July Palestine Update

The Liberation of Palestine is a Commitment, Not a Slogan

Photo by Ali Jadallah (@alijadallah66)

International

The death toll in Gaza has surpassed a grisly 80,000. Per reports, Israeli forces have committed at least 19 separate massacres over the last month. Humanitarian aid corridors remain nothing more than state-managed execution grounds.

In one instance on June 11, Israeli forces shot and killed at least 120 Palestinians, many at designated aid sites. Some IOF soldiers are losing the ability to rationalize their crimes, referring to occupied Palestine as "a killing field."

Palestinian officials reported that oxycodone was discovered in flour bags distributed through aid channels, condemning it as a “heinous crime” aimed at destabilizing Gaza through addiction. The allegation adds yet another layer to the genocide—using food not just as a lure into a deathtrap, but as a weapon in and of itself.

While the IOF is now conducting an investigation—in actuality, a thinly veiled attempt to maintain its optics—into its own crimes against humanity, the Israeli government is already undermining the legitimacy of any investigation by taking the stance that the reports are "malicious falsehoods."

Meanwhile, the much-hyped "peace conference" in Europe unraveled after the UK and France reneged on their plans to officially recognize Palestine as a state. These cynical reversals expose how hollow the West's supposed commitment to justice truly is.

On June 10, activists from 50 countries launched the Global March to Gaza, a decentralized international campaign demanding an end to the siege and occupation. The resistance planned to march from Cairo to enter the Gaza Strip on foot, but this massive wave of solidarity was met with repression; the Egyptian government beat and detained activists, effectively crushing the entire march. Cairo's collaboration with the Israeli blockade sheds light on a larger truth: Zionism does not act alone. It depends on regional regimes like Egypt's as much as it does Western powers like the U.S.

National

On June 20, Palestinian graduate student and activist Mahmoud Khalil was finally released after more than three months in an ICE detention facility. Khalil's case, which drew nationwide protest, was deemed a violation of due process and basic constitutional rights. The ongoing attempt to deport him is only one snapshot of a nationwide crackdown on pro-Palestinian activists, from campus surveillance to the carceral state.

Despite the repression, resistance continues to grow. In New York City, Zohran Mamdani overcame a coordinated campaign by Zionist lobbying groups to win the Democratic mayoral primary. While his victory should not be mistaken for a revolutionary shift in the party—an impossibility under bourgeois politics—it reflects the strength of grassroots organizing and working-class solidarity. Mamdani's unapologetic stance against the genocide is part of a growing trend: Palestine is no longer a political third rail. It's a line in the sand.

But the ruling class is retaliating. On June 26, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that, despite years of military occupation and unquestioning U.S. aid to Israel, American victims of alleged Palestinian violence can sue the Palestinian Authority and the Palestine Liberation Organization. The legal system is a tool of empire; it shows sympathy and grants rights to the oppressor while criminalizing the resistance.

Local

In Cincinnati, organizers continued to hold the line in June through consumer pressure campaigns and strategic interventions into mainstream political spaces.

In partnership with Midwest Direct Action, Cincinnati Palestine Solidarity Coalition launched a new local Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaign demanding Kroger remove SodaStream, an Israeli company operating on stolen land, from its shelves. The campaign targets Kroger as a powerful local and national corporation deeply entwined in the profits of occupation.

The “No Kings” protest, organized by Cincinnati 50501, drew thousands to the march to protest the Trump administration and authoritarianism. Despite the crowd size, the event mostly stayed within safe, liberal bounds: speeches focused on “saving democracy” and returning to normalcy, with little mention of U.S. empire or its global violence. That silence did not go unchallenged. Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) UC and local anti-imperialist groups intervened directly, connecting Gaza’s destruction to the U.S. weapons industry, surveillance infrastructure, and the bipartisan war machine.

Conclusion

What’s happening in Gaza is not a tragedy. It’s policy—crafted in Tel Aviv, funded in Washington, enforced in Cairo, and normalized by every U.S. institution and "leader" that refuses to speak out.

From Cincinnati to Cairo to the streets of New York, people are rejecting complicity. They’re demanding more than symbolic gestures or ceasefires that keep the machinery of genocide intact. They’re organizing campaigns, disrupting comfort, and forcing Palestine into the center of public life—where it belongs.

This is not charity. This is solidarity. It’s not about awareness. It’s about action. And it doesn’t stop until Palestine is free.

Because liberation is not a slogan. It’s a commitment.