Eight Ways to Unleash the Power of Creative Activism for a Ceasefire

Written By Priscilla Grim

Over the past few months, the world has seen a dramatic upsurge of creative and confrontational actions demanding liberation and protection for the people of Palestine. Yet the bombs continue to drop on Gaza. What tools can help us continue to escalate strategically in this horrific moment?  

Here are eight insights from the Beautiful Trouble toolbox we hope may prove useful in pressuring Israel and its allies to stop the genocide.

Disrupting Binary Framing: A New Narrative Unfolds

Reject the oversimplified frame of Israel vs Hamas and think instead life vs death, or humanity vs genocide. As Beautiful Trouble team members Rae Abileah and Nadine Bloch wrote in Waging Nonviolence:

“Framing beyond the binary can also be helpful when done intentionally. Or reframing the binary: Yes, there are two sides. The side of life and the side of death. As Palestinian poet Suheir Hammad wrote: ‘You are either with life, or against it. Affirm life.’”

Visual Storytelling: The Art of Impact

Transcend linguistic barriers by presenting compelling visuals in an artistic vigil. Recent vigils have left an indelible mark on the popular imagination, from symbolic shoe placements in Seoul honoring lives lost in Palestine to student-led processions in Sao Paulo. Creative activism can and should spark empathy and urgency.

Get inspired by the long legacy of Palestinian creative activism. The Great March of Return in 2018 utilized the time-honored nonviolent tactic of making a trek that has been practiced from Gandhi’s Salt March to cross-continent walks for nuclear disarmament. Rabbis for Ceasefire utilized the trek in their pilgrimage from Philadelphia to DC. In 2011, Children in Gaza set a world record for the most kites flown simultaneously, with 12,350 kites from the shores of the Mediterranean Sea in Gaza.

Strategic Action: Choose Your Target Wisely

Identifying the most strategic target is the key to success in any action.

Is the target an oppositional figure who likely won’t budge or a potential ally who could be won over by public pressure and thoughtful messaging? Do they have the power to create change, or are they in a position to pressure a more powerful target to take action? Which community voices and leaders can best reach your target? (Think about engaging power mapping.) 

By identifying strategic targets and leveraging tactics like divestment, boycotts, and civil disobedience, you can create multiple entry points for engagement, maximizing their impact.

In the No Tech for Apartheid movement, workers are demanding a shutdown of the AI surveillance being used by Israel, Project Nimbus, and the companies creating it, Amazon and Google. 

Divestment holds significant sway as a means of exerting economic pressure on the targets of industries or states benefitting from unjust practices and environmental harm. Students at the University of Virginia and the University of California Riverside have fought to divest the schools' endowments in “companies engaging in or profiting from the State of Israel’s apartheid regime and acute violence against Palestinians.” Wielding the weapon of economic pressure is often the only action those in the halls of power hear. 

In November 2023, the Howard University chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) staged a “Chalk the Block” boycott of Starbucks and McDonald’s to support the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions campaign against the Israeli government’s treatment of the Palestinian people.

Amidst intensifying repression of free speech on campus, students at Columbia University protested in January of 2024 to forge on with their divestment campaign.

The Overton Window: Common sense is a moving target

The critical lesson of the Overton window is that what we call common sense is a moving target and that it’s our job to shift common sense towards our position so that positions once thought "unthinkable" can evolve into the adopted stance of a partisan base. 

Worldwide perception has opened to the understanding that Israel is a settler colonial project. The challenge for activists supporting Palestinian liberation from apartheid is to continue to shift the window, moving “common sense” closer and closer to our dream of a free Palestine.

The Principle of Impact: Following the Lead of the Most Impacted

Centering the voices and experiences of the most impacted ensures that the movement remains authentic and impactful. This means following the leadership of the Palestinians both on the ground in Palestine and in local coalitions where you live, both of whom are clamoring in the streets daily for a ceasefire.

Symbolic Actions to Engage New Audiences

While symbolic actions are unlikely to yield immediate concrete outcomes (in fact, expecting them to do so can cause problems!), they play a vital role in shaping public consciousness. Ritual, for example, can potentially pave the way for tangible future changes.

When designing your action, it’s helpful to think about a spectrum of allies and recognize the importance of knowing your audience. The symbolism, art, and ritual you choose can help engage your key audiences and even invite them to participate, such as caroling, writing valentines or postcards to elected officials, an interactive Passover Seder for collective liberation, and so on. 

Ohio Religious Leaders Gather in Cincinnati to Call for Ceasefire in Gaza Source: CityBeat.com

Culture Jamming

From Beautiful Trouble: “Rational arguments and earnest appeals to morality may prove less effective than a carefully planned culture jam that bypasses the audience’s mental filters by mimicking familiar cultural symbols, then disrupting them.”  Showing up in the tools of mainstream culture, like the Super Bowl Ceasefire billboard in Las Vegas, or the remixing the “JewBelong” campaign in San Francisco, brought revelatory moments to all who passed by them, sparking conversations for thousands of drivers. 

Prefigurative Actions, Showing What You Want to See

Actions seem starved for vision right now, as we are all fighting collective trauma by constantly holding up the bloody truth as if the gore and bloodshed will convince people to do something. Activists must understand human behavioral psychology and try to engage people with humor and joy like the NO campaign in Chile did!

“One strategic campaign that harnessed the power of positive messaging encouraged masses of Chileans to vote and end the vicious Pinochet dictatorship in 1988. Campaigners integrated criticism of the regime with an optimistic vision of the future — mobilizing people out of despair with a colorful rainbow symbol, bright music, and happy commercials for the future.” via Waging Nonviolence

Whichever path you choose, know that taking to the streets and disrupting the quiet acceptance of genocide that otherwise pervades is planting seeds of a future grounded in justice, care, and compassion. 

Thank you, activists and organizers. You are loved. 

Priscilla Grim
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