Global Solidarity and the Politics of Pinkwashing Part 1

Honestly, I was having a lot of trouble with this reading, but one part of the reading that I found to be inetresting was the story of Mohammed Abu Khdeir. He was a Palestinian who was kidnapped and killed by Israelis. The Israelis lied and claimed that he was gay and that his own family killed him. This wasn’t true, but people believed it because of stereotypes about Palestinians. This upset me because its a clear example of pinkwashing. In this case, they used a fake story about Abu Khdeir’s sexuality to make Palestinians look violent and to distract from the fact that he was killed by Israelis. What bothered me the most was how this hurt the rest of the LGBTQ Palestinian community as well. Their identity was used as a tool to push a political message. The murder became a tool to make Palestinians look like the enemy and the LGBTQ Palestinians were hurt by this because it pushed a story that made it seem like a Palestianian cannot be queer. Abu Khdeir didn’t get the respect he deserved and his story was used to blame his people instead of getting justice for him. Supporting LGBTQ people should never mean lying or covering up violence. We should care about all gay people, including Palestinians and not let their lives be used for an agenda. This part of the reading really opened my eyes to how complicated and unfair these situations can be and many Palestinians are taken advatage of.