Student Intifada: The fifth column of the Palestinian Resistance

Youssef Siher 

Source: Al Mayadeen English

The colonized people, long subjected to systemic oppression and exploitation, eventually reach a breaking point where passive resistance gives way to active struggle.

Colonial rule is maintained through violence and repression. There are no alternatives. Colonized populations remain colonized only with the total suppression of their freedoms and their social, political, and cultural structures. This simple notion is not studied at all in Western history books, but it is literally like that. We have seen a concrete example in Palestine since 1948. Another thing that history books don't tell us is that decolonization is, by its nature and using the words of Franz Fanon, "a violent phenomenon." Fanon also explained that in decolonization processes there is always "a point of no return," marked by an enormous and all-encompassing repression that overwhelms all sectors of the colonial people. Decolonization is a transformative process that fundamentally alters the power dynamics between the colonizer and the colonized. It involves a profound upheaval that dismantles the established order. The colonized people, long subjected to systemic oppression and exploitation, eventually reach a breaking point where passive resistance gives way to active struggle. This struggle is not just physical but also ideological, as it seeks to reclaim identity, culture, and autonomy that have been systematically eroded by colonial rule. 

In the process of decolonization of Palestine, we can very well make this "point of no return" coincide with October 7. That date is a watershed moment, the first ray of the dawn of a new era. It is the prologue to the end of Zionism and, with it, the last chapter of the Western colonial era. October 7 symbolizes a critical juncture where the cumulative effects of prolonged subjugation and the indomitable spirit of resistance converge, catalyzing a movement toward self-determination and liberation. Furthermore, the struggle for decolonization in Palestine is emblematic of broader global movements against colonialism and imperialism. It highlights the enduring legacy of colonial exploitation and the persistent fight for justice and sovereignty. The Palestinian cause resonates with other decolonization movements around the world, drawing parallels with historical struggles in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. These movements share a common narrative of enduring oppression, resilient resistance, and the quest for liberation. The end of colonial rule in Palestine would not only signify a pivotal victory for the Palestinian people but also mark a significant shift in the global geopolitical landscape. It would challenge the remnants of colonial power structures and inspire other oppressed communities to pursue their own paths to freedom. The downfall of Zionism, as suggested, represents a broader rejection of colonial ideologies and practices that have perpetuated inequality and conflict for centuries.

The effects of October 7 did not in fact reverberate only in Palestine or the Arab world but reached the entire planet, pushing the masses, and especially the students, to mobilize in solidarity with the Palestinian Resistance and against the genocide perpetrated by "Israel". Through a boomerang effect, "Israel's" colonial practices have also spilled over into the political-social contexts of its allied countries, first and foremost the United States and Europe. The set of these repressive colonial practices has a very specific name in the West: fascism. Fascism is in fact nothing more than the application to white societies of the ideological, liberticidal, and violent tools of colonialism perpetrated against non-white populations in other geographical contexts over the last five centuries. However, the first to suffer these fascio-colonial practices, in the context of Western countries, are those parts of society already denigrated and marginalized in themselves, first of which are Arabs, Muslims, and racialized people, subject to a highly colonial, dehumanizing, and inferiorizing status quo.

The student struggle movement is putting this system under stress, showing all its weak points and preluding a mass mobilization against Western governments, bearers of corrupt values and double standards policies toward the situation in Palestine, and complicit - if not true propulsive engines - in the Zionist colonial project in the Palestinian Arab land. In fact, the most unprecedented violence has been seen in recent weeks, with the outbreak of the Student Intifada in the United States. Despite this, the university students continue their fight, more determined than ever. Furthermore, the Arab world is not exempt from these decolonization phenomena. On the contrary, the Arab regimes, collaborators of Zionism, and vassals of the Western imperialist neocolonial system have used even more violence against students fighting for the liberation of Palestine. This violence was seen in the squares and universities against those who have given, since October 7, their full support and support to the Palestinian Resistance and its glorious struggle for national liberation.

This unprecedented violence and this repressive fascist reaction on the part of governments show how the foundations of the entire Western imperial system are starting to shake. The systems of power feel the strong pressure of the united masses - behind the vanguard of the Palestinian Resistance and the student push - in a single struggle for the liberation of humanity from the chains that have tied it for centuries to a system, the capitalist one, whose sole purpose is to suck the soul out of the weak to line the pockets of the strong. The new generation has decided to break with the ancient colonial and racial regime of the nineteenth century. The time has come to overturn everything through a total revolution. Universities are the fulcrum of this revolution, students are its protagonists.