Please note: this article was originally published in August 2024, in Archer Magazine #20: the RESISTANCE issue. Please be advised that it discusses the Zionist genocidal war against Palestine and police brutality/violence within the carceral system. 

My dad’s cousins in Gaza have been displaced multiple times. They used to live in Bureij refugee camp, in central Gaza.

When the camp was bombed by the Zionist army in October 2023, they fled to a United Nations school, then another school, then a hospital, then a tent camp in southern Gaza.

And now Rafah has been invaded, Dad’s cousins fled back to the bombarded Bureij camp where their homes stand as ruins. Like many in Gaza, they have been reworking the rubble of their homes so that they have somewhere to dwell.

When there is nowhere to go in Gaza, people reside in their demolished homes.

While writing this, I saw in my newsfeed that Bureij camp was bombed over the past 48 hours.

When I asked Dad about it, he said he hadn’t heard anything new. Later that evening, he wrote to our WhatsApp family chat:

My two Sammak cousins returned to Bureij camp a few weeks ago. One of them fixed his ruined house temporarily and the two families lived there as the older brother lost his house completely. Yesterday, [the] Israeli army destroyed a multi-storey building next to them which resulted in the temporarily fixed house to get destroyed again. They had to leave to a shelter again… This is the story of every Gazan.

The next morning, I read that the Zionist army was launching a ground invasion at Bureij camp.

Every morning, a massacre. Every morning, mass murder. Morning for us, which is when we receive the news. Mourning.

For years, the people of Gaza have been posting about Israel’s incursions into the Gaza Strip.

“Gaza is under attack,” we’d hear, and the International Palestine Solidarity Movement would reshare. Videos of the bombardment would circulate, and a snap rally would be called.

For over 16 years, since Israel’s intensified blockade in 2007, the people of Gaza have faced the Zionist regime’s bombardment and sniper bullets at the occupation’s border that stands between them and their land.

On 7 October 2023, we opened our phones to footage of parachuted militants falling from the sky.

Palestinians had flooded ‘southern Israel’ with Operation Al-Aqsa Flood. Israel was under attack. Palestinians were jumping on the military vehicles of the occupier. Israel was in mourning. Palestinians were swerving back to the enclave with hostages and guns. Israel was in shock. Palestinians were giving the victory sign to the cameras.

Israel decided that it was at war and Palestinians were in the streets, tasting victory.

Often, when prisoners break out, they taste rebellion before their jailers beat them back into the cages. But that is not what always happens.

One night, when I was seeking a restful break from the activism, I decided to turn on the TV.

My friend and I looked for a documentary and settled on Attica (2021). We watched interviews with brothers of the 1971 prison rebellion that ended in the massacre of 33, mostly Black, incarcerated men when State forces retook control of the notorious prison. They spoke to the revolutionary times that had swept racialised communities.

Before the gunfire, the prisoners had an upper hand in their rebellion. They had taken 42 staff members hostage, and they were negotiating their political demands, including amnesty for the acts of their revolt.

Governor Rockefeller then interfered against the negotiation process at the advice of former president Nixon to ensure American law and order was restored.

Armed correction officers and the police massacred the prisoners and took back control. They shot at the prisoners who had occupied the yard and filled the yard with their blood.

Zionist forces have flattened Gaza. I wonder if the Zionist regime will take back control of the Strip. Standing up to your oppressor is a duty. Still, that oppressor has the means to keep their boot on your neck.

The New York Times writer Fred Ferretti commented that the re-control of the prison ended in “mass deaths that four days of taut negotiations had sought to avert”.

“Mass killing is better than negotiating with ‘violent criminals’,” I remark to my friend.

I first met Ammo Ihab (Uncle Ihab) in November 2023.

During a Blak-Palestinian protest that began at the Parliament of Victoria, I saw Ammo giving out printed photos of injured and dead Palestinians. He had so many copies.

The photos were marked with text he had added using Microsoft Word, which pointed to the Zionist regime’s terrorism.

Before Tarneen Onus Browne and I opened the rally by reading out a joint statement on behalf of Warriors of the Aboriginal Resistance and Palestinians, Ammo Ihab was speaking to people about the recent Zionist atrocities.

I later learnt that Ammo had established a sit-in at the Victorian Parliament where he had been sitting for over three weeks, vowing to remain at the steps until Israel’s genocidal assault on Gaza stopped.

As the word got out and creatives participated in the sit-in, Ammo’s hand-outs received an upgrade.

Ammo Ihab and the Sit-Intifada crew are still holding their sit-in – at the time I write this, they are entering eight months of a 7am to 7pm community gathering. Every day ‘til the killing stops.

When I spend time there, I get to be with other Palestinians. Between the cigarettes and coffee to fend off the day, the men of the Sit-Intifada scheme their next actions.

Their tradie sensibilities allow them to converse with most passers-by, as roped up Palestinian flags wave behind them.

Every morning, Ammo sets up the banner and flags, then takes phone calls and reads the news on his screen. When people arrive, he takes them to the cafe across the road.

People come by to be with Palestine; to keep Ammo company. Palestine is an idea; Palestine is a people. People have left their shitty jobs to be with Palestine, deferred semesters, and delayed weddings to be with Palestine. They hold each other.

Together, at ‘the steps’ of the sit-in, prepared to take a step for liberation, they sit under the shadow of this colonial Parliament building, transforming it into a site held by the colonised.

Sky News articles seem to characterise Ammo as the ringleader of a terror cell. He tells us that the politicians inside Parliament are bastards; they walk past him every day and don’t extend a greeting.

I’m not sure if everyone heard this in his remark, but to me, Ammo is evoking a very Palestinian way of governance, back when you could take your problems to the village leaders, back when the villages were ours, back when we farmed the land – it aches.

I tell him that these gatherings he holds do more parliamentary work than the Parliament. That amuses him.

These political leaders who don’t greet Ammo are arming Israel.

“Fund community, not bombs” is one slogan some of us are currently using to campaign against the Victorian Government’s arms deal with Elbit Systems, the largest Israeli-owned weapons manufacturer.

We want to remember the anti-militarisation campaigns of previous decades that pointed to the unjust military spending of governments, so we thought this slogan could support this anti-capitalist, consciousness-shifting work.

This article appears in Archer Magazine #20, the RESISTANCE issue – buy a copy here.

In response to the first Gulf War, Tupac Shakur offered us: “They got money for wars, but can’t feed the poor.”

Since October, we’ve been discussing whether to call it a ‘war on Gaza’ or ‘the genocide of Gaza’. We tend to go with ‘the Zionist genocidal war’ because the aggressor is active, the crime of genocide is named, and we’re able to tap into popular anti-war sentiment.

Western media compulsively calls it a ‘war with Hamas’, or a ‘conflict’. The disgust at that has meant that we become invested in this language terrain. Our slogan, “Fund community, not bombs” covers all grounds.

Every day at ‘the steps’, every day we take a step, we’re called ‘antisemitic’.

We, as Palestinians, do provide our side of the story.

In a short film, one of the Palestine movement filmmakers captured the pro-Israel Christian Zionist rally ‘Never Again is Now’, held at Parliament to coincide with the weekly Free Palestine protest.

She played the words of Victorian Liberal MP David Southwick over footage of white Christians, Jewish Zionists and extremist personality Avi Yemini demonstrating together:

We are not afraid. We will not be bullied. And the good news is they are an isolated fringe. They do not speak for Australia. In fact, just this week the Senate voted on an overwhelming bipartisan basis to condemn their hateful rhetoric and slogans. The vast majority of Australians reject these extremists.

A speech by Liberal Party Opposition Leader Peter Dutton was also played at this demonstration. It’s true, federal politicians had decided that week to subject our chant, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” to racist attacks. They gather in their Parliament, which is built on the bones and bodies of colonised First Nations, to demonise our cries.

The film then crosses over to the ‘Never Again Means Gaza’ counter-protest organised by Jews, Palestinians and anti-fascists.

In this footage, the regular Sunday Free Palestine protestors are recorded marching over to Parliament to join the counter-rally, assembled metres away from the right-wing Zionist rally.

We are seen drumming and chanting repetitively until our lungs come out of our chests: “One, we are the people. Two, we won’t be silenced. Three, stop the bombing. Now. Now. Now. Now!”

The filmmaker ends the film with a slide that reads: “Our hateful slogan: ‘Stop the bombing now.’”

Her work is brilliant.

On the day of the counter-rally, Ammo Ihab arrived at the sit-in at 7am.

He managed to negotiate with security, allowing him to stay at Parliament while the Zionist rally commenced, as long as no one else joined him.

Among the sea of Israeli flags and ‘Aussie’ yellow and green umbrellas that filled Spring Street, Uncle Ihab stood alone perched on the top of the steps, wearing his kuffiyeh, with his hand resting on his cheek. He listened to every word of his opponents.

None of us could reach him for several hours, held behind police lines separating the CBD.

He told us afterwards that a teenage girl said to him, “We bombed Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza. We’re going to bomb all of the hospitals.”

That day, we assembled from 11am until 5pm. After the Zionist rally ended, we marched over to the sit-in, embraced Ammo and declared a victory against Zionism.

The drummers banged into the sunset. Everyone got some rest on the steps.

The stories we share may be ‘partial’ or biased against the side that supports the State committing genocide. We are ideological about racism and war-mongering, and we’re fucking zealous.

Some of us are so zealous we’re arrested by Victoria Police for snatching Israeli and Australian flags off racist men who walk right through the crowd. Mounted police run into our side violently, violently, violently to ‘keep the peace’.

This is the same police force who slam trans activists to the ground when they seek to interrupt fascist anti-trans speakers; who are deployed to protect neo-Nazis hailing Hitler in front of Parliament; who tell news reporters that Palestinians are ‘violent’.

Mainstream media reported the counterrally as an assault on the Australian-Jewish community. That’s ordinary though. Our side speaks, and we just get censored. Jews Against Fascism wrote:

The Zionist community should be ashamed of their allyship with these extremists, and they must recognise that their colonial interests are causing them to align themselves with people who use them for ideological goals that do not ensure the safety of their wider community. On the contrary, they are advancing interests of the far-right, who haven’t, and never will, care for Jewish safety. Our safety will always be assured when we are able to identify and oppose fascist ideologies in the strongest terms, including the ‘Never Again Is Now’ movement.

Can it be enough that we read their words, comrade to comrade?

We’ve shut down the docks for a few days, nights and numerous hours. We’ve picketed at local weapons factories. Yet we are just getting started. I said this at a snap-protest called to shut down the Flinders Street intersection.

Eight months of the active genocide, we still do not have the organising power to impose sanctions or boycotts that would impede on the Zionist regime’s ability to perpetuate its crimes. That’s the task we have taken on.

We have us, we keep us safe, we mobilise each other. Sometimes when I look beyond our experience, I notice that the rest of society is going about business as usual.

We regularly chant “the people united will never be defeated”, but white liberal multicultural governance gears society against this.

I open my phone to scroll. I read excerpts of a paper on Instagram squares, as though it is a horoscope among this digitally mediated horror.

What would it mean for us to confront our abjection honestly? To overcome our fears and succumb to that internal voice of self-loathing that speaks of our possible defeat, of the errors we have acquiesced to out of fear or pride? Abjection is the primer of our culture.

This awesome article, ‘Confronting the Abject: What Gaza Can Teach Us About the Struggles That Shape Our World’ was written by Tareq Baconi and published on Literary Hub. I copied a link to share it with Free Palestine folks.

We cannot be defeated. Gaza lives, like Indigenous sovereignty, with glory to the land, the martyrs and the prisoners tearing down the walls.

We are firm in our resolve and we demand, as human beings, the dignity and justice that is due to us by our right of birth. We do not know how the present system of brutality and dehumanisation and injustice has been allowed to be perpetrated in this day of enlightenment, but we are the living proof of its existence and we cannot allow it to continue.

– The imprisoned men of Attica prison, Attica Liberation Faction Manifesto of Demands and Anti-Depression Platform, 1971

You can view the archive of the The Sit-Intifada here, and follow Free Palestine Coalition Naarm on Instagram for collective action updates.

This article first appeared in Archer Magazine #20, the RESISTANCE issue.

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