is because I remember my grandmother also not just telling me that the land is occupied, but every time we take the bus, she refused to pay because this bus was a Palestinian bus for her one time, and now it's being taken, so we will not, you know, she'll never pay the bus fees. She'll fight with the driver. You know, from that to, you know, to be able to go to Jerusalem and pray, So every little thing that matters for her is a form of resistance. So resistance starts with colonization. The very first day of occupation is the birth of resistance in any land. that a native indigenous population find itself under colonization. And it starts with individual resistance, not organized. It starts with, you know, initiatives by people, by villagers, by workers, and then it formulate itself with experience under occupation in a national liberation movement that is organized, with very defined goals, very defined vision, not just for the political vision or political speech or discourse of this National Liberation Movement, but it touches the students and the labor movement and women and children from kindergarten all the way to the military resistance is one national liberation movement that is, every component of it is important. The reason I'm talking about this is because they call national liberation movements and organizations who carry arms struggle, they call them terrorists because they say that they use means of violence and that if they don't use violence and don't carry arms, then we'll negotiate with them, or then there will be a solution, or that. But in the history of humanity, there has never been a case in which the colonizer voluntarily took an initiative and say, I'm going to respond to this peace initiative. Maybe, yeah, we should get along. And you're making sense here. In fact, you know, the U.S. didn't have a problem with anybody having weapons as long as this weapon is directed to somebody the United States doesn't like. If any arm is directed against the occupier, then that's terrorism immediately. And terrorism is to say that you don't have a cause, that a terrorist without a cause. They're just born terrorists. They're violent. They're savages. They're barbaric. They don't want their extremists. They don't want to you know, go along with the program. They're rebels. They're, you know, all these names is to actually say that you don't have a cause, which means that you don't have rights. And it's really important to also realize that when they say that, they want to strip you from your cause, from, you know, and it's not hard to actually differentiate between a terrorist group and a national liberation movement. It's very easy. It's not hard or complicated as they try to convince us. All you have to do is, especially in today's world, right, I mean, with all this, you know, ability for people to go and check in for themselves and read and educate themselves and kind of, you know, you'll be able to tell if a group is massacring people left and right, people, racist, you know, killing, they don't have a vision, you know, they're puppets for a regime or some kind or, yeah, that's a terrorist group. But all these groups that these things applies on them are supported by the United States. The National Liberation Movements are being called terrorists and they are not supported by the United States. And we all know that the U.S. have armed the groups in Afghanistan to the teeth, including arming them with weapons such as Stingers, anti-aircraft missiles, very high-sophisticated missiles to fight the Russians. A week later, they became terrorists because they don't serve the United States' interests anymore. So we know all this BS, and we know that the use of this pressure of terrorism is to actually force nations to give up right, concession, and to give in, and to accept what is being offered. I'll give you three examples from the Palestinian experience, very quick. The first encounter with the Europeans was 1799, when, you know, Palestinians, they find out You know, they wake up one day and they saw the French, you know, military warships advancing towards Palestine, the city of Acre, and immediately they resisted the French colonization or attempt of colonizing Palestine, and they couldn't colonize the city of Acre, and they left after three months of siege. They went and occupied Egypt. They couldn't occupy the city of Akka. They occupied Egypt. But there was a resistance for any French attempts to colonize Palestine. But the three examples, very quick, I'll give you, is that Palestine fall under the colonization of the British in 1917. From 1917, Until 1936, Palestinians didn't have an armed movement. It was only when this man, who came from Syria, actually, he is not Palestinian, but he was the Imam of the Independence Mosque in Haifa, and he was the one who led the great revolution between 1936 and 1939 in Palestine. His name is Al-Qassam, and this is the name that later on the Hamas movement used to describe, to name their military wing after, you know, Al-Qassam. Al-Qassam, with his men, fought for these three years, and also it was combined with the longest general strike in the history of humanity. Six months general strike daily in Palestine. There was a real popular resistance from all sectors of the society, from students, from and actually there was a secret movement of women, Palestinian women, who carried on guns and participated in the revolution in also various different forms and ways. And every Tuesday, the British will hang one of our leaders and execute them. But the Palestinian people were able to carry on their struggle for three years, until the revolution was not crushed, but it was ended because of false promises that some leaders in the movement accepted by the British, is that if you lay down your arms and you come to London and we negotiate, then everything is going to be okay. And the Palestinian armed resistance movement was crushed immediately after that. And Palestinians never got a thing from London. It was false promises. And the other example, and this, by the way, led to the occupation of Palestine, led for the Zionist terrorist organizations that was operating in Palestine to be more stronger and more able to inflict harms on Palestinians and committing massacres that led later on to the genocide and the ethnic cleansing of two-thirds of the population that became refugees. The second experience is the phenomena of Palestinian resistance in 1968. up until 1972, when Palestinians decided that as the world is not paying attention to our cause, the Israeli occupation is doing what it's doing, the world is watching, and the world doesn't even know about this, then we need to actually carry our struggle into different areas, not just in Palestine, but to practice certain tactics resistant tactics that can bring Palestine into the world scene. And that nations will start asking, what is Palestine? What is the Palestinians? Who are the Palestinians? What do they want? And that's when the hijacking of airplanes started it by Palestinians, is to actually address this question. And when you study these military, well-calculated operations, you will realize that no one was killed at the hand of the Palestinian fighter. In fact, it was a chance for Palestinian fighters, any Palestinian fighter who carry on an operation has to speak English or French in order to talk to people because the idea was to actually talk about Palestine. bring Palestine into the world scene. And now, in retrospect, you can say, well, some of these tactics were right, some of these tactics were wrong. You can always evaluate that, but the entire Palestinian movement have said that this will be a tactical operations for a certain period of time to achieve a specific not because Palestinian revolutionaries are interested in terrorizing innocent people. And this was a movement led by Dr. Wadi Haddad, who's a medical doctor, and who is later was assassinated by the Israeli intelligence service in 1976. So in the Palestinian National Liberation Movement from 1936 until today, you always have these two trends, a trend that says let's negotiate and see what can come out, and another trend that says we need to resist and continue the resistance until the liberation of Palestine. And it doesn't mean that it is wrong to negotiate. Sometime, a national liberation movement finds itself in a position where we can negotiate and come out with real results. It's not a taboo to negotiate with your enemy. But in the situation of Palestine and in the conditions that surrounds Palestinian struggle, we see that negotiations is nothing but a failure and illusionist path that will never lead anywhere. It didn't lead us anywhere in 36. It didn't lead us anywhere when the PLO leadership in 1974 accepted the state, the Palestinian state, and that the liberation of the entire land of Palestine and the talk of just a Palestinian state. The last thing I want to say, and I end with this, is that the reason that Palestinian struggle is continuing for the last hundred years is not because of of the Palestinian, just the Palestinian resilience and the Palestinian resistance history and experience, but it also, because of the people's support for the resistance, because this is a resistance that belongs to the people and not to a political party or a group or a person. And that, as individuals, we're just passing passing through the life of the Palestinian people, because the Palestinian people is what's going to remain and protect their cause until they achieve their rights with all means necessary and legitimate and possible in their position. Thank you.

Abir: Tonight, we have a really important topic. We'll be talking about, of course, Palestinians, but very specifically about Palestinian prisoners and Palestinian political prisoners. And today, we are honored to have Khaled Barakat with us. Khaled is a writer and an activist and the international coordinator of the campaign to free Ahmed Saadat. So welcome, Khaled. How are you?

Khaled Barakat: Hi, Abir. Thank you so much for having me.

Abir: We're so honored to have you. And this is just such an important topic because, as you know, within any type of political atmosphere, many times the political stories may be amplified, but people often forget the stories of the prisoners. The prison system is very much made so that you forget about these people, that they're kind of exiled in this kind of way. And so the work that you do working um on Palestinian political prisoners um is just so important for our movement and I think that's where I want to start off with you I mean of course you have an you know an accomplished career as a journalist and and you'd be so interested to hear about that but uh Today, we're talking about your movement with political prisoners. And so can you tell us a little bit about the history of the Palestinian political prisoner movement and some historical context about when this movement started and how it started?

Khaled Barakat: Yes, thank you so much for this question. This is a very important question to shed some highlights on the history of the Palestinian struggle confronting imprisonment. It's important because We cannot separate the history of Palestinian people's struggle for liberation and the struggle of Palestinian prisoners. They go hand in hand. We cannot separate them. This is also true in the case of all national liberation movements and movements that is confronting oppression and imprisonment. It is also important to study the history of the struggle of Palestinian prisoners because it actually uh paved the way for us to understand many political issues that some might not see the interconnection or the relationship with on the political level on the social level and on multiple levels why because uh colonizations and the colonialist power, they don't come to build libraries and sport clubs for us. They come and build prisons. And this is one of the first tasks of the colonizers is to build prisons. And sometimes they actually inherit the prison from a previous authority. So in the case of Palestine, for example, when the British started the colonization of Palestine, they inherited some of the prisons that Turkey used to imprison our people. And then after 1948, Israel inherited some of these prisons. And so the history of the prisoners and the history of the prison is actually the history of the Palestinian people's struggle. So that's why it's important. It's also important because usually Palestinian uprisings and popular uprisings and revolutions have a lot to do with imprisonment. So when we, for example, study what Palestinian calls Red Tuesday or Bloody Tuesday of June 17, 1930, when the British executed three Palestinian leaders in Palestine, this actually had saw a great impact on the Palestinian movement. And these three icons and the poetry that was written about them and the songs that were written about them have became what you can call the manifesto of the Palestinian prisoner movement until today. All Palestinians in Palestine and elsewhere, they memorize the song of From Akka Prison, describing the history and then the experience of these three Palestinian leaders. And it has to do also later on with the revolution of 19, the uprising of 1933 and then the revolution of 86. Also, Palestinians didn't only confront colonialist prison, the British and the Israelis, also thousands of Palestinians have also experienced imprisonment in Arab reactionary regimes. So in Jordan, in Syria, in Lebanon, especially in the 50s and the 60s. And so thousands of Palestinians were imprisoned in these jails because these Arab regimes also worked as subcontractors, you know, with colonizers. So it sheds light on a forgotten as you say the beer a forgotten history and a forgotten people but we must remember two facts about prisons in general one that imprisonment does not mean the end of struggle it just you begin a new chapter of struggle it's harsher maybe the space is very limited but that does not mean it is the end of the struggle to freedom fighters, women, men, youth, students, and so on and so forth. And this is important to remember. The other fact is that colonizers put you in prison because they fear you. And it's important to realize this. Otherwise, many people will break from the first experience knowing, you know, thinking that it is a defeat of some sort or an end of a journey. And it is not. That's why it's important that Palestinian prisoners plays this role of educating us and as a living examples, a continuous living example of why struggle in prisons is crucial and important as in outside prison cells. So that's, it's a bit long answer, I'm sorry, Abir, but.

Abir: No, it's a great answer. And just to highlight, I think two things that stuck out for me. One, this idea that prison has always been a colonial tool and you didn't mention from 1948 in the beginning of the Israeli occupation. Palestinians have been fighting colonial rule before even 1948. It's been a longer occupation than even that. And the icons that we look up to are from even before this 48 era. So I think that's actually really interesting for me to learn. And then the second thing about just the resilience of prisoners that although they want them to disappear, Actually, for those in the resistance, they become our educators, our guides, our icons. You know, they actually don't disappear for us. And it's their resilience and the resilience of the Palestinians and those who are fighting for liberation that kind of holds that relationship together. So that was a really, really great intro to this conversation.

Khaled Barakat: Yes. And just one sentence. there is also the history of the colonizer himself because we need to document these crimes. And if we write the history of our movement as if we are documenting these crimes, because there will be a day where it will come and where Palestinians are going to have to put these war criminals in courts. And so we want to know the details.

Abir: I have so many follow-ups there. Maybe I'll come back to this at the end. But the second question that I want to ask for you, as we're talking about Palestinian prisoners, and this is something that's very common that people hear in the news. Often, actually, the stories that got highlighted are the stories of young people, like these stories of young prisoners. Can you walk us through what the typical experience is? How do the Israelis usually arrest these people? How many people get arrested? What is the process like for Palestinians living in Palestine at the moment of experiencing this horrific thing coming from the Israelis?

Khaled Barakat: Yes, well, there are so many forms that Israel and ways that Israeli occupation forces use to imprison Palestinians, but the most common one is the nightly raids. There is not one single night that passes without Israeli occupation forces invade a village or a refugee camp or a city and arrest a Palestinian woman or a man or youth or sometime, you know, they do night raids that reaches up to 25 and 30 Palestinians every day. And that's why no one can give you an exact number of how many Palestinians are today in Israeli presence, because it fluctuate every day. Every day there are Palestinian prisoners who are freed, and every day there are Palestinians who enter prisons. And so we can give rough numbers on that. Israel could arrest you for any reason that an Israeli soldier thinks. that it is suitable for him or her. So they can arrest you just because they thought that you might be endangering their life for walking in the street, for entering a place without a permit, for millions of reasons. They come up with any reasons to imprison Palestinians. But the main format is these nightly raids, and usually they target youth and students. In the last few months, we have been seeing campaigns. Sometimes these nightly raids are campaigns that they, for example, focus at one particular week on the students. A few months back, we saw that tens of Palestinian student activists were arrested from Birzeit University and other universities and colleges, but this campaign was primarily targeting students in Birzeit University. Other campaigns, sometimes they focus on Palestinian youth or workers or women. And we see that in daily basis in Palestine. In a nutshell, I can say that when we look at the vast, at the number of how many Palestinians experienced imprisonment, we are almost at 1 million case. Some of these prisoners have experienced imprisonment more than one time, some of them three and four and five times. So, but for the number of a small nation like Palestinians and 1 million, you know, just after 67 occupation, there was almost 700,000 Palestinians who went in these experienced imprisonment. This tells you that not one single Palestinian family in Palestine was not affected by these policies.

Abir: wow no that that's just uh it's kind of harrowing to hear because um while prisons are kind of created to be this thing that are outside of society you know so that people kind of don't remember prisoners etc for palestinians this is just part of their daily lives everybody knows somebody who's been in prison and so many people have been in prison themselves like you said several times. And it's just such a part of life. And I think the one thing that I want to kind of go to next is that it's not just them going into prison. But the second part of that is that they get detention without trial. So I want to hear a little bit about this. So now people get imprisoned. And just like, you know, I think in many broken civic systems, whether, you know, it's the United States and this has happened in apartheid South Africa with prisoners, you know, getting false sentencing or just no trial at all. Tell us about the trial system or the non-existent trial system within the Israeli jail system.

Khaled Barakat: Yes, when it comes to Palestinians, the entire court system is a joke because these are fake courts and a system that is placed there in order to become a tool of an oppression and not a tool of justice. Palestinians cannot seek justice in Israeli courts. If you are charged, you are charged because the conviction rates on these courts against Palestinians is 99.5%. So almost every Palestinian who enters an Israeli court will be sentenced. It's giving. And the other thing is that the Israeli security agencies use these courts as their tools to oppress Palestinians and Palestinians will not see justice in these Israeli judiciary system. It's just a colonialist system is there to justify occupation. And this goes as high as the so-called Israeli high court, you know, constitutional court. The other thing, that's not the case with Jewish people. There is a due process if you are a Jew. There is, you know, a different set of system, and that's what apartheid is all about. So, for example, if... you know, look at the, if you compare how Israel deals even with Israeli criminals, you know, detainees who are Jewish detainees versus how they deal with Palestinian political prisoners, you know, there's no comparison there. I mean, these criminals, they can be rapists, and uh you know uh serial killers and and so on and so forth and they will have rights and we experienced that for example in the covet 19 epidemic where israel releases the israeli criminals from prison and they ash they said that we want to assure our society that not one single Security prisoner, they call us. They don't call us political prisoners. Security prisoner will not be released. So this is a system that is set there to maintain the occupation and to maintain colonization. And that's why Palestinians don't trust the Israeli court.

Abir: Wow, just that tidbit about under COVID-19, these are the high stakes prisoners that must stay in the prisons and be exposed while other prisoners get to walk away. It's just, I mean, there's no such thing as justice under this occupation, no justice without liberation. And what you're speaking to really highlights how much Israel is a fascist state that is under a guise of being a democracy, under saying that it's this just state, but this entire system is just untrue. It's unjust. And I want to go to, and you can speak a little bit about the COVID-19, but I want to just talk generally about the conditions of, of the prison system. You mentioned that especially in the night raids, children get picked up, students get picked up, and also there's a large number of women who get picked up and put into these prison systems. So can you talk about the conditions that they are put under once they go into the prison systems?

Khaled Barakat: Yes. Well, I mean, Israeli terror and crime starts with the invading of a village or a city to arrest someone because they want to terrorize the entire community. and they want to terrorize the entire area. They don't just want to arrest someone. They do make sure that the entire village or a town is aware of that. And this is also to create this deter or fear that they hope they can inflict on Palestinian society. But Palestinians, they confront these forces with molotov cocktails and rocks and youth go out to actually, so it doesn't work. You know, they cannot deter Palestinians. In fact, once the Palestinian, especially the youth, when they know that there is an Israeli troops trying to arrest someone, they go out in the street. They don't stay home. But this is how the, you know, Israeli terror starts. And then in the actual process, Torture is a common use against these prisoners. From the first minute they arrest them, they are subjected to a form of torture. When we talk about administrative detention, for example, that is placing a Palestinian person without charge, without lawyer, without any due process, This is a law that Israel inherit from the British colonization. This is and they practice it on a daily basis. Currently, there are almost 360 Palestinians under administrative detention. There is 160 children in Israeli prison and 41 Palestinian woman. And so when you look at the experience of how they got arrested and the due process, It is very common. However, in the last six months, we have seen a escalation in terms of using torture against Palestinian students, like in the case of Mays Abu Ghosh, for example, a Palestinian student from Birzeit University, or Samer Arbid, a Palestinian student who was arrested for being charged that he is part of the Palestinian resistance. The torture that was used against these individuals and others had not been used since 1992, 1993 in some cases. And so whenever Israel feels that it can oppress Palestinian prisoners or torture them and get away with it, they'll do it. When there is campaigns against these tortures, of course, Israel pay attention to international awareness. So it's really important to expose these Israeli crimes against Palestinian prisoners on an international level. So I'm not sure if I answered your questions or not.

Abir: No, I think that's actually a really, really great note to end on. You speaking about this idea of, you know, these prisoners are being arrested. They're being tortured. There is no due process for them. And the only way that really We can put pressure on the system through these international campaigns. And so I want to actually speak to you about the campaign that you're part of, the campaign to free Ahmed Saadat, and some campaigns about these prominent political prisoners. Can you tell us more about his campaign, how it started, and how people can get involved in this campaign?

Khaled Barakat: Well, I mean, as you know, Abir, from also the experience of Palestinians and also in South Africa, in Ireland, in Algeria, there is always a Palestinian or a prisoner who is an icon. And the reason that it's important to highlight their names is also to speak about the issue. and not to speak about the person himself. And we are continuously reminded by comrade Ahmed Saadat not to talk about his case, but to talk about Palestinian prisoners in general. But it's important to highlight that he is the General Secretary of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. His experience is very much similar to Ahmed Katrada, Kathy, in South Africa, or Steve Peacon. And there is always similarities between, you know, Palestinian experience and other experiences. So Ahmed Saadat was arrested by the Palestinian Authority in 2001. It is really important to remind people that the Palestinian Authority is not exactly a representative or a genuine voice for Palestinian people. They have security cooperation with Israel, which is a tool to oppress Palestinian resistance and Palestinian struggle. And Ahmed Saadat was kidnapped by a Palestinian security agency that placed him in Jericho prisons along with four other comrades. And then this prison, Jericho prison, was stormed by the Israeli army in March 14, 2006, and they arrested Ahmed Saadat or kidnapped him along with other comrades. And until now, he is in an Israeli prison. So the Palestinian Authority is complicit in his arrest. And when we talk about his case, we want to expose this security cooperation thing is that that's a clear example of how the Oslo agreement has become a tool to oppress Palestinians and nothing but a security relationship with the occupier and a subordinate to the occupier in economy and in security. And that's why it is a Palestinian popular demand and consensus today that this security cooperation with Israel ends immediately and that Palestinians should not, you know, the Palestinian Authority should not be cooperating with the occupiers. Otherwise, they are placing themselves as an enemy of the Palestinian people. We also call upon progressive and revolutionary forces in South Africa and elsewhere to understand this, that the Palestinian Authority is not exactly, you know, a friend of the Palestinian people or a representative of the Palestinian people. and that it is important to criticize any forms of oppression against our people, whether it comes from Israel or whether it comes from France or the United States or Palestinians. And so it is important to highlight this issue and to understand this issue And it could be understood through reading about the experience of Ahmed Saadet and hundreds of other Palestinians who have been in prison in Israeli jails and in Palestinian authority jails.

Abir: No, this is, I mean, it's, I think for myself as an activist or for anyone who's listening, it's, it's, Of course, we are demanding the release and the freedom of Ahmed Saadat, but it's also just inspiring to hear the commitment to this campaign. For those who are in the South African audience, I mean, South Africans know firsthand that the icons of the movement, whether it was Nelson Mandela or like Ahmed Katrada, like these people that you mentioned, Nelson Mandela was in prison for 27 years. So hearing that, oh, this was from 2001, these numbers don't mean anything to us because when we believe in the liberation of these icons, you know, we don't care how many years they've been in prison, we still believe that their liberation is possible. And the fact that Ahmed Saadat still holds a political position and is still, you know, a teacher and a leader for Palestinians, I think is extremely important to highlight because, you know, I think, as you said, there may be people who don't want you to think that. who just wants you to kind of forget about his case or, you know, he's irrelevant, et cetera, et cetera. But there are still people who are committed to this campaign.

Khaled Barakat: Exactly. And also, Abir, if I may add to this, is that it shows that Palestinians actually have a genuine and respectful leadership, but they are in prison.

Abir: Mm hmm.

Khaled Barakat: And so we don't lack good Palestinian leaders. There are many of them, thousands, student leaders, labor union movement leaders, woman leaders, and so on and so forth. And Ahmed Saadat is one of those freedom fighters and leaders that our people trust. So this is important. And that's another reason why they keep them in prison, to isolate them from the masses, to isolate them from our people. But it is also important to say that regardless of all of these oppressions and exploitation and occupation and colonization and annexation and all of the Asians that Israel is committing against our people, Palestinians are strong.

Abir: Yes.

Khaled Barakat: We are not weak. We are a strong nation that have kept the struggle for over 100 years. We have a very strong resistance in Gaza. Yes, Gaza is under siege, and yes, Gaza is suffering on a daily basis, and we know who's responsible on putting Gaza under siege, but we also have strong resistance in Gaza. We have strong resistance in prisons, we have strong, Palestinian student movement resistant that it's high rising more and more every day. And Palestinian refugees outside Palestine are also getting engaged more and more in the struggle. And we see that when we talk about the boycott movement, for example, outside Palestine, Palestinian youth and students are an integral part of this struggle. and they are also a voice for the Palestinian people. So don't let anyone convince you that we are facing great challenges at a very you know, harsh times, but our people will overcome that and will be victorious.

Abir: Yes. No, I mean, I think that this is such an important message for everybody to remember. And we're calling them prisoners, but they're not just prisoners, you know, like they are the students leaders. They are our political leaders. They are the resistance. And, you know, we're doing them a disservice if we only consider them these prisoners that we have to fight for. They're fighting. They're fighting where they are at this very moment. I think that's such an important message for everybody to internalize.

Khaled Barakat: I asked one of my comrades who is in prison today, what do you want us to do outside? He said, liberate yourself because we are free here. When you are engaged in the struggle to free Palestinian prisoners, you are actually beginning to liberate your voice. When we say freedom for Palestinian prisoners, we are liberating our voice and that's how it starts. You know, Palestinian movement and resistance was managed many times to release Palestinian prisoners by force. by force because Israel only understand the language of force.

Abir: I think this has been such a just beneficial conversation and I've just learned so much and I hope the audience has benefited so much just from these last 40 minutes. But this last note that you said, when you asked a prisoner, your comrade, what should we do? the answer was liberate yourself. And I think we should end maybe just expanding on that final call for all of those who are listening in the audience. What are some sources, some ways that they can be part of this movement, these campaigns, some things that they can use to learn how can they liberate themselves?

Khaled Barakat: Well, one of the... most active organization on the freedom of Palestinian prisoners is Samidoun. And it is a Palestinian international organization that is dedicated to the freedom of Palestinian prisoners. And, you know, being involved with campaigns to free comrade George Ibrahim Abdullah from the French prisons a fighter who's been in prison for 36 years with no reasons whatsoever to keep someone for 36 years. And that just tell you how many Mandela we have in Palestine and outside Palestine. And so it is important to to be involved in the campaign to free these prisoners. There are five Palestinian political prisoners today in American US jails, the Holy Land Five. They can look them up on the net and be involved in their campaign. But I think that the most important thing is to understand the relationship between fighting for the liberation of Palestine and fighting for the liberation of Palestinian prisoners are literally one. because the cause of the Palestinian prisoners is Palestine. So anything we do for Palestine, as if we are actually doing it for the prisoners.

Abir: This has been so helpful. And it's important, I think, for all of us, just as you're using this example of South Africa. We have so many these examples of South African prisoners in Palestine. and they are samidun and we are also you know samidun for those who who are not familiar and maybe you can explain this more kind of to end the way I understand it is samidun comes from the word samud which means to be steadfast

Khaled Barakat: Absolutely. Samidun is steadfast. So we all need to be Samidun.

Abir: Yes, they are Samidun in their position and we need to be steadfast in our commitment to their struggle, to their liberation. So thank you. So much, Khaled. This has been such a wonderful conversation and so beneficial for everybody who's tuning in. And we hope to continue being in conversation with you in the future and finding ways that the audience here in South Africa can support the campaign to free Ahmed Saadat, but also to free all the political prisoners in Palestine at the moment.

Khaled Barakat: Thank you so much, Sister Abir. And thanks to all of those who are hearing us and watching us and a salute to our brothers and sisters in South Africa and that we know their struggle is continuing as well. It did not stop.

Abir: Amanda.

Khaled Barakat: Amanda.