The author, Pauline Park, at the gap in the separation wall at Al-Wallaja east of the Israeli frontier. (Photo courtesy Park)

Pinkwashing & Israeli occupation – not so complicated
By Pauline Park
Washington Blade
January 6, 2014

“The concept of ‘pinkwashing’ emerged as a hot topic throughout the week,” Kevin Naff wrote of his participation as part of “a delegation of nine LGBT leaders from the United States” to Israel in November (“Israel as ‘gay heaven’? It’s complicated,” Times of Israel, Nov. 10). The delegation tour was sponsored by Project Interchange, a program of the American Jewish Committee, which is aggressive in its defense of the Israeli occupation of Palestine.

Naff quotes a speaker who addressed the group, Gal Uchovsky, as telling the delegates “that we had arrived in ‘gay heaven’” and that Israel is “the best LGBT country in the world” whose “LGBT residents face no serious problems that he could identify.” My Israeli friends would certainly contest Uchovsky’s absurd claim that LGBT Israelis “face no serious problems.” Fortuntely, Naff was able to recognize Uchovsky’s propaganda for what it was.

One would get a very different impression speaking primarily or exclusively with wealthy gay Jewish Israeli men in North Tel Aviv — as Naff and his fellow delegates seem to have done — than if one spoke with LGBT Israelis from more marginalized communities, including lesbians and bisexuals, who often feel marginalized by gay men in Tel Aviv and elsewhere in Israel; transgendered women, who face police harassment and brutality in Tel Aviv and other cities in Israel just as they do in New York and other U.S. cities; Israelis who face discrimination because of their of Mizrahi (Sephardic) Jewish ethnic origins; or refugees from Africa and elsewhere who may be LGBT (though not necessarily openly so) but who have no right to remain in Israel, because the state of Israel does not recognize non-Jewish economic refugees or those fleeing political persecution — regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

And that’s not even to mention the pervasive discrimination that Palestinians with Israeli citizenship face. As Prof. David Lloyd argued persuasively in a December 2013 analysis for the Electronic Intifada, the crucial distinction between “citizenship” (ezrahut) and “nationality” (le’um) in Israeli law privileges Jewish Israelis over Palestinians living in Israel because “citizenship” is in effect a second-class citizenship without nationality status.

“Some critics claim the country’s embrace of LGBT rights is merely a propaganda effort to claim the mantle of modernity and establish a stark contrast to homophobic regimes in the West Bank, Gaza and elsewhere in the Middle East,” Naff writes. In doing so, Naff is in fact rearticulating the very discourse in which Uchovsky was engaging in when describing Israel as a gay paradise — the attempt to use Israel’s record on gay rights (supposedly better than that of its Arab and Muslim neighbors) as a justification for an Israeli occupation that is illegal under international law, or at the very least as a means to distract attention from it.

Naff’s delegation appears to have met with only one Palestinian — “a scholar and Fatah and PLO adviser,” Abu Zayyad. But meeting with a single official with the Palestinian Authority — widely viewed by many West Bank Palestinians as little more than a tool of the Israeli occupation — hardly constitutes balance when the rest of the tour was devoted to meeting with LGBT Israelis and Israeli officials.

“The focus of the visit — LGBT issues — was often overshadowed by the frustrating stalemate of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Why can’t the two sides come to an agreement on a two-state solution? It’s complicated,” Naff writes. And yet, is the issue of the Israeli occupation of Palestine really that complicated? For all of the complications and complexities of the situation, it is at root quite simple: the indigenous people who have lived in Palestine for centuries are being systematically dispossessed of their land and their rights by a foreign military occupation that is illegal under international law and that even the United States does not recognize as legitimate. And that occupation makes no exception for Palestinians who might be LGBT/queer, who face the same restrictions and daily humiliations living under Israeli occupation as non-LGBT Palestinians. And contrary to propaganda in circulation, Israel is not and cannot be a haven or a refuge for LGBT Palestinians because there is no such thing as refugee status for non-Jews in Israel, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity.

Rather than hearing pinkwashing propaganda from the likes of Gal Uchovsky, Naff and his colleagues would have learned far more if they had met with Palestinian villagers and farmers under siege from Israeli settlers and the Israeli military in the West Bank, as I have. I participated in the first U.S. LGBTQ delegation tour of Palestine in January 2012 and met with many Palestinians — both LGBT and non-LGBT — throughout the West Bank, from Nablus in the north to Hebron in the south and Ramallah in between. Staying two nights with a Palestinian family in Dheishe in Bethelem, one of the largest refugee camps in the West Bank, I had the opportunity to speak at length with Palestinians about conditions in the occupied territories.

Naff expresses his disappointment with the decision of alQaws and Aswat to decline the invitation to meet with his delegation. AlQaws and Aswat, two of the leading Palestinian LGBT groups, are doing vital work on behalf of queer Palestinians under extremely difficult circumstances that no U.S.-based LGBT organization has to face. The 16 members of my delegation met with members of both alQaws and Aswat for extensive discussions about the impact of the occupation on LGBT Palestinians, and those discussions were productive and enlightening. It seems to me that Naff’s group of relatively privileged LGBT Americans should have recognized how problematic it was to demand that LGBT/queer Palestinians either facing pervasive discrimination within Israel or living under a crushing foreign military occupation in the West Bank engage them in dialogue, which is the privilege of the powerful. True dialogue is simply not possible when one party is holding a gun to the other’s head, which is what “dialogue” with a people living under a brutal and illegal military occupation represents.

I might add that members of Naff’s delegation could have found opportunities to engage with LGBT/queer Palestinians even before leaving the U.S. and could do so now that they are back from their tour; they can also feel free to engage members of New York City Queers Against Israeli Apartheid if they wish to hear our views on Palestinians and the Israeli occupation.

The conclusion I have come to is that pinkwashing does nothing for queer Palestinians and arguably makes things worse by generating more support for Israel and the occupation in the U.S., Europe and elsewhere. The liberation of queer Palestinians is inseparable from that of Palestinian society as a whole; whatever privileges wealthy gay Jewish Israeli men may enjoy in the affluent districts of North Tel Aviv do nothing for queer Palestinians being crushed by a brutal and illegal foreign military occupation that is daily dispossessing more and more Palestinians of their lands and their homes.

Given the intransigence of the government of Binyamin Netanyahu — the most right-wing prime minister in Israeli history — and his determination to move forward with the ethnic cleansing of East Jerusalem and the de facto annexation of the West Bank, it seems to me that only boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against apartheid Israel will advance the cause of the peaceful resolution of the impasse that the Israeli government itself has created with its endless occupation of Palestine and construction of an apartheid regime.

Pauline Park is a member of New York City Queers Against Israeli Apartheid, founded in 2011. She was a member of the first U.S. LGBTQ delegation to Palestine in January 2012.

(Kevin Naff responds: After members of our LGBT delegation expressed concerns that we were not given access to more of the Palestinian perspective, Project Interchange arranged a follow-up conference call in November with Dr. Khalil Shikaki, director of the Palestinian Center for Policy & Survey Research. I shared Pauline Park’s concerns over pinkwashing, but Project Interchange worked hard to present a balanced itinerary, which included visits to the West Bank, Ramallah and the edge of the Gaza Strip. I welcome Park’s invitation to learn more about NYCQAIA and will follow up with her.)

This op-ed was published by the Washington Blade and appeared in the 6 January 2014 issue of the paper.

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To the Editors:

Re: “Bloomberg faulted for mixed record on gay issues” (news, June 29)

There is one major omission in Joshua Lynsen’s article — mention of the Dignity in All Schools Act, enacted in 2004 by the New York City Council over Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s veto. DASA prohibits bias harassment based on sexual orientation and gender identity or expression (as well as race, religion, ethnicity, disability and medical condition), and the training required by DASA would do much to combat the epidemic of homophobic and transgender-phobic harassment in our city’s schools.

But Bloomberg has called DASA “a silly law” and his administration refuses to implement the duly enacted statute. Just as on marriage, Bloomberg pledged to lobby the state legislature on the Dignity for All Students Act, but the mayor has done nothing to help move that bill through the Republican-controlled Senate, where it is currently stalled (primarily because of its transgender-inclusive language).

The article mentions the Empire State Pride Agenda’s praise for Bloomberg for signing the transgender rights bill into law; but the mayor had little choice, as the City Council passed it by a 45-5 vote, so any veto would have been swiftly overridden. The New York Association for Gender Rights Advocacy, which led the campaign for that landmark legislation, working in partnership with the Pride Agenda, worked with other groups and the City Commission on Human Rights on guidelines for implementation of the law, but they were issued in December 2004 only after considerable resistance from the mayor’s office.

And because Bloomberg has under-funded the Commission, the task of educating employers and the public about the provisions of the law has fallen to a few small, under-funded transgender advocacy organizations here.

Yes, we would have same-sex marriage in New York City if it were not for Bloomberg’s appeal of the lower court ruling, but his hypocrisy on marriage is part of a larger pattern. High-level appointments to his administration and an elaborate annual Pride event at Gracie Mansion are part of a larger strategy to co-opt LGBT community leaders and organizations.

Anyone who is under the common misapprehension that our mayor is “pro-gay” needs only talk with activists here in New York to learn how truly dismal Bloomberg’s record on LGBT issues really is.

PAULINE PARK
New York

Editors’ note: The writer is chair of the New York Association for Gender Rights Advocacy.

This letter to the editor originally appeared in the 6 July 2007 issue of the Washington Blade, which is now defunct.

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It is important to point out that neither Cleve Jones nor David Mixner — the unelected, self-appointed leaders of their very own LGBT movement — consulted with a single state or local organization before putting themselves at the head of the parade, as it were; they are now asking (demanding, really) for support for this ill-conceived mess of a ‘march’ that at best will yield no positive results for the community.

It’s also important to point out that Jones & Mixner called this march before securing permits. Given the reputation of the Washington, D.C. police for police brutality, to send youth, seniors, transgendered people and people with disabilities to a non-permitted march and put them in a position of being vulnerable to arrest and imprisonment in my view was simply unethical — all the more so since Jones & Mixner have not been honest about the permit situation or its implications for vulnerable members of our community.

It’s also important to point out that there is no structure for financial accountability for the money being donated to this march, which is so reminiscent of the Millenium March; that event took place in 2000, but there has still been no accounting for the finances for that march a full nine years later. (The Millenium March board was actually investigated by the FBI for fraud, but no one — unfortunately — was prosecuted for it.) I’m going to go out on a limb and make a prediction here: we will never know how the donations now being solicited by Mixner & Jones were actually used, because they will never tell us.

It is an unusual experience for me to be in agreement with Barney Frank, but I have to agree with him on this: this ‘march’ will not accomplish anything positive for the LGBT community. It’s important to point out that no national LGBT march on Washington has ever moved legislation; the inclusive ENDA & federal hate crimes bills are already moving forward, and there are more effective ways of advancing legislation to repeal the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell (DADT).

What the march will do is divert scarce resources from those state and local organizations doing the real work of the movement just at a moment when they most need resources because of the recession. In fact, a lot of state and local organizations already have events planned for Oct 11 — which is National Coming Out Day — and so the scheduling of this march on that day will force many of those organizations to choose between continuing to organize events in their home communities or send members to Washington.

It is the height of arrogance for Jones & Mixner to claim that this march will help organize the community at the state and local level. In fact, there is already a strong infrastructure at the state level — the Equality Federation (formerly, the Federation of Statewide LGBT Advocacy Organizations). At the Equality Federation annual summer meeting in St. Louis earlier this month, representatives of statewide LGBT advocacy organizations from across the country held one meeting specifically to discuss Cleve Jones’ appeal to the Federation to endorse the march; while a few people spoke in favor, the overwhelming majority opposed the march and urged Toni Broaddus (the Federation’s executive director) to issue a statement distancing the Federation from it, which she did in an op-ed in the Washington Blade.

There are serious process issues with this march as well as substantive, stragetic and tactical issues, as indicated by Steve Ault in his op-ed for Gay City News. Steve was co-coordinator of the first National March on Washington for Lesbian & Gay Rights in 1979 (which I participated in), and co-chair of the second in 1987, and his analysis of the march should be carefully considered by anyone thinking about heading to Washington on Oct. 11. 

It is becoming increasingly apparent to me that this non-event will do little if anything to advance marriage equality, transgender rights or any of the other important elements of the LGBT movement’s agenda. If you do want to advance marriage equality, go to Maine. We have the chance to win full marriage rights at the ballot box for the first time in the history of the United States, but that will only come through work in Maine, not from an ill-timed and ill-conceived national march on Washington.

As an openly transgendered woman of color, I feel compelled to point out that the march was called and is being pushed by two gay white men with no consultation whatsoever with members of the community they claim to represent. A ‘march’ that purports to represent the entire LGBT community but whose organizers have excluded youth, women, transgendered and bisexual people and people of color from any significant decision-making role in the planning process is a march that lacks any legitimacy in claiming to represent me, and I cannot support it.

Do not be deceived by the propaganda coming from the head honchos: this ‘march’ is not a grassroots effort in any meaningful sense of the term; this is not a road trip, it’s an ego trip.

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