Saturday, Oct. 30, 2010
One Land, One People, One Cause: Asserting the Unity of the Palestinian Struggle
Presented by the U.S. Palestinian Community Network
Room: ‘Aaidoun Grand Ballroom
Saturday; 9:30-11:0am
(Presented in Arabic & English)
This plenary will analyze the current national Palestinian struggle and the crisis of our work in the diaspora and specifically in the U.S. This session will seek to explore a new, strategic way of working and thinking both politically and practically.
Palestine Film Festival Presented by the Palestine Online Store
Saturday from 9:00am-5:00pm; stop in throughout the day.
Room: Al-Kasaba Theatre (located outside of the Grand Ballroom on the main level)
Film Titles (topic, run time):
- Chronicles of a Refugee (refugees, 52 minutes)
- To Know is Not Enough (BDS, 30 minutes)
- The Land Speaks Arabic (history, 60 minutes)
- USA vs. Al-Arian (civil rights, 98 minutes)
- To Gaza with Love (activist grassroots organizing, 70 minutes)
- Women, War, and Welfare in Jerusalem (women, 35 minutes)
- Driving to Zigzigland (comedy, 92 minutes)
These films & more will be available for purchase at the Palestine Online Store table in the bazaar.
Workshop Series I
11:15am – 12:15pm
Knowing Our Rights: Protecting Our Movement and Activists
Workshop Room: Khan Younis Camp
It’s not a secret that the Palestinian movement, its organizers and supporters have been a target of repressive state policies for decades. A major part of our strategy should be to study these policies and tactics and to develop strategies to learn, assert and protect our rights. This is especially important with the ever-increasing institutionalization and legitimization of domestic national security practices created to instill fear and thwart our movements. Advancing our rights and challenging such policies are vital for the sustainability of our cause.
Solidarity and Support: From Palestine to Iraq to Chicago
(Presented in Arabic and English)
Workshop Room: Yarmouk Camp
More than 1350 Palestinians have arrived in the US as part of a re-settlement process aimed at emptying the no-man’s land desert camps in which Palestinians have been languishing since the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. This workshop seeks to discuss the reasons for Palestinian expulsion from Iraq, their conditions in the desert camps, and the work of national and local bodies in the US to help re-settle the arriving Palestinians. The workshop will seek to describe work currently done by the Chicago Committee, coordinate national support, and help build up local committees throughout the US.
Pedagogy of Self-Determination: World Education Forum in Palestine
(Presented in Arabic and English)
Workshop Room: Jenin Camp
This workshop is part of the expanded activities of the World Education Forum in Palestine, where education activists are currently meeting in Haifa, Beirut, Gaza and Ramallah to talk about how to empower Palestinian educators and students for liberation. This workshop will bring together Palestinian educators and education activists in the US to discuss liberatory strategies in each of our educational spheres, and how we can build possibilities for expanding collective understandings of theories and practices of self-determination within the Palestinian community in the US.
How to Organize a BDS Campaign on Your Campus: Lessons from UC Berkeley
Workshop Room: Shu’fat Camp
The primary goals of this workshop are to empower students to develop and execute a BDS campaign at their respective campus by helping them formulate frameworks, research skills and argumentation; to encourage student engagement with the Palestinian and Arab community in their respective cities; and to empower them to think of the Palestinian Question in relation to all other oppressed communities and in the broader context of social justice and the progressive left.
Building U.S. Support for Palestinian Popular Resistance
Workshop Room: Tul Karim Camp
Participants in this workshop will briefly outline the history of nonviolent Palestinian popular resistance then frame that history and the multiple ongoing efforts in Palestine in the context of organizing support in the United States. This participatory workshop intends to produce concrete, actionable results.
Gender and Palestine: Examining National Liberation and Women’s Liberation
Workshop Room: Jabalia Camp
This workshop will examine the role of women’s liberation in the project of national liberation. What are the particular experiences of women living under Israeli military occupation and in the diaspora? How are perceptions of gender used to perpetuate the colonization of the homeland? How do we define women’s liberation, and what steps should be taken to empower this process?
Seven Sisters, Seven Struggles: Building Palestinian Women Solidarity
Workshop Room: Rafah Camp
Through the ‘Seven Sisters, Seven Struggles’ campaign of Ella’s Daughters, our hope is to draw upon connections and build coalitions with fellow sisters in other social justice movements in the U.S, in order to build solidarity between these movements and Palestine. Through these connections, we want to chip away at political isolationism and work towards realizing how similar our struggles are, and how through working together, we are strengthening the movement for justice in Palestine.
Empowering the Palestinian Family in the U.S. by Empowering Palestinian Women
Workshop Room: Ein El Hilweh Camp
Palestinians families living in the US face the same challenges as other families living in any given community in the US. Do Palestinian women know where to turn for assistance or advice; do they know the resources and services available to them as members of their communities? Even if they do know, do they actually know how to access these resources, which may be at times essential for survival? The aim of this workshop is to raise awareness of the needs of Palestinian women and their families living in the US.
Workshop Series II
1:45-3:00pm
From Palestine to the US: Palestinian Political Prisoners
Workshop Room: Tul Karim Camp
The workshop’s objective will be to discuss ways of building a massive social campaign aimed at utilizing the media and the Internet to defend Palestinian prisoners in Palestine and the US. Special attention will be given to the case of the Holy Land Five, Palestinian-American political prisoners since November 24, 2008.
Consequences of War and Occupation on Palestinian Women in Palestine and in the Shatat
(Presented in Arabic and English)
Workshop Room: Shu’fat Camp
Activist Palestinian women leaders from Palestine and Lebanon will explore the effects of occupation, war and oppression on Palestinian families and society. Presented by speakers from the General Union of Palestinian Women in Palestine, Najdeh Association in Lebanon, and Mothers’ Society in Palestine.
Confronting Zionism and Normalization on Campus
Workshop Room: Yarmouk Camp
In recent years, as part of their Rebrand Israel campaign, campus Zionist organizations have attempted to normalize relations between Palestine solidarity groups and Zionist groups under the guise of being pro-peace and pro-dialogue. This workshop will explore why these types of events are counter-productive and mislead the student body about the nature of the colonization of Palestine. This conclusion derives from working with Columbia Students for Justice in Palestine and its struggle against Zionist organizations on campus. The workshop will also present the typical Zionist arguments and how to respond to them. It will review training material provided to student groups by national Zionist organizations including The David Project, StandWithUs and the Israel Project.
Popularizing Palestinian Youth Mobilizing in the Current US Socio-Political Climate
Workshop Room: Rafah Camp
Members of the Palestinian Youth Network will examine the current challenges confronting Palestinian Youth activism in the US today. By examining the various conditions, identities, and issues that complicate justice centered mobilizing and activism for young people of our time, both within the US and international landscape, we are better able to examine how to overcome the various barriers we are confronted with. The significance of young Palestinian based institutions and the principles which they embody will be explored, specifically examining the revitalization of the General Union of Palestinian Students on campuses across the US, as well as establishing the US national chapter for the Palestinian Youth Network
Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions: The Role of the Palestinian and Arab Communities
Workshop Room: Ein El Hilweh Camp
The global BDS struggle stems from a call emanating from Palestine, and is led, ideologically and organizationally, by Palestinians, including those in the US. This workshop will discuss, strategize and develop an action plan on how the Palestinian community can critically advance BDS in the United States through their support, organizing efforts, and leadership.
No More Waiting: Taking Back Our Land and Right to Representation
Workshop Room: Jenin Camp
This workshop will create and put into action plans and strategies for Palestinians to exercise their national, civil, and political and human rights, both in Palestine and in exile. These include a project to Return from Exile by air without awaiting permission from any authority, to Enter and Remain (squatting), to challenge the Jewish National Fund through legal and other means, to build mechanisms for Palestinians in the Diaspora to participate in Palestinian Political Systems (e.g. absentee voting in elections and referenda), and to challenge US policies that affect Palestinian rights (e.g. FTO and OFAC designations, foreign policy, etc.), to record, mobilize and sue locally and internationally for land and water theft, and to build political participation for Palestinian issues in the US through community and institutional mechanisms
The Time is Now: Standing with those Attacked by the FBI for their Palestine Support Work
Workshop Room: Jabalia Camp
This workshop will explore different ways of building solidarity and political support for the activists who were raided and served subpoenas by the FBI on September 24th, 2010. Presenters are from the Chicago Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild, Black People Against Police Torture and the National Boricua Human Rights Network.
Connecting Palestinian Women in the US & Palestine: Collaborative Economic Empowerment Projects
(Presented in Arabic and English)
Workshop Room: Khan Younis Camp
This workshop will discuss the current status, and projects for the creation of partnerships between Palestinian women in the United States and the homeland. The general concentration will be economic empowerment and financial independence of Palestinian women. More specifically, an emphasis will be placed on raising funds in the United States through community events to help establish women-led cooperatives and factories in Palestine.
Palestinian Movement Assemblies (PMAs)
3:15-5:30pm
What is a Palestinian Movement Assembly?
Palestinian Movement Assemblies represent a powerful method of building for our liberation movement and our community and associational life in the US. They provide an organizing strategy for us to enter the Popular Conference with our own ideas, and emerge with stronger coordination, more defined directions and mandates for change. PMAs seek to empower Palestinians in the US to learn together and from each other, and take control of their own movement for justice.
The PMAs will be coordinated by several Palestinian organizers representing various parts of our community who will facilitate discussion around how to best advance our struggle within our particular localities, as a US community, and as part of the Palestinian people. Community members come together to set priorities for our movement, think together about ways to intensify collaboration, and develop Action Proposals to be adopted by the General Assembly and implemented by our community as a whole. In our PMAs, we will lift each other’s voices as we think collectively. All of us have a place within our movement, and all of us must participate.
The 4 Palestinian Movement Assemblies will be held on:
- Political and Civil Rights
- The Palestinian and Arab Student Movement
- The Palestinian and Arab Women’s Movement
- Community Centers and Associations
The PMAs will culminate in the General Assembly on Sunday, October 31st, where Action Proposals will be voted on and adopted. Representatives from each PMA will gather to synthesize all Action Proposals and PMA recommendations into a National Call to Action for the Palestinian Community in the United States.
Sunday, Oct. 31, 2010
Trans-Arab Research Institute (TARI) Panel: Israeli Apartheid, and Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS)
Room: ‘Aaidoun Grand Ballroom
9:15-10:45am
The panel addresses the nature of Israel’s colonialism, it uniqueness, and similarities with the South African Apartheid regime. It also addresses the value and practice of BDS (Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions) in the US as well as globally. It illuminates the role and lessons of the BDS in the success of the South African struggle.
General Assembly
Room: ‘Aaidoun Grand Ballroom
11:00-3:00pm
As Palestinians in the shatat [diaspora], we must continue to strengthen our grassroots popular movement. Democratic participation is the only way to safeguard our self-determination and continue to resist for our national rights.
We therefore strongly urge you attend this Assembly as we equally participate in shaping the direction and agenda of our community in the months and years ahead. USPCN is held accountable for its national work by its membership.
To that end, this General Assembly will:
- Vote to adopt Bylaws that safeguard our internal democratic process;
- Elect National Facilitator members of the Coordinating Committee and encourage the ongoing local elections for local representatives to the Coordinating Committee;
- Issue a National Call to Action that sets the agenda and timeline for national action and work based upon the Action Proposals submitted by the Palestinian Movement Assemblies and Workshops.