“Despite the unique characteristics of each social/political/environmental struggle, they all aim to dismantle structures perpetuating injustice. The Palestinian fight for freedom mirrors the global fight against colonialism and racism. Palestinians experience both physical and structural violence within their homeland”, wrote last September in A*DESK, Artists + Allies x Hebron (AAH), our resident editors, whose thematic focus was Intersectional Solidarity.

One month later, our resident editor, Constanza Mendoza, expressed his helplessness in the face of the violence and genocide that is happening before our eyes.: “In the last few days I am unable to find the emotional and political vocabulary to write this text. The words are wrong, vague and superfluous in the face of the Palestinian genocide after 75 years of colonisation and the mass murder and kidnapping of Israeli civilians. With horror in my body I hold on even tighter to the idea of imagining a horizon of hope that a different world is possible. I refuse to accept the world I live in without resistance. As fragile as my voice is and as weak as my actions are, I must articulate that resistance and my field of action to do so is art and writing.”.

While the citizens of many countries are demonstrating in favor of a ceasefire and against the ambiguous statements of many of their governments, A*DESK echoes the letter “signed by more than a thousand art and culture workers to demand that Spanish cultural institutions break their silence on the situation in Palestine. The petition is a call to action to take a clear position, demand the entry of humanitarian aid, the immediate ceasefire in Gaza and apply BDS policies (…) The success of the document, which has been endorsed by workers from different centers since last Thursday, November 2, contrasts with the silence of most cultural institutions“.

[Featured image from WHO, showing the widespread destruction in the Gaza Strip following Israeli airstrikes on October 10, 2023].