I remember seeing a march in support of Palestine last December with hundreds braving the cold to make their voices heard. A long, rainbow-colored banderole marked the middle of the massive gathering that inched its way over snow-covered cobblestones and past windows illuminated in Christmas lights. The sign said the same thing I’ve seen mocked countless times on social media: Queers for Palestine.
It’s a stance that, to many Zionists and right-wing provocateurs, would seem to be an oxymoron. (1) After all, Palestine does suffer from institutionalized and violent homophobia, something pro-Israel groups use to place gay men like me at odds with Palestinian rights. (2) Even Benjamin Netanyahu recently mocked the sentiment in front of the US Congress, joking that it’s similar to “Chickens for KFC.” (3) Some, though not all, Queer Westerners swallow the bait, too; as if one can not exist without the other, as if our freedoms are intrinsically linked to the success of Israel’s conquest. It’s a worldview that requires a revolting amount of narcissism to justify and it’s something that’s kept me furious this past year. After all, here I am; tucked away in the comfort and safety of my home in Sweden, but I'm somehow supposed to feel victimized by people I’ve never met nor will ever meet. Meanwhile, Queer Palestinians—the actual victims of this persecution—are now also fighting for their very survival against Israeli bombings, seemingly forgotten amid a campaign that seeks to paint all Palestinians as murderous bigots. Those who’ve bought into this campaign seem to believe that the human right to life comes with the prerequisite of Queer acceptance, conveniently forgetting that something as simple as same-sex marriage isn’t even legal in Israel. (4)
Of course, they’re not really forgetting nor do they genuinely care about gay rights. It’s a tactic called Pinkwashing, a smokescreen of Queer acceptance used in exchange for nationalist or corporate gain. The term was first coined by author and activist Sarah Schulman in 2011, using it then to decry Israel’s exploitation of the LGBTQ+ community as a justification for the many horrors committed against Palestinians. (5) This moral shield—a buckler with as many holes as a sewer grate — arms many a Zionist today in an attempt to garner neoliberal sympathies. By hosting Pride parades, engaging in Queer-adjacent art (like the Eurovision Song Contest), and being semi-tolerant towards our community, Israel and its army become infallible heroes. By living in a society that largely opposes these things, Palestine and its civilians become dehumanized villains. And so, if Israel can successfully portray itself as the only defense against violent homophobia in the Middle East, it also becomes the sole arbiter of what constitutes an “acceptable defense.” We’ve all seen what that leads to, and I believe it is the responsibility of every LGBTQ+ person in the West to refuse this narrative lest our community stand complicit in genocide. That is what this essay is: A rebuttal to the Pinkwashing of Israel, and the demand of anyone who gives a damn about gay rights to also care for Queer Palestinians.
Assumptions of Superiority and Lapses in Logic
We’ve all seen the headlines. Palestinians like Ahmad Abu Marhia, a young gay man found decapitated in the occupied West Bank, are the visible victims of homophobia in Palestine. (6) Others, forced to hide their identities for fear of the same fate, remain invisible save for what they can safely share with each other and whatever anonymity the internet has to offer. (7) It’s not unlike much of the West not so long ago (or even today). Like us, Palestinians need the protection afforded by their Western counterparts—something that's only been accomplished through decades of advocacy from gay rights groups. (8)
Therein lies the problem: What kind of progress can you achieve in an active warzone? Which activist's voice can carry over the sounds of bombs and death? Where can these gay rights groups safely gather when Israel turns residential buildings and hospitals alike to rubble and dust? (9) Who can even find the time when they’re fighting for survival? The answer is none.
This is assuming the question is posed to the Palestinians themselves. For many, the road to progress is believed to come instead through Israel’s occupying forces and the new laws they would impose if they came to rule. (10) This tactic frames the Palestinian people as unable to govern themselves—unable to accomplish progress on their own accord—and therefore need Israel to protect LGBTQ+ interests.
It echoes The White Man's Burden, a poem-turned-rhetoric that sanctified many imperialist projects during the 19th century. (11) In it, Rudyard Kipling (yes, that Rudyard Kipling) describes people of color as “half devil and half child” and presses the moral duty of white men to “civilize” these people through colonialism. As the title suggests, he phrases it as a thankless burden—dirty work for the good of all—and not for what it actually was: Violent exploitation justified by white supremacy.
Anyone who evokes this sentiment in the present day fundamentally misunderstands the lessons we ought to take from these shameful endeavors. Israel, like all imperialist warmongers of the past, can create a legal system enforced by marching troops and bullets, but they can’t change the cultural and social climate without an incentive for said change (12). Such an incentive doesn’t exist. Only the bloodshed is real, and the suggestion that Palestinian norms would change because of it is not just unfounded, but absurd. What's the thought here? They return to the ruins of their homes, look at the desecration of their lives, their loved ones, and their past and future that lie crushed beneath the concrete that once sheltered them, and suddenly decide that “gay is okay”? By all means, send another missile, I’m sure the next one will even cure cancer.
This line of reasoning also frames Israel as a haven for the LGBTQ+ community. While the country is comparatively more free for Queer people than the rest of the Middle East, that declaration comes with an important caveat: Are you Palestinian?
For Israel and the IDF, anything you may be will always come second to your Palestinian identity (13). This past year has made that all too clear, but it is a truth Queer Palestinians have known longer than that. An example of this went viral on Twitter/X not too long ago with an excerpt from Danny Kaplan’s 2002 book Brothers and Others in Arms: The Making of Love and War in Israeli Combat Units. (14)
The book's first half consists of interviews with gay and bisexual Israeli soldiers interviewed about their experiences serving. One of these soldiers recalls a particularly horrific event when he visited a group of Israeli snipers who were watching nearby houses, killing anyone they saw:
“Come here, I want you to see something,” one of the snipers said. The soldier did as he was told and saw two male lovers. The interviewed soldier calls them terrorists and remarks how they ‘fucked like real animals.’ He tells Kaplan that it was pretty funny.
“And now look,” the sniper said as he leaned in closer to his rifle and pulled the trigger. In an instant, the sniper’s bullet burrowed into the skull of the man being penetrated. His partner was still inside of him as he died, the surviving man panicking as he realized what just happened. A second ago, they shared an intimate moment—freedom away from war and prejudice. Now, one is dead and the other has to live with the trauma alone in fear of ostracization or death.
It’s a scene that, in essence, though not in its specificity, might feel familiar to Western gay and bisexual men. Be it police raids of bathhouses or cruising spots, entrapment from homophobes who use sex as bait, or our own families and peers who catch us at an inopportune time, there’s a long history of violence used against our bodies during sex. Maybe that’s why this particular story seemed to have touched and galvanized so many of us who read it: In that moment, Queer men can recognize that Israel is not our friend or ally but yet another bully who cares little for our lives or well-being. While this is but one example of many, it stands as a testament to the actual values of Israel and why no one should ever consider them an authority on LGBTQ+ rights, let alone an “enforcer.”
Present in Oppression, Absent in Liberation—The Western Way
Suffice it to say, the road forward for Palestine's Queer community does not lie in interventionism. Don't take it from me though; activists in both Palestine and other Middle Eastern countries have raised this exact point for years. They’ve also recognized that when Western countries either wage or fund wars in the Middle East, a cultural backlash is sparked against what is perceived to be Western values. (15) While the gay rights movement is native to every country on earth, it appears to the invaded countries to be as much of a Western import as the fighter jets that America is supplying Israel with. (16)
For the Palestinian activists, this means that they not only have to convince their people that being Queer is morally okay, but also that it’s not a weapon of the enemy. In other words, they’re fighting two wars at the same time with little to no support. It's a hard task made impossible by Israel's genocide, and so it should be evident that Palestinians need peace, sovereignty, and justice for any progress to be made.
I can’t tell you what the road to LGBTQ+ equality looks like after that, I’m not Palestinian after all. Whatever my thoughts and wishes may be for the future should always come second to the Queer people who see Palestine not just as a nation, but as a home. It is Queer Palestinians who must lead the charge for social change, and it is up to the rest of us to help in whichever way is helpful. A humanitarian asylum process for Queer Palestinians in need is a start, and there are plenty of Middle Eastern activists who've already made proposals on this topic (some even cited in this essay). But make no mistake, freedom for LGBTQ+ Palestinians begins with freedom for Palestine itself. That’s why “Queers for Palestine” isn't just morally correct, but necessary. The 40,000 dead Palestinians since October 7th should’ve convinced the world of that. (17) The innumerable atrocities committed by Israel even before then—which have been written about so extensively you can fill libraries with its sorrows—should’ve convinced the world of that. (18, 19) Every notion and instinct of shared humanity should’ve convinced the world that Israel’s rampage serves no cause but its own. And yet, the Pinkwashing continues. But not in my name. Not now, not ever.
Written by Stephen K. Pettersson.
Cover photo by Kurt Bauschardt.
References
(1) O’Neill, Brendan (2023) “‘Queers for Palestine’ must have a death wish”, The Telegraph, 9 November 2023, accessible here.
(2) Wikipedia (n.d.) LGBT rights in the State of Palestine, accessible here.
(3) Politico (2024) ‘Like chickens for KFC’: Netanyahu knocks Gaza war protesters, 24 July 2024, accessible here.
(4) Wikipedia (n.d.) LGBT rights in Israel, accessible here.
(5) Schulman, Sarah (2011) “Israel and ‘Pinkwashing’”, The New York Times, 22 November 2011, accessible here.
(6) BBC (2022) Gay Palestinian Ahmad Abu Marhia beheaded in West Bank, 7 October 2022, accessible here.
(7) O’Neal, Sarah (2023) “Gaza’s Queer Palestinians Fight to Be Remembered”, The Nation, 16 November 2023, accessible here.
(8) CNN (2023) LGBTQ Rights Milestones Fast Facts, updated 21 August 2023, accessible here.
(9) Human Rights Watch (2023) Gaza: Unlawful Israeli Hospital Strikes Worsens Health Crisis, 14 November 2023, accessible here.
(10) David Kilmnick (2023) “LGBTQ people must support Israel”, New York Daily News, 5 November 2023, accessible here.
(11) Wikipedia (n.d.) The White Man’s Burden, accessible here.
(12) Moseley, Alexander (n.d.) “Interventionism”, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, accessible here.
(13) The Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy (2022) Q&A with Elias Jahshan: To be Queer and Arab, 28 June 2022, accessible here.
(14) Kaplan, Danny (2002) Brothers and Others in Arms: The Making of Love and War in Israeli Combat Units, Harrington Park Press, p. 58.
(15) Al-Kadhi, Amrou (2017) “As a gay man born in Iraq, I know that western intervention is to blame for the murder of LGBT Iraqis”, The Independent, 5 July 2017, accessible here.
(16) Hudson, John (2024) “Biden administration approves more weapons for Israel”, The Washington Post, 2024, accessible here.
(17) Al Jazeera (2023) Israel-Gaza war in maps and charts: Live tracker, 9 October 2023, accessible here.
(18) Amnesty International (2022) Israel’s apartheid against Palestinians: a cruel system of domination and a crime against humanity, 1 February 2022, accessible here.
(19) United Nations (n.d.) About the Nakba — Question of Palestine, accessible here.