By Adam Pagnucco.
On March 7, Montgomery College President Jermaine Williams issued a statement of condemnation against a virtual Zoom panel held by a faculty member using college resources earlier that day. In his statement, Williams wrote, “The inflammatory language used in the discussion is in direct conflict with our mission and values. I am writing to issue a direct and unequivocal condemnation and rejection of hateful sentiments expressed by panelists who advocated for violence against Israel.”
The panel was hosted by Gus Griffin, a professor at the college’s Takoma Park/Silver Spring campus. I requested video of the panel, which the college provided and I uploaded to my YouTube account. The entire two-hour video is embedded below. If the embed does not work, you can watch it here.
The panel was titled “Palestine and Africa, the Historical Relationship.” Its format included three panelists, who were introduced by Griffin and made opening statements, and then questions to the panelists by Griffin and participants. Although the title refers to Palestine and Africa, the panel featured much discussion of Israel and its treatment of Palestinians. Following are a few excerpts from both the opening statements and the questions and answers.
The first panelist was Miranda Mlilo, whom Griffin introduced as “a Palestinian and Zimbabwean organizer with the Palestinian youth movement.” Here are a few things Mlilo said with accompanying time stamps.
16:48 On Israel’s establishment in 1948: “And we call that as Palestinians the Nakba, which means the catastrophe, because the declaration of that state meant the ethnic cleansing of the people of Palestine, it meant driving out 750,000 Palestinians and destroying over 500 villages and towns and now Palestinians make up the largest number of refugees in the whole world since then. And since 1948, the Palestinians that have remained have been living as second-class citizens under the occupation of the Zionist state.”
“So this is the basis of Israel – settler colonialism, which is the stealing of land and resources and the settlement by colonizers on the land and importantly – and which is their ultimate goal – the mass extermination of the indigenous population, which is Palestinians. So this is important because we have to know that Zionism is by definition a racist and imperialist ideology because it’s contingent on the extermination of native people. And so Zionism and imperialism are the same.”
19:33 “People will say Israel has a right to defend themselves. But this, this isn’t true. Israel, the Zionist state, they’re the aggressors and they exist due to an ideology that seeks to murder all indigenous Palestinians and the only thing that Palestinians have done wrong is that they’re refusing to die quietly, you know, in their eyes. They want them to just disappear. But Palestinians continue to resist and they will not go down quietly. And so that’s why these events have happened. And now all of Gaza is facing collective punishment against, the Zionist punishment of the people of Gaza.”
The second panelist was Rafiki Morris, who Griffin introduced as “a longtime organizer with the All African People’s Revolutionary Party as well as the Black Alliance for Peace Coordinating Committee.” Here are a few things that Morris said with accompanying time stamps.
29:38 “The U.S. was born of settler colonialism and the tactics and methods that were used by the U.S. to colonize and control and dominate the U.S.A., for example, are the exact same tactics and methods that are being used by the Zionists to dominate Palestine. In fact, the model of the U.S. is the model that is being followed by the Zionists in Palestine. What is that model? Well, first is invasion. Second is the conscious effort to annihilate the indigenous population. Third is to concentrate those who are not killed into concentration camps. In the U.S., they called them native reservations, but a reservation is nothing but a concentration camp. And it’s the same thing as what was happening in Palestine…”
“As sister Miranda said, Zionism is imperialism. And we would add that Zionism is racism, that Zionism is settler colonialism, that Zionism is the most rabid form of patriarchy, that Zionism is in fact a tool of international imperialism and a key element in imperialist strategy for control of the world and control of the region.”
33:40 “What is happening in Palestine today is a crime against all humanity. If you cut your finger off, the whole body suffers. And if you oppress and exploit and murder a segment of humanity, all of humanity is under attack. And simply based on that ethical premise, we think it’s clear that not only should all African people be absolutely and totally in support of the struggle that is being waged with the Palestinians, but all of humanity needs to step up. This is a scourge and this is an unimaginable horror that’s being inflicted upon a people in front of our very eyes. We see it every day. And if you’re not moved to get involved and engaged in the struggle to bring this genocide to an end, be you African or European or Asian or whatever identity you claim, then you must question your own humanity. And we, so we put this question to test on an ethical stand even though we do know that we have clear political, ideological reasons and historical reasons for supporting the struggle of the Palestinians. We think we are fighting the same enemy. And we think we need to coordinate our efforts in order to ensure that that enemy is defeated.”
The third panelist was Hanna Eid, whom Griffin introduced as “a Palestinian writer, researcher and community organizer.” Here are a few things that Eid said with accompanying time stamps.
40:53 “And as Miranda said, right, Zionism… the role of the Zionists is to exterminate the Palestinians and they’ve been very clear about that since October 7th and before. So this is a different form of settler colonialism than say in South Africa where the Black African labor was exploited in the mines and in the fields, right. This is a system of extermination.”
44:43 “Now I also wanted to touch on something that Miranda said about South Africa and the fact that the Zionists offered nukes to the racist White minority government to use in a last resort. And this was something that was seriously discussed among this minority White regime in South Africa was using nuclear weapons against the masses of Africans fighting against them.”
Now to the questions and answers. At 54:34, Griffin asked, “There are more than a few Black folks in the United States who essentially say we have enough of our own struggles, why should we take up another struggle with another group where there is no reciprocity?”
Mlilo answered: “Yeah, I guess I can answer that. And we did touch on this a little bit but as I’ve said, Zionism is an inherently racist ideology and it primarily relies on three things to exist: imperialism, capitalism and white supremacy. So we’ve shared a lot about how our struggles are similar and how what we face is similar. But I think what’s really important to highlight is that our enemies are the same, right, and they can only exist and be strong with the help of each other…”
“Zionists have committed decades and millions of dollars to thwarting Black liberation. Why would they do that, right? It’s because they understand, even if we don’t acknowledge, they understand that all of our liberations are intertwined. And so they don’t want to see the unification of the people against our oppressors. They want us to believe that we’re all on our own individual paths. And so we have to understand that if our enemies are working together to thwart all liberation struggles wherever they pop up in the world, we have to work together in order to achieve actual liberation.”
A participant then asked about what could be done to get Congress to approve more aid for the Palestinians. Morris dismissed the value of conversations with Congress. Instead, he proposed the following.
1:06:12 “I think that part of what we have to do is to clarify this language and develop a language of our own that people can understand because… This is ridiculous what’s happening here. I’ve been involved in this movement for a long, long time. In 1978, we came out and said smash Zionism. And nobody paid any attention to us. For 50 years, we be yelling smash Zionism. And nobody was paying us no mind. Well now, smash Zionism is the historically determined mission of an entire generation. And the whole world knows that the only solution to the problem in Palestine is the destruction of this Zionist entity. And this is what we need to be organizing to do. It’s a long-term, protracted struggle that is not going to be solved in the next six days or six weeks or six months. It’s a struggle that we have to be committed to ‘til the end. And the linkage between the Palestinians and the Africans is an integral part of that struggle.”
Griffin read out this statement by a participant: “No one has mentioned Hamas.” He then asked the panelists to talk about that. Mlilo responded.
1:14:13 “I guess I can say that like in mainstream settings, most of the time when people bring up Hamas, it’s in order to shut down conversations around Palestine and in order to scare people out of speaking in favor of Palestinian liberation. The U.S. has said that Hamas is a terrorist organization. U.S. also said the ANC, the African National Congress was a terrorist organization, that Nelson Mandela was a terrorist organization, that the Black Panthers was a terrorist organization, the guerilla fighters in Zimbabwe were terrorist organizations, the guerilla fighters in Vietnam were terrorist organizations. You see what I’m saying? That is just a way of scaring people out of speaking on behalf of national liberation struggles. There are many different ways in which Palestinians all over the world and Palestine in diaspora have been fighting for Palestinian liberation. As Nelson Mandela said, everyone who seeks to struggle for their own self-determination seeks to do so peacefully, and when they’re met with violence, they’ll respond with violence. And that’s what I think we’re seeing here. Palestinians and all marginalized people who are fighting against their colonizers have a right to resist by any means necessary and that takes its forms… and has taken many different forms over the decades and even now.”
1:18:49 Morris added, “If a spear is your weapon, you cannot support the staff, or the staff of that spear and then denounce the tip and the pointy end of the stick, right? Hamas is fighting in line with the masses of Palestinian people. They may do something else tomorrow and they may have done something different yesterday. But at this moment in time, that is the tip of the spear. They’re actively engaged in confronting the Zionist entity. And it’s not a bunch of dodgy old men sitting up in a corner making up ideas about what these young people should do. No. It’s youth who have seen their families bombarded and destroyed in the past, who have grown up under occupation and have spent years developing the wherewithal and the armaments necessary to break through that wall or go over it. And so we support those who are fighting for the interests of the people. And we say without reservation that we support Hamas and their actions this day.”
Griffin asked this question of the panel: “Considering the extensive destruction and displacement resulting from the ongoing Israeli military offensive in Gaza, what are the best and worse case scenarios you foresee for the future of Gaza and Palestine once the war is over?”
1:42:40 Morris replied, “OK, I’ll jump out there and say that the best solution is the absolute and irrevocable destruction of the entity known as the State of Israel. I think that Israel, with each bomb it drops, moves closer to its own destruction and I think that humanity will see clearly from this genocide that this is in fact an illegal, racist settler colony that does not have a place among the states of the planet. Israel is a pariah and it needs to be destroyed just as South Africa was destroyed, just as the racist Jim Crow policies in the United States were destroyed, but even more so. We have to smash Zionism and that means the end of the State of Israel. And they say that when we say these things, we’re talking hate speech. But the Israelis did not take part of Palestine. They took all of Palestine and then relegated to Palestinians to look through pockets here and there. And so the struggle of the Palestinians is to regain their land and to have a society that is tolerant of the beliefs and religions and equality of all its people. And that is the solution as we see it. And we don’t see anything short of that, no two state solution, no three state solution, no manna from heaven is going to resolve this issue as long as the illegal State of Israel continues to exist.”
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There is a lot more. The full two hours are shown in the link and embed above.
I asked a college spokesman whether Griffin would be hosting similar panels to this one in the future. When I get a response, I will update this post.
Is this academic freedom or hate speech? Readers, that’s your call to make. After all, you paid for it.