FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: 18 November 2024
UPDATED ENDORSERS: 2 December 2024
SIGN THE PETITION IN #SolidarityWithAisha ABDEL GAWAD
No matter who we are, where we live, or the color of our skin, we all have the right to make our voices heard. We know that embracing diversity of thought and our multiracial, ethnic, and religious democracy only strengthens our society.
For the past century, and especially within the past year, supporters of the Israeli government and military have been relentless in their anti-Palestinian racism, Arabophobic, and Islamophobic attacks. As well as extreme harassment of anyone who dares take a principled stance against the genocide in Gaza.
Aisha Abdel Gawad is a writer who fights for the humanity of all oppressed peoples. Her work as a writer is a powerful testament to this. In her award-winning debut novel, Between Two Moons (2023), Aisha explores the experience of Arab Muslim girls in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, coming of age under the specter of post-9/11 surveillance. Since the escalation of the Israeli government’s siege in Gaza, Aisha has also used her voice as a writer to advocate for an end to the genocide in Palestine. Most recently, she privately withdrew from a panel about her novel at an Albany, New York, literary festival that she felt would not be constructive and, instead, harmful and create more conflict during a contentious time in our society. We all have the right not to participate in any public forum, especially those that do not uphold our values.
Unfortunately, pro-Israeli government bad actors have reacted to Aisha’s reasonable response with a growing smear campaign, relentlessly targeted for exercising her Constitutionally-protected fundamental First Amendment rights, targeted online harassment, and the loss of her writer-in-residence fellowship at a Connecticut Public Library. Now, her longtime career as a K-12 educator is under attack. Sign this petition in #SolidarityWithAisha Abdel Gawad.
These bad actors upend our First Amendment Constitutionally-protected rights with their actions and do so by New McCarthyism investigations, harassing, doxxing, violence, misrepresenting pro-Palestinian voices, and falsely equating anti-Zionism with antisemitism. These same individuals have attacked people across numerous fields for exercising their First Amendment rights and voicing support for Palestinians, including journalists, nurses, prominent politicians such as Rashida Tlaib and Cori Bush, and recently Connecticut-based Egyptian Arab American Muslim award-winning author, creative, and educator Aisha Abdel Gawad.
Aisha’s views are no different than most Americans. According to June 2024 estimates from the leading medical journal, The Lancet, the total death toll likely exceeds 200,000 Palestinians in the last year. Despite the overwhelming support for a ceasefire and an end to weapons sales to the Israeli government, with almost two-thirds of people in the U.S. wanting to stop arming the Israeli government and the military’s genocide, the actions of pro-Israeli government’s bad actors state-side have underscored a horrifying trend of relentless harassment and violence for anyone speaking out on behalf and in solidarity with the Palestinian people.
Each of us has the power to fight against attacks that do not uphold our values, threaten human rights, and undermine our ability to coexist in a multiracial, ethnic, and religious democracy. We must take action to resist attacks on freedom of speech, thought, and religion, especially toward Arab and Muslim people, and in doing so, build together the world we deserve—where all people have the right to speak up on issues that impact us no matter our race, religion, or location.
Make your voice heard by signing this petition in #SolidarityWithAisha Abdel Gawad as she faces a brutal campaign of harassment from not only her local community but also nationally.
#SolidarityWithAisha Abdel Gawad Campaign Endorsers:
- International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network
- Labor for Palestine National Network
- Radius of Arab American Writers (RAWI)
- Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), Albany
- Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), New Haven
- CT Palestine Solidarity Coalition
- CT Dissenters
- Palestinian Rights Committee Albany
- Desis Rising Up & Moving (DRUM)
- Uptown for Palestine
- SUNY BDS
- Student for Justice in Palestine, UAlbany
- Young Democratic Socialist of America, UAlbany
- Stony Brook Students for Justice in Palestine (SBU SJP)
- Binghamton Solidarity for Palestine
- Binghamton Graduate Students for Justice in Palestine
- Stony Brook Graduate Students for Palestine
- New Paltz Students for Palestine
- Students for Justice in Palestine Oswego (SJP at SUNY Oswego)
- SUNY BDS UBuffalo
- FIT Students for Justice in Palestine
- Bridgevolt Cooperative
- Northeast Anarchist Union
- Bolt Cutter Collective
- Space City Anarchist Organization (SACO)
