Open Letter to the LGBTIQ Community and WorldPride Participants

Open Letter to the LGBTIQ Community and WorldPride Participants

As LGBTIQ Muslims and allies, the Al-Fatiha Foundation is torn, but united in our boycott of WorldPride in Jerusalem. As a religious organization, Al-Fatiha embraces the great symbolism that WorldPride in Jerusalem represents: the bringing together of LGBTIQ people in a city regarded as holy by Islam, Judaism and Christianity. Yet, this WorldPride will not be a bringing together of people; Palestinians and the vast majority of Muslims will continue to be denied access to the city of Jerusalem. Al-Fatiha cannot, in good faith, support participation in WorldPride held in a segregated Jerusalem, under an Israeli apartheid system.

There is no pride in a system of apartheid institutionalized by the Israeli government and enforced by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) against Palestinian civilians. Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza are routinely denied freedom of movement and unrestricted access to Jerusalem. Palestinians must carry identity cards to go anywhere, and if granted, special permits to enter or exit Jerusalem. Every day, Palestinians must endure numerous checkpoints which restrict and often prohibit their travel for work, for education, and for healthcare. The escalating violence targeting civilians in Palestine/Israel precludes freedom of movement for everyone, regardless of sexuality, religion or ethnicity.

There is no pride in collective punishment of millions of people, in wholesale denial of food, water, adequate shelter, right to property, freedom of movement, access to health care and hospitals, access to education, right to earn a living, right to integrity and liberty. These are basic human rights. And, these are human rights that are systematically violated by policies and practices of the Israeli government and the IDF on a daily basis throughout Palestine.

The recent Israeli bombing of a water treatment plant and the sole power plant that supplies electricity to sixty-five percent of Gaza Strip's 1.4 million inhabitants is just one example of collective punishment experienced by all Palestinians--regardless of religion, political or ideological persuasion, sexual _expression or identity. To date, thousands of Palestinians are still without access to clean water and electricity during the hottest summer months.

In addition, the recent systematic violence by Israel targeting civilian lives in Lebanon and the deliberate annihilation of Lebanese infrastructure of water and electric power plants, airports, seaports, highways, schools and hospitals further widens the scope of collective punishment of millions of innocent civilians.

As an organization, and as a community that spans all continents of the globe, Al-Fatiha stands for justice, peace and self-determination for all people. We believe that all people have the inherent right to liberty, and to freedom of sexual and religious _expression. We equally believe that all people have inviolable human rights, regardless of ethnicity, culture, or nationality.

The Al-Fatiha Foundation stands in solidarity with the many individuals and organizations, such as ASWAT and Helem, which are actively working for nonviolent, peaceful solutions to the violations of human rights in Palestine/Israel, and now Lebanon. We envision a time when all people, regardless of faith, sexuality, gender, ethnicity, culture, or nationality, may celebrate a true WorldPride in a united Jerusalem.

In Struggle and Solidarity,

Al-Fatiha Board of Directors
http://www.al-fatiha.org/

Why We Can No Longer Look the Other Way

Why We Can No Longer Look the Other Way
By Kerry Lobel and Julie Dorf

It might seem rather myopic, even self-centered, to focus on an LGBTQ rights demonstration in Israel during times like these. For now, Jerusalem WorldPride is still on after much debate. Its organizers are even more determined to sound a message of peace and tolerance in the midst of growing chaos in the region, but they can't do it alone.

As foreigners, it's hard to imagine that business goes on as usual in Jerusalem. We see unending images of complete destruction in Southern Lebanon, and attacks on Northern Israel. Since the Israeli siege in Gaza earlier this summer, many activists, understandably, have found it difficult to call for a focus on LGBTQ issues in the heart of an occupied country at war knowing that Palestinians in Gaza do without water and electricity under the 100 degree summer heat and that the Israeli army bombs not only Hamas and Hezbollah leaders, but roads, power lines, and innocent families, displacing more than 600,000 people.

However, with international attention now on this part of the globe, WorldPride can and must be seen as part of a wider social justice agenda. Together, we must seize this opportunity to show the interconnectedness of all movements for liberation.

In the two weeks prior to the Hezbollah capture of two Israeli soldiers, WorldPride Jerusalem organizers and LGBTQ leaders from around the world mounted a sustained and necessary response to anti-LGBTQ attacks and death threats by right wing religious leaders, particularly from the ultra- Orthodox Jewish community. These are the same leaders who support the settler movement, and who oppose the creation of a Palestinian state.

Calls by extremists for the world's largest anti-gay demonstration, combined with violence in the region, has led Jerusalem authorities to deny WorldPride organizers the permit needed to march. The connection between anti-LGBTQ and anti-Palestinian attacks has been made for us, and these attacks are escalating on both fronts.

With the escalating violence in Israel, Gaza, the West Bank, and Lebanon, it is time for LGBTQ leaders to help WorldPride organizers make real their pledge to use this critical moment and world stage to show solidarity with Palestinians and Israeli peace and justice activists by calling for an end to the occupation, at the same time as calling for the end to religious intolerance. Together, we can work for a just resolution to this decades-long conflict.

The WorldPride Jerusalem 2006 website reads:

The reality that surrounds us is one of violent conflict and decades-long occupation. While painful enough, it is becoming even more painful as a result of the separation wall being built up over the last 2 years, which physically divides Jerusalem and leaves many Jerusalemites behind the wall, denying access to most of Jerusalem for Palestinians, including members from our LGBTQ community.

Our commitment &is to challenge the hostile environment around us and stand behind our principles. The separation wall hurts everyone in our community. Within the official program of the Jerusalem WorldPride events this August, we want to express our solidarity with our community's members who will not be able to be part of World Pride&"

As the WorldPride Jerusalem 2006 organizers wrote, "Holding WorldPride in Jerusalem the city at the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a significant opportunity for our diverse community to raise a different voice, a voice for progressive moral values, inclusion, and pluralism."

If WorldPride organizers can speak out against the occupation, our LGBTQ leaders from around the world can do no less. As an LGBTQ movement, we have the responsibility to promote our own deeply held values of human equality and civil rights and to speak out against injustice wherever and however we find it.

For those of us spending WorldPride week at home, we can take action to bring peace to Israel and Palestine, and now Lebanon. Kerry Lobel will be standing with Women in Black in the Bay Area to call for an end to the occupation. For more information about an action near you, contact www.bayareawomeninblack.org.

For those who are attending Jerusalem WorldPride, please join Julie Dorf, WorldPride U.S. co-chair, who will stand along with WorldPride Organizers in solidarity with Palestinians on Monday, August 7th at a Solidarity Rally at the Jerusalem Separation Wall at 17:00. More information about the Rally location can be found at www.worldpride.net.

With our every action, we can bring peace. Rabbi Shimon Ben Gamliel said, "On three things the world stands: on justice, on truth, and on peace." (Zechariah 8:16)

Kerry Lobel is the former Executive Director of the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force and is a consultant to national and international LGBT and feminist organizations. She can be reached at kerrylobel@thechangegroup.org

Julie Dorf is the founder of the International Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission, and is Chair of the advisory committee to Human Rights Watch's LGBT Rights Program.