Sumud, Steadfast Resistance
Sumud is Arabic for “steadfastness” or “steadfast perseverance”
Through this theme our seventh Festival honors Palestinians who have persevered under oppression in daily life for – how long? When would you like to start counting?
With continuing Jewish settlement building in the West Bank?
With declaration that “the right to exercise national self-determination in the State of Israel is unique to the Jewish people?”
With the 1967 occupation and life under the rule and law of the military?
With the 1948 catastrophe Palestinians see in the declaration of the state of Israel?
With an expression of colonial rule in the 1917 Balfour Declaration?
Given that the olive tree is a symbol of rootedness in the land – and often an expression of sumud – for the first time this year we will offer Palestinian olive oil for sale during our screenings at The Little. One World Goods is making product available and benefiting from the sales.
We stand steadfastly with those who have lived with injustice. We hope you’ll attend our programs this year:
- The keynote highlights the lack of equal justice for Palestinians and for people of color in the U.S.
- Constructing the Terrorist Threat describes, among other things, how hatred of Muslims in the West is a construct for the West’s own purposes
- Naila Ayesh was a leader in a women’s network working for Palestinian self-determination. Naila and the Uprising tells the story of the first intifada
- Twenty-four Jews Step Forward to speak on behalf of justice for the indigenous Palestinian people
- Even The Stones Cry Out when others are silent. In this program, many prominent Christians speak in steadfast support of justice
- “You can read all kinds of books but you really have to be here to understand what is occurring here, how settlements are utilized to punish and humiliate these Palestinian people,” said a former U.S. Marine, one of the Veterans for Peace in Palestine.
- I Was Living Here before Zionist occupiers, pipeline builders, racism arrived.