Statement of solidarity with the Standing Rock Sioux tribe

We the undersigned Palestinians – artists, academics, activists, elders, laborers, musicians, authors, businesspersons, attorneys, students – hereby declare our unqualified and heartfelt solidarity with the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe in their epic struggle to protect what remains of their ancestral lands, waters and sacred sites.

As an indigenous people whose lands have been robbed and pillaged, and who face existential settler-colonial expansion in Palestine, we recognize that Native American and First Nation peoples have endured centuries of violent settler colonialism that has dismantled and robbed them of home, heritage, dignity, security, narrative, land, language, identity, family, trees, cemeteries, animals, livelihoods and life.

We recognize the multitude of ways that Native American and First Nation struggles to protect indigenous territories have ultimately been struggles on behalf of all of humanity to save the Earth we share from toxic globalization of neoliberal and capitalist ethos that threaten our collective survival.

We also heed the wise leadership of a people who first conceived of mountains and rivers as sacred, who look upon a prairie with reverence, who consider trees as family and who risk their lives to protect the water and the integrity of their ancestral lands.

With respect, love, solidarity and hope,

Leila Abdelrazaq, author and artist
Rabab Ibrahim Abdulhadi, senior scholar, Arab and Muslim Ethnicities and Diasporas Studies, SFSU
Rinad Abdullah, human rights and international law attorney
Tarek Abuata, executive director, Friends of Sabeel North America
Susan Abulhawa, writer
Ahmad Abuznaid, human rights attorney and organizer
Enas I. aL-Muthaffar, film director and producer
Dina Alzeer, journalist
Issa Amro, human rights activist, Youth Against Settlements in Hebron
Iman Annab
Huwaida Arraf, civil/human rights attorney and activist
Mariam Arraf, Detroiter
Hanan Ashrawi, PLO Executive Committee
Sa’ed Atshan, academic
George Awwad, human rights activist
Zeina Azzam, writer and educator
Sam Bahour, Palestinian-American writer, businessperson and activist
Rana Baker, student and journalist
Mariam Barghouti, activist and writer
Ramzy Baroud, journalist and author
Iyad Burnat – Bil’in Popular Committee
Diana Buttu, human rights attorney
Shirien D.
Lamis Deek, human rights attorney
Azzam Elder, attorney
Nazmi Elder
Shareen Elder
Joeseph Elder
Jasmine Elder
Laila Elhaddad, author, activist and journalist
Ismail El Zabri
Philip Farah, co-chairman, Washington Interfaith Alliance for Middle East Peace
Reem Farah, CCD
Hala Gabriel, filmmaker and activist
Tamar Ghabin
Budour Hassan, writer
Zaha Hassan, human rights lawyer and writer
Thayer Hastings
Saleh Hijazi, human rights activist
Gus Hussein
Ramzi Jaber
Nour Joudah
Alaa Juma
Andrew Kadi, steering committee of US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation
Remi Kanazi, poet and organizer
Hanna Kawas, journalist and activist
Tanya Keilani
Reem El-Khatib, humanitarian
Noura Khouri, writer and activist
George Khoury, Nakba survivor
Samia Khoury, Palestinian elder, author, and university trustee
Nerdeen Kiswani, NYC Students for Justice in Palestine
Dalell D. Mohmed
Yousef Munayyer, executive director of US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation
Jumana Musa, human rights attorney
Izzaddine Mustafa
Khalil Nakhleh, PhD, Palestinian anthropologist, researcher and author
Lois Nakhleh, botanical artist
Amira Nassim, student
Ali Omar, activist and academic
Mazin Qumsiyeh, professor and director, Palestine Museum of Natural History
Fadi Quran
Tareq Radi, artist and student
Tamara Reem, human rights attorney
Nadia Saah
Samah Sabawi, poet and activist
Mahdi Sabbagh, architect and urbanist
Steven Salaita, scholar and writer
May Seikaly
S.R. Shafie RPh.
Dina Shana’a, US Palestinian Community Network
Halla Shoaibi, assistant professor of law, Birzeit University
Samee Sulaiman, PhD student
Sandra Tamari, St Louis Palestine Solidarity Committee
Steve Tamari, educator
Karimah Tarazi, RN BS MFA
Randa Wahbe
Hurriyah Ziada
Raya Ziada