Over the last year of Israel's military campaign in Gaza, Palestinian and queer groups in Utah have made collaboration a key part of their work. Organizers in both communities say the two struggles are not so different.
Some queer individuals and groups have shown support by attending Palestinian-led events, while others have gone further to help organize protests, fundraisers, and educational events.
Pro-Palestine protests led or supported by the queer community have been held around the state since Oct. 7, including a series of protests at Utah State University during graduation in May in honor of how Palestinians weren't able to graduate due to ongoing attacks.
Other events have included film screenings, educational conversations, fundraisers, and establishing a solidarity encampment on the University of Utah campus.
One group involved in many of these events is the Nuanua Collective, a Salt Lake City-based organization for queer native Hawaiian and Pacific Islanders, who began attending protests in October 2023 and soon after started to assist in organizing as well.
“The first event we organized for Palestine was a vigil held at the International Peace Gardens,” said Jakey Siolo, director of the Nuanua Collective. “We felt it was very culturally relevant for us to create that breathing space amidst the revolution, but also to create that space for Palestinians to find refuge.”
Siolo said that in any event Nuanua has supported or organized, they strive to always center Palestinians. That included their annual Pride event Fafa Fest, which Nuanua decided to charge tickets for this year to raise money for four Palestinian families trying to evacuate — specifically, families referred by local Palestinian community members and organizers.
“We felt that ... we could only do this event centering Palestinians, and especially queer Palestinians,” Siolo said.
Protecting each other
The far-left LGBTQ+ organization Armed Queers Salt Lake City has a different way of supporting the ongoing Palestinian movement.
As they’ve done for movements like Black Lives Matter and labor rights, the organization offers security and defense at Palestinian events, especially ones more in the public eye like protests or demonstrations.
Like Nuanua, Armed Queers got involved with the movement very early, partly because many organizers had already built connections with Palestinian organizers and groups.
“So when the movement for Palestinian liberation really built up ... in October, we determined as a group that it was important for us to explicitly come out in favor of the Palestinian struggle and dedicate a significant aspect of our skills and our capacity to the Palestinian cause,” said Ermiya Fanaeian, an organizer with Armed Queers.
Fanaeian said physical threats have thankfully been rare in the city, but Armed Queers has still been at most events in Salt Lake City to be proactive in defending organizers and giving them a stronger sense of security.
Learning about each other
Support hasn’t just gone one way — Aziz Abuzayed, a self-described Palestinian refugee with the Palestinian Solidarity Forum of Utah, said he’s learned a lot about queer culture and identities through these groups joining in the movement for Palestine.
“It is a very wonderful experience that I cherish, and if it wasn’t for their participation, their friendliness ... if it wasn’t for all of this, I probably wouldn’t be as well informed as I am today,” Abuzayed said.
He said the movement has also connected him to Palestinian queer individuals and community.
“People would come out to me and say, ‘Hey, thank you for raising our voice, for representing Palestinians and normalizing relations and action with queer community everywhere, which will help in normalizing queer community in Palestine,’” Abuzayed said.
He added that the Palestinian Solidarity Forum of Utah has been doing educational study sessions bi-weekly at the Salt Lake City Library to give non-Palestinians an opportunity to learn history, ask questions, and learn how to approach media about the conflict.
“I only want people to be critical, either of us or of the narrative that they’re listening to,” Abuzayed said. “Ask yourself for evidence, for proof of everything you hear. Do not take anything for granted.”
Solidarity against pinkwashing
The organizers also said that Palestinian/queer solidarity is important because queer movements have been co-opted against Palestine.
"Pinkwashing" is when an organization uses queer culture to promote a product or institution without genuinely supporting queer communities. The strategy is often used to distract from the organization's harmful policies or practices.
The term pinkwashing was popularized in this context by a 2011 New York times op-ed by writer and activist Sarah Schulman accusing Israel of using pinkwashing to conceal human rights violations in Palestine.
Pro-Palestinian groups and organizers have accused Israel of pinkwashing by posting about queer Israelis when same-sex marriage is illegal in Israel. The state only legally recognizes same-sex couples if they were married in another country.
Fanaeian also accused the U.S. of pinkwashing by feigning concern over queer Palestinians, without protecting LGBTQ+ people in the U.S.
“The state that pretends to care about us by bombing people abroad [is] actually oppressing us right here within our borders,” Fanaeian said.
Siolo agreed, noting Utah's support of Israel — defense companies Northrop Grumman and L3Harris Technologies, which provide parts and technology to Israel, both operate in Utah. He referred to several anti-LGBTQ+ laws Utah has passed in recent years, including banning trans healthcare for minors and blocking Title IX anti-discrimination protections for LGBTQ+ students.
Abuzayed said that viewing Palestine as an anti-LGBTQ+ country and Israel as a pro-LGBTQ+ country also erases queer Palestinians and their struggles.
“A lot of these [queer Palestinian] individuals who reached out to me were expressing to me how, you know, devastated they feel that they're not being talked about in the news,” Abuzayed said. “Nobody is talking about how many queer Palestinians has Israel killed, how many of them Israel has exposed and outed.”
“I personally would prefer to have an oppressed queer friend than a dead one,” he added.
Common struggles
The existence of LGBTQ+ Palestinians is one reason for this ongoing solidarity, in the same way Nuanua Collective is aimed at not just queer people or native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders, but those who are both.
Abuzayed also expressed that the struggles these two communities face, even separately, aren’t so different.
“Both communities have felt and known what it feels like to be unheard, to be marginalized, to be dismissed and not listened to,” Abuzayed said. “As a Palestinian myself, I understand what it means to be oppressed and not be listened to and have your identity questioned and have your day-to-day affairs controlled by someone who has nothing to do with you.”
“Kinship does not come from the shared color of skin or religion or national origin, but how you stood in my protest, and I came to your protest, and we help each other through the hard times,” Abuzayed added.
Siolo and Fanaeian agreed, noting the interconnected nature of different movements by oppressed or marginalized groups.
“Our queer liberation, trans liberation is directly tied to Palestinian liberation,” Siolo said.
“I think it's important for us to show that and to show that all people around the world — queer people, trans people, feminists, Jewish people, all different people around the world — are in solidarity with the Palestinian cause,” Fanaeian said.
The future
A year in, attacks on Palestine are continuing with no ceasefire expected soon, but organizers remain dedicated to their cause.
“The short-term goal for us is for the genocide to stop, for the killing and murder to stop, for the Palestinians to stop wondering where their next meal is gonna come from,” Abuzayed said. “For longer term, I myself will not rest until all of Palestine is free.”
They also all expressed a desire to continue the solidarity between Palestinian and queer communities in Utah long after the fighting stops.
“Not only do we want to be in the streets with these organizations and these organizers, but we really want to create genuine relationships because we’re all that we got,” Siolo said.
