The first protest I attended at university was for Palestine. It was early summer of 2021, the middle of my freshman year, during the displacement of families in Sheikh Jarrah. I was raised in New York City by Bangladeshi immigrants: there was no skirting around the question of the Israeli Occupation of Palestine, and no restrictions from engaging in popular protest. On the contrary, my family encouraged it. But during the protests of the summer of 2021 was when I truly reckoned with the urgency of Palestine’s slow but steady destruction at the hands of the Israeli regime. The movement triggered what would become years of learning and analysis of Palestinian history, alongside a greater understanding of colonialism, Western hegemony, and politics of power.
If I must die, إذا كان لا بد أن أموت
you must live فال بد أن تعيش أنت
The last protest that I attended, and most likely the last protest I will be able to participate in during my college experience, was also one for Palestine. During the last few days of April and the first few days of May 2024, I joined dozens of my classmates at the encampment on Brown University's Main Green. Our demands were consistent with the college encampments that spread across the country through the national student movement calling for institutional divestment from Israeli apartheid, weapons, and genocide. I didn’t spend the remainder of my last year of undergraduate study in class, my regularly scheduled research meetings, or any of my club events during the week of our encampment. Like many of my classmates, I had lost interest in most other things in the months after the genocide began in October. I did the bare minimum to pass my classes. I stopped paying attention to what I was eating or when I was exercising, of which I had always been mindful because of a preexisting health condition. Doing things I enjoyed also felt wrong when I could view a live feed of Gaza’s destruction from my phone. The pulse to act for Gaza was all I could think and feel.
to tell my story لتروي حكايتي
to sell my things لتبيع أشيائي
I was asked why I had chosen to be at the encampment. I spoke about my family’s own survival of famine, occupation, and genocide. As I was telling this story, I became aware that before and alongside me, my father and my grandparents have also told this story. When (then) West Pakistan’s invasion of Dhaka city began, there was a curfew instituted. The day’s violence portended horrors in the dark, and we didn’t wait. We took what we could carry, and we fled before night could fall. Many of those in the city made the same decision to run for the countryside. Upon reaching the Jamuna River, the only option to cross was by boat. At that very moment, one of the boats ferrying people across capsized, collapsing upon itself by the sheer volume of people desperate to escape. What could we do now? We could die on this side of the river waiting for an unknown fate or drown fighting for a chance at life. Let us at the very least die together. When we do cross safely, it feels like a miracle: a gift from the universe. We continue on foot, for days, and when we finally reach our family in the countryside, our legs give way and we fall to our feet, in relief or grief, we cannot say. My family’s trauma lives in me, in my body and my mind. But I like to tell myself that their will to live equally continues on within me. I reflect on the obligation I have as a descendant of such a legacy. How could I, in good conscience, not support this encampment? Why had my bloodline survived unspeakable violence if I wasn’t going to stand and fight when I see this violence happening to others?
to buy a piece of cloth وتشتري قطعة قماش
and some strings, وخيوطا
The physiological experience of the encampment taught me a lot. It was very cold one day, and the sun beat down the next. It was uncomfortable and at times physically unpleasant. But I know it pales in comparison to what our counterparts, students in the besieged Gaza Strip, are facing daily, not for a week, but for over seven, weary months. Morale at the encampment withered throughout its duration — as a result of extreme pressure from the University administration from the outset, but especially during the negotiations.
(make it white with a long tail) (فلتكن بيضاء وبذيل طويل)
I have participated in many student movements in the past pertaining to gun control, climate change, and Black Lives Matter. But the environment of the encampment was markedly different. It was the first time we students possessed specific material demands rather than mere rage, and the first time I had existed in community while organizing for change. The encampment presented a daunting task, but we learned and took inspiration from the sumud Palestinians have long practiced. Things were difficult, but things have always been difficult. We are here to sit with this difficulty. Let the administration continue its tactics of intimidation, refusal, and ignorance. We endure it with each other, with our ancestors and all that was done to them. We do so on the soil of this stolen land, aware of the violence it has endured; we hold each other and the many violated lands with us.
so that a child, somewhere in Gaza كي يبصر طفل في مكان ما من ّغّزة
while looking heaven in the eye وهو يح ّّدق في السماء
Punishment for the encampment was dependent upon what you admitted to during the administrative review meeting. Being in the meeting was akin to being underwater: I could not shake the ostensibly ludicrous notion that I was being questioned for opposing the university’s intentional and unabashed support of a widely recognized war crime. Worse, during the interrogation, administrators tried to make us feel grateful that we had not been brutally arrested, violated, or suspended, like our peers were at other university campuses, including Columbia and UCLA.
awaiting his dad who left in a blaze— منتظرًاً أباه الذي رحل فجأة
and bid no one farewell دون أن يودع أحدًاً
I remember being asked if I was cognizant of the noise complaints made about the encampment. A brief glance over a handful of bullet points from the school denoted some such complaints: the one that caught my eye the most was a professor who bemoaned having to relocate their class to the room down the hall to avoid the clamor of the Main Green. It felt like a slap in the face. Moving a class next door? What a privilege to move a class next door. There are no universities left in Gaza. Where should they move their classes? What is a little bit of noise when compared to the devastation of a bomb? The frivolous line of questioning itself affirmed for me the reasons for which I joined the encampment.
not even to his flesh وال حتى لحمه
not even to himself— أو ذاته
This past year, I have been thinking more than ever about what feels to me like the diametrically opposed ideologies of peace and liberation. I can’t delude myself into ignoring the way that many people regard the struggle of the Palestinians: they will recognize Israel’s military aggression, call the genocide as it is, and above all, demand a ceasefire. A ceasefire is imperative, a ceasefire is necessary. But emphasis on purely a ceasefire erases the history of the Occupation, and whittles down the suffering of the Palestinian people to a single year or moment. I worry that the desire for a hollow peace, which manifests through focus on only the above, is louder than the desire for true liberation. Peace means that we stop seeing so many grotesque videos on our phones of decimated children. It means that Palestine and the Congo and Tigray and Sudan and every other place in the world facing exploitation at the hands of the West go back to their standard, ignorable level of suffering. It means quiet on the Main Green so that classes here don’t have to move their lesson all the way down the hall. That is not why I joined the encampment or the broader student movement at Brown. I am here for liberation, for all peoples liberation.
sees the kite, my kite you made, flying up above يبصر الطائرة الورقّية طائرتي الورقية التي صنعَتها أنت
and thinks for a moment an angel is there ويظ ّّن للحظة أن هناك مالكًاً
bringing back love يعيد الحب
There's a quote I love by aboriginal activist Lilla Watson and her activist group: “If you have come here to help me, you are wasting your time. But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together.”
When Bangladesh declared itself a sovereign state, the first imperative was recognition. The first “nation” to come forward and offer recognition was Israel. Even as it stood on faltering legs, fragile and desperate for entrance into the international community, the state of Bangladesh rejected Israel’s offer. Of course, political corruption is not limited to the West, and I don’t mean to assign honor where there isn’t any in the government of my motherland, past or present. What I honor is the symbolism of this gesture. Palestinian liberation is bound up with mine. The liberation of Bangladesh doesn’t exist without the liberation of Palestine. When I think about the manufactured famine in Gaza right now, I think about the series of famines in the Bengal region. Both Palestine and Bangladesh are two lands historically known to be fertile, bountiful, and rich in resources that were plundered and assaulted for the gains of imperialist powers.
If I must die إذا كان لا بد أن أموت
let it bring hope فليأ ِِت موتي باألمل
let it be a tale فليصبح حكاية
When we remember the Partition of 1947, we remember the Nakba of 1948. One does not exist without the other. Liberation is not a piece of paper signed to end the noise. When we see the encampments throughout campuses across the Western world, we see Gaza. We see each other. Liberation is not just divestment from violence; it is the end of the occupation and securing the Palestinian right to return. When one encampment is destroyed, three more are created. Why? Because the student uprising is powerful and fearless and abundant with love and determination. Because we are heeding the call from Refaat Alareer: “If I must die, you must live”. . . Our encampments are the white kite of which Refaat speaks — the kites that come after months of protests, arrests, sit ins, and hunger strikes. We believe that the student uprising brings hope, too. Thousands of miles away, we tell the tale.
