As queers, we know the pain of being cast out. We have been and continue to be despised by many—even by our own parents, families, and communities of origin. We have been and continue to be deemed deserving of death. This reality evokes in many of us a deep empathy with others who are likewise seen not as fully human, but as problems to be solved, questions for which the answer is ultimately elimination and erasure.
As we watch the ongoing genocide of Palestinians by the state of Israel—carried out with the full support of our government and funded by our tax dollars—we witness the inevitable results of defining a people solely as a threat to the safety and well-being of those deemed inherently worthy of life. This horror compels us to speak out, not only against the current bombardment and siege of Gaza by the state of Israel, but against the historical and ongoing displacement of Palestinians by Zionists and the conditions of occupation and apartheid under which Palestinians have been forced to live for over 75 years.
In response to the invitation by Writers Against the War on Gaza, the Bureau of General Services—Queer Division commits to following the guidelines for the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI), which advocates for a boycott of Israeli academic and cultural institutions for their deep and persistent complicity in Israel’s denial of Palestinian rights as stipulated by international law, and we endorse the larger Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement.
Links
Writers Against the War on Gaza
writersagainstthewarongaza.com
Call for an academic and cultural boycott of Israel -July 6, 2004
bdsmovement.net/pacbi/pacbi-call
Palestinian Civil Society Calls for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel Until it Complies with International Law and Universal Principles of Human Rights – 9 July 2005
