AFTER the major media success and publicity in 2000 of Rome World Pride, the group behind the event, InterPride (International Association of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Pride Coordinators), elected the organization Jerusalem Open House to organize a similar event entitled “Love Without Borders” in Jerusalem in August 2005. On May 14, 2005, however, Jerusalem Open House decided to cancel the parade. The organization announced that probable Israeli demonstrations against Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s supposed pullout and dismantlement of Israeli settlements in occupied Gaza prompted them to move the parade to August 6–12, 2006.
One wonders how much purposeful censorship is involved in organizing “Love Without Borders.” Whether out of callous lack of interest or naïve ignorance, World Pride 2005 blatantly ignores the socio-political stakes in the Palestinian region. Paradoxically, if gay Arabs even tried to participate in an event such as “Love Without Borders,” they would probably be denied entry into the festivities due to “borders” World Pride 2005 seeks to do “without.” Although their efforts to combat sexual bigotry is a noble one, InterPride and Jerusalem Open House turn a blind eye towards a struggle that has been raging for decades. The event signals a critical moment in gay and queer culture. Now that events such as World Pride are sweeping the international horizon, the once politically disenfranchised sexual minority has taken on a host country’s own political suppression as its alibi—this is as “assimilationist” as queer culture can get. Contrary to what may seem like silence on the Israeli front regarding these infractions, it also has dissidents—including, surprisingly enough, many GLBT people. The Tel-Aviv based direct action group Black Laundry (Kvisa Shchora), is one such organization (www.blacklaundry.org). Black Laundry’s mission is simple: “There is no pride in the oppression of others. There is no pride in occupation.” Before the date change of World Pride 2005, Black Laundry did not boycott the event but insisted on remaining as a presence. “We don’t actively encourage anyone to visit Israel to take part in World Pride events, or in any kind of global consumerist gay culture, but we will organize events and present radical alternatives to international queers who do decide to visit. We hope that queers coming to Jerusalem for World Pride will consider joining our activism against the occupation and for social justice in Israel and Palestine.” For many queer activists involved in Palestinian rights and resistance, sexuality is always an issue—as it is with everything else. Briefly stated, Palestinian society does not welcome alternative lifestyles. Journalist Eric Beauchemin investigated the tension that many gay Arab men experience daily in the BBC radio program aptly titled “The Gay Divide.” Traveling through Palestine, Beauchemin encountered gay men and women who are ostracized, punished, and threatened for their sexuality. According to the BBC, at least 300 gay Palestinian men illegally escaped into Israel in 2003 to evade sexual persecution at the hands of Muslims who claim that homosexuality breaks with the Qu’ran. Gay men who flee Palestine only face further troubles in Israel—the uncertainty of living as an illegal citizen, deportation, and the persecutions common to persons whose nationality automatically labels them a security threat. Gay people involved with Palestinian issues are in a bind: while we voice our opinions on the war waged against Palestine at the hands of the Israelis, to express their sexuality, many gay Palestinians flee the very society, culture, and land that we seek to support. The true test of a future Palestine, I believe, is anchored by the social position gay men and women will have as Palestinian citizens. Caught in the net of sexuality, identity, and nationality, they underscore the particular difficulties for a people in the midst of forging their own state. What will be their status as citizens if Palestine becomes its own state? How will Palestinian society and culture apprehend alternative sexual orientations? With Westernized Israel occupying it on every side, how will Palestine grapple with sexual identity? To be sure, Arab culture in general, unlike the West, does not accommodate open homosexuality. Queer or gay sexuality cannot be found in any industry, culture, or city quarter. Palestinian society, like many others, is bound by tradition. Palestine’s current socio-political efforts are geared toward achieving basic human rights, while the question of homosexuality is a susidiary one. Cheryl Clarke observed in a seminal essay of 1983, “The Failure to Transform: Homophobia in the Black Community,” that the refusal to address and confront oppression in a community struggling for equality can result in a “failure to transform.” In Clarke’s case, homophobia is counterintuitive to the struggle for equality for all black Americans. For Palestinian society, one forcibly occupied by Israel—the racial supremacy of Israel also resembles that of white American attitudes—the “failure to transform” is of equal measure. The power to transform hate against homosexuality can be instrumental for the independence of Palestinian culture, especially when oppression affects Palestinian society in its entirety. As a form of political intersection, the struggle for Palestinian equality and civil rights can only build strength as a struggle that confronts issues such as homophobia, heterosexism, and racism. Trying to disengage one’s sexuality from one’s ideology, when both are so closely intertwined, is a challenge. Rather than being a stumbling block, this challenge remains as another generative dialogue, voiced by many gay people, for the coming statehood of a free Palestine. Rather than remain silenced, queer resistance to the acts of ignorance, racism, and genocide effectuated by the Israeli government against the Palestinian population can only benefit from the necessity of bearing witness to the issue that is Palestine.
Farris Wahbeh is a Palestinian-American residing in Chicago.
