https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/campaigns/national-day-truth-reconciliation.html

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Truth and Reconciliation Week

This bilingual educational program is open to all schools across Canada. All sessions will be held virtually, allowing classroom participation from across the country and the involvement of Indigenous and non-Indigenous students. From September 25-30, 2023, registration is required.

@allthecanadianpolitics

god I'm so fucking furious at the removal of Te Reo Māori names from organisations around Aotearoa. it's a complete non-issue, every organisation has the English name directly underneath the Māori name. I have never once as an English speaker been unable to understand what an organisation is for. Winston Peters, the Deputy Prime Minister, who is literally Māori himself, said “Te Papa is a historic name but tell me this waka kotahi, how many boats have you seen going down the road?”. Waka does not just mean canoe. it means vessel, and waka kotahi (the transport agency of Aotearoa) explains this VERY SIMPLY on their official website. waka kotahi means to travel together as one. Can you see how fucking upsetting this is. A Māori person in power who is in agreement about banning his own language, being so cocky about something that he does not even understand due to the suppression of the language of his people. It makes me sick. I've seen reports from Māori people all over Aotearoa speaking out about how upset and furious they are, how decades of progress have been undone in the fight to restore the rights of their people who have for so long been oppressed and have suffered the effects of colonisation. Please share this if you can, I hate knowing how few people will hear about this, I know there is so much injustice in the world right now and it is so exhausting, I know. I love you all, keep it up.

https://waateanews.com/2023/11/27/te-reo-public-service/

Whenever I see people try to differentiate what is “Israel” and what is the “Palestinian state” I always have a very awkward feeling - which is why I think a lot of people need to reevaluate how they speak about Palestine and Israel, specifically what they define as occupied Palestine.

My father’s family is from a village in Jaffa (the district), which is now part of what most people define as “mainland Israel” or an “undisputed” part of Israel - like that land was acquired legally or ethically and an unequivocal part of what is Israel vs what is considered (at least to some) Palestine (the West Bank & Gaza). 

My father’s family had the choice to flee or die and to this day cannot return home to Jaffa. It leaves me with a strange feeling when people discuss a hypothetical “two state solution” as if that land is inarguably Israel and the West Bank and Gaza is inarguably Palestine - my family is not from the West Bank or Gaza, they’re from Jaffa. Proudly Palestinians from Jaffa - they’re not Israeli and never be Israeli, they predate the modern colonial state of Israel.

When people talk about occupied Palestine, they’re usually referring to the 1967 borders and the increasing settlements in the West Bank, when Palestinians talk about occupied Palestine, we’re talking about all of it - every corner of what people define as “mainland Israel” there is a story of Palestinian dispossession - It includes my family and thousands of others. 

Leaving this map here for people to get an idea of how much destruction of Palestinian life and communities happened in what people see as an “undisputed part of Israel” - there is a reason the Palestinian population here plummeted in 1948. 

In short:

Olive harvest in the West Bank. Photos by Ari Messinis, courtesy of Al Jazeera.

disturbed by the number of times i've seen the idea that calling gaza an open-air prison is not okay because "that implies that gazans have done something wrong", the subtext being unlike those criminals who deserve to be in prison. i'm sorry but we HAVE to understand criminalization and incarceration as an intrinsic part of settler colonialism and racial capitalism, because settler states make laws that actively are designed to suppress indigenous and racialized resistance, and then enforce those laws in even more racist and discriminatory ways so that who is considered "criminal" is indelibly tied up with who is considered a "threat" to the settler state. that's how law, policing, and incarceration function worlwide, and how they have always functioned in israel as part of the zionist project.

talking about prison abolition in this context is not a distraction from what's happening to palestinians; it's a key tool of israel's apartheid and genocide. why do you think a major hamas demand has been for israel to release the palestinians in israeli prisons? why do you think israel nearly doubled the number of palestinians incarcerated in their prison in just the first two weeks after october 7? why do they systematically racially profile palestinians (particularly afro-palestinians, since anti-blackness is baked into israel's carceral system as well, like it is in much of the world) and arrest and charge 20% of palestinians, an astonishingly high rate that goes up even higher to 40% for palestinian men? why are there two different systems of law for palestinians and israelis, where palestinians are charged and tried under military law, leading to a conviction rate of almost 100%? why do they torture children and incarcerate them for up to 20 years just for throwing rocks? why can palestinians be imprisoned by israel without even being charged or tried? why do they keep the bodies of palestinians who have died in prison (often due to torture, execution, or medical neglect) for the rest of their sentences instead of returning them to their families?

this is not to say that no palestinians imprisoned by israel have ever done harm. but incarceration worldwide has never been about accountability for those who have done harm, nor about real justice for those have experienced harm, nor about deterring future harm. incarceration is about controlling, suppressing, and exterminating oppressed people. sometimes people from privileged classes get caught up in carceral systems as well, but it is a side effect, because the settler colonialist state will happily sacrifice some of its settlers for its larger goal.

so yes, gaza is an open-air prison. that doesn't means gazans deserve to be there. it means that no one deserves to be in prison, because prisons themselves are inherently oppressive.

From Levantine_gay on insta

He tried his best to cheer the innocent baby when he knows himself the catastrophe they’re facing. Ya Allah, please protect the people of Gaza. You know what is best for them. Grant us the imaan, patience and bravery You gifted them

via @/writer_liltash on twitter

Palestinian freedom fighters breaking out of Gaza and reclaiming their occupied territories. They’ve taken over israeli tanks and have chased out the settlers that were on that land. They’ve launched rockets everywhere and the iron dome has failed to intercept. This is about to mark a momentous event in history.

From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.

Pouring one out for Afghanistan and Anguilla and Antigua and Aoteoroa and Barbuda and Australia and the Bahamas and Bahrain and Bangladesh and Barbados and Belize and Bermuda and Botswana and Brazil and Brunei and Canada and the Cayman Islands and Cornwall and Cyprus and Dominica and Egypt and the Islas Malvinas and Fiji and Gambia and Georgia (the country) and Ghana and Gibraltar and Grenada and Guyana and Hong Kong and India and Iraq and Ireland and Jamaica and Jordan and Kenya and Kiribati and Kuwait and Lesotho and Malawi and Malaysia and Maldives and Malta and Mauritius and Montserrat and Myanmar and Nauru and Nigeria and Pakistan and Palestine and the Pitcairn Islands and Qatar and St Lucia and Saint Kitts and Nevis and Saint Helena and Ascension and Tristan da Cunha and St Vincent and Grenadina and Scotland and Seychelles and Sierra Leone and Singapore and the Solomon islands and Somaliland and South Africa and Sri Lanka and Sudan and Swaziland and Tanzania and Tonga and Trinidad and Tobago and Turks and Caicos and Tuvalu and Uganda and United Arab Emirates and United States and Vanuatu and Wales and Yemen and Zambia and Zimbabwe tonight

hey. you. yeah you. if you think every and all zionists are inherently evil and the jewish people have no ties to the levant then the posts about antisemitism are about you.

fundamentally I think it’s an asshole move to drag indigenous peoples into one of the worlds great trash fire discourses to prove various points, but one of the most unhinged things about the Antisemitism Log is how deeply so many of these people are not in any way cognizant of the fact turtle island is a massive, massive and far more powerful colony and settler state, so ideologically powerful it has been normalized in their minds like

I know this might come as a surprise, but “Vermont” “long island” and “Florida” are all settler colonies. These jokes about “where to send Israelis” are literally just repeated suggestions to make more settler colonies, showing that no one has actually critically unpacked the problematic ideological tenets of Zionism to begin with beyond “something Jewish I don’t like” because they are literally. Suggesting. The same thing. All over again. I know they’re jokes but the combo of antisemitism and normalization of settler colonialism is really really disconcerting

Palestine was not an empty land. It was part of a rich and fertile eastern Mediterranean world that in the nineteenth century underwent processes of modernization and nationalization. It was not a desert waiting to come into bloom; it was a pastoral country on the verge of entering the twentieth century as a modern society, with all the benefits and ills of such a transformation. Its colonization by the Zionist movement turned this process into a disaster for the majority of the native people living there.

132 Indigenous activists, artists, and intellectuals just made a joint statement condemning Israel's genocide against Palestinians. It is a beautiful piece and I highly recommend reading the full post here: https://therednation.org/statement-of-indigenous-solidarity-with-palestine/

We encourage Indigenous peoples worldwide to uplift additional demands from Palestinian organizers, to commit to the Palestinian call to Boycott, Divest, and Sanction (BDS) Israel and all institutions complicit in Israeli apartheid and settler colonialism, to issue solidarity statements and mutual aid for Palestine and organize mutual aid for Gaza, to demand freedom for political prisoners, and to support Land Back and the right of return for Palestinians. Stop the genocide. End the siege. End the occupation. Dismantle apartheid. Decolonize Palestine.

We are heroes. We are Gaza.

Through adversity and pain, a boy who lost his mother and sisters as martyrs emerges from the rubble to avenge them: "Behind these martyrs are three sons who will blow up your head, Netanyahu."

His words resonate with pain, pride, and unwavering steadfastness. With his eyes on the camera, he declares, "One day, you will film me stomping on the necks of the soldiers inside the occupied lands, just like they did on October 7th."

I need people to understand that no one has a right to dictate what should and shouldn't happen in Palestine right now or in the future, except Palestinians. Literally. No one has the right to tell them if a 2-state solution is the best option, if a diplomatic resolution is, or if it's a complete dismantling and deconstruction of the entire israeli govt, and assimilating israelis under a Palestinian govt.

So, if you have an opinion about the solution, take a second and try to remember: the land isn't yours, and the bloodshed isn't yours. Remember that you did not just watch your home get carpet bombed, your loved ones massacred or imprisoned for no reason. You did not watch your land get annexed. You did not witness the trauma in your children’s eyes and that feeling of dread because you know that they might be dead in the next few hours. You did not hear the screams and cries of people under the rubble begging for help. You did not watch your school being bombed to pieces and people’s limbs on the street. You didn’t have to live through the reality that absolutely not a single person in authority did ANYTHING to help except watch you be murdered live on their pretty little screens while they tweeted about it. Remember that, and then proceed to shut the fuck up and listen to Palestinian’s voices.