Black Lives Matter Grassroots stands in solidarity with our Palestinian family who are currently resisting 57 years of settler colonialism and aparthied. As Black people continue the fight to end militarism and mass incarceration in our own communities, let us understand the resistance in Palestine as an attempt to tear down the gates of the world’s largest open air prison. As a radical Black organization grounded in abolitionist ideals, we see clear parallels between Black and Palestinian people.

We, too, understand what it means to be surveilled, dehumanized, property seized, families separated, our people criminalized and slaughtered with impunity, locked up in droves, and when we resist they call us terrorists. We, too, dream of a world where our people may live freely on decolonized land. May the borders, checkpoints, prisons, police and watchlists that terrorize our communities crumble and may the world we build from their ashes honor those who have fallen in struggle.

For lasting peace to come, the entire apartheid system must be dismantled. The war on the Palestinian people must cease. We call on the United States government to immediately stop funding war and redirect the $4 billion in annual spending from the Israeli military to repair the damage caused by U.S. backed wars, military air strikes, coups, and destabilizing interventions against oppressed people around the world