Snapshot
Hundreds of international solidarity activists staged a “fly-in” at Ben Gurion airport demanding to visit Palestine in protest of Israel’s racist border policies and de facto siege of historic Palestine.
The Palestinian people have been enduring systematic repression, colonization, and ethnic cleansing since the occupation of Palestine in 1948. Today, Palestinians live in Bantustan-like areas segregated by an apartheid wall built on stolen Palestinian land to allow Israeli settlers to enjoy Jewish-only privileges. Historic Palestine has been torn into scattered pieces of land disconnected from each other.
In 2011, Palestinians in the West Bank invited people of conscience from across the world to visit Palestine with the aim of drawing attention to the cruelty of life under the occupation, in general, and racist Israeli border policies, in particular. The initiative also aimed to strengthen the ongoing boycott effort to isolate Israel, demonstrate the hypocrisy and illegitimacy of the Israeli occupation and colonization of Palestine, and exert pressure on European and other governments accused of collaboration with that occupation.
The actions disrupted the status quo at the heart of injustice, making a clear statement that could not be silenced except by repression.
Since Israeli authorities regularly deny visitors the right to visit Palestine if they state their intention to do so at the border, the idea was to have international solidarity activists fly into Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport, and try to publically exercise their right to visit Palestine. Inevitably, they would be denied that right, which, if well-publicized, would help expose the truth about Israel’s regime of occupation, colonization, and apartheid.
In the first year, more than 300 people from different countries and nationalities took part. After arriving at the airport, activists peacefully unfurled their “Welcome to Palestine” banners, creating a dramatic scene at the airport. Israeli police attacked the protesters, and ripped down their signs. Activists and non-activists alike were arrested and interrogated. Those identified as part of the campaign were deported or sent to detention facilities.
In response, the Israeli government launched a “diplomatic” campaign requesting governments of other countries to help bring an end to this form of solidarity. Some airlines cancelled the scheduled flights, others, at the behest of Israeli security, prevented activists from boarding planes for which they had already purchased tickets that they had every right to use.
In 2012, most of the 400 people worldwide who were set to fly to Palestine were denied boarding. Activists responded by holding sit-ins inside airports across Europe to protest their governments’ complicity in supporting the Israeli occupation and violations of Palestinian human rights. During the sit-ins, activists also distributed flyers to raise awareness about the campaigns. In some of these airports, pro-Palestine protesters were violently dispersed and expelled from the airports.
All told, the actions disrupted the status quo at the heart of injustice, making a clear statement that could not be silenced except by repression. The extensive local and international media coverage exposed the repression and racism of Israeli policies, leading the Israeli regime to launch a massive PR campaign in an attempt to save face.
Originally published in Beautiful Rising.
Key theory
The fly-in staged by international solidarity activists was a media big bang that challenged and exposed Israeli apartheid as one of many facets of the Zionist colonization of the indigenous Palestinian population. It was yet another example of grassroots disobedience to the ongoing colonization of Palestine. By exposing the racist border policies, the violence against solidarity activists, and collusion of Western governments, the action disrupted, even if only momentarily, the balance of power between colonizer and the colonized.
Key tactic
Freedom of movement is a basic right denied to Palestinians. By deliberately trying to exercise that right, which required defying Israeli travel restrictions, the Welcome to Palestine campaign put a global spotlight on the racist border policies imposed by the Israeli occupation.
Key principles
Welcome to Palestine activists knew they would be denied entry to Palestine once they’d explicitly stated their intentions. They knew how the Israeli regime would react, and so they planned their action accordingly. And that reaction did a better job of demonstrating the racist, oppressive, and colonial policies of the apartheid state than any critique could.
When designing your action, keep in mind the people who aren’t physically in the immediate vicinity of where the action is taking place. The fly-in action was planned to have global media reach; organizers were keenly aware that their primary audience was not witnessing it directly in the airport, but receiving it indirectly all across the world through TV and other media.