Gaza is Not for Sale!

"The West Bank, the Gaza Strip

The West Bank, the Gaza Strip

The West Bank, the Gaza Strip

Soon to be parking lots

For American tourists 

And fascist cops, yeah"

These are some of the lyrics featured in the song "Haillie Sellasse, Up Your Ass" by the punk band Propagandhi. The song, which heavily critiques religion, was written in 1993. Despite being written 32 years ago, however, it has held up pretty well (despite some problematic lyrics at the beginning of the song*). The lyrics I quoted above are extremely accurate even today, especially given that Trump has been talking about ethnically cleansing Palestinians from Gaza and building resorts for the wealthy over mass graves and homes, hospitals, and cultural sites that have been reduced to rubble by Israeli bombs during Israel's genocidal attack on Gaza that took place for 15 months (and is likely to start up again soon).

Today, Trump shared an appalling AI generated video on social media. The video showcased his vision for the Gaza Strip. In it, Trump, Elon Musk, and Benjamin Netanyahu can be seen hanging out in an AI-generated Gaza as kids play on a beach and a bizarre, AI generated song plays in the background. The video also appears to show several resorts, one of which is called "Trump Gaza" (the song in the background of the video is all about how "Trump Gaza is #1"). In addition to all this, there are several shots in the video where golden Trump statues can be seen everywhere. I truly do not have the words to describe how sick this video made me feel when I watched it for the first time.

Gaza is not for sale, no matter how much Trump tries to make it seem like it is. The Palestinian people are a resilient people, and they will and should remain on their land. May Palestine someday be free.

Link to the video I mentioned: https://youtu.be/PslOp883rfI?si=KN89sgLsPBQQCQCB

* The lyrics in question go as follows: 

"You speak of Rastafari, but how can you justify 

Belief in a God that's left you behind?

You simply fill the gap between the upper and lower class

And your faith merely keeps you in line"

Chris Hannah, the member of the band who wrote these lyrics as a teenager, is not proud of these lyrics due to the fact that he attacked Rastafarianism in them. The whole reason he wrote these lyrics in the first place was because he was disappointed that Bad Brains, another punk band and one of Hannah's favorites, wrote a homophobic song shortly after converting to Rastafarianism. It should be noted that Bad Brains later apologized for making this song and that Propagandhi later changed the lyrics in the first verse of "Haillie Sellasse, Up Your Ass" to:

"We reach our hands to the sky, but how can we justify

Belief in a God that's left us behind?

Have we simply filled the gap between the upper and lower class

Does our faith merely keep us in line?"