Daily Podcasts Video Research

Why Has Palestinian Activism Been So Successful?

JL;DR SUMMARY The article examines how Palestinian activism has successfully mirrored historical social movements, such as the U.S. civil rights movement, to gain traction both academically and socially in Western contexts. A way out west there was a fella, fella I want to tell you about, fella by the name of Jeff Lebowski. At least, that was the handle his lovin' parents gave him, but he never had much use for it himself. This Lebowski, he called himself the Dude. Now, Dude, that's a name no one would self-apply where I come from. But then, there was a lot about the Dude that didn't make a whole lot of sense to me. And a lot about where he lived, likewise. But then again, maybe that's why I found the place s'durned innarestin'.

JL;DR members get full summaries of all articles in the archive, including this one. Donate & start reading »

Tags

Bds MovementIsrael AdvocacyIntersectionalityMartyrdomProgressive PoliticsCivil RightsAcademiaPalestinian ActivismAnti Israel MovementSocial Movements

Places mentioned

Palestinian Territories
"The times, they were a-changin. But the times can also change for the worse. The success of a movement is not proof of its moral warrant. Plenty of nefarious movementsNational Socialism in Germany, Soviet Communism in Russiahave seen their way through the same stages of development described above."
Germany
"National Socialism in Germany, Soviet Communism in Russiahave seen their way through the same stages of development described above."
Russian Federation
"National Socialism in Germany, Soviet Communism in Russiahave seen their way through the same stages of development described above."
Israel
"The political version of what was happening in the academy was the Black Power movement, also at odds with the prevailing integrationist ethos, which came to embrace Palestinian militancy, giving a distant foreign movement an important ally on the fringes of American society."
Los Angeles, California, United States
"The political version of what was happening in the academy was the Black Power movement, also at odds with the prevailing integrationist ethos, which came to embrace Palestinian militancy, giving a distant foreign movement an important ally on the fringes of American society. Celebrity performers with fringe politics also eventually got in on the act: Vanessa Redgrave dedicated her 1978 Oscar to the proud Palestinian people standing up against Zionist hoodlums."
New York City, New York, United States
"Although more than half have been defeated and none have yet been adopted at the administrative level, they have given momentum to a movement. The result is that divestment has made its way to the trustees of several universities. Nowhere did we see how quickly a practice can be replicated than with the campus encampments that started with Columbia in April 2024: By the end of the month, copycat encampments had taken hold on 40 additional campuses."
Washington, United States
"At George Washington University, Students for Justice in Palestine marked this stage by projecting the words Glory to our martyrs onto the walls of the university library."
Colorado, United States
"Perhaps rather than spending our resources fighting BDS resolutions at Harvard (whose attractiveness is already falling among Jews), we should tell Israels story at the schools where it isnt heard. (Sapir editor-in-chief Bret Stephens reports that one of the most robust conversations on Israel hes had on campus took place at Colorado Mesa University, a campus with slightly older students, including many veterans.)"

Support this source

This item was indexed and curated by Cairo, JL;DR's web crawler.
Cairo Item ID 51559
Cairo Source ID 29
Retrieved 2025-05-14 05:31:11 UTC
Curated 2025-05-14 08:32:56 UTC