Israel LGBTQ Pinkwashing
Updated 2024-04-03
2024-02-05 No Pride in Genocide: Calling Out Israel’s Pinkwashing Israel continues to paint itself as a pro-LGBTQ haven in the Middle East, using this alleged tolerance as justification for its genocide in Gaza. Queer activists around the world are pushing back.
But this violence isn’t just militaristic. There is also violence in the ways occupation is justified and sanitized through language, especially on the global stage. Especially in white, European, or Western media, there are certain cultural narratives—the kind that shape political action and inaction, media coverage, cultural attitudes, and even interpersonal conversations—that work to defend state violence and foster hostility toward victims of that violence. Pinkwashing is one such strategy, now on prime display amid the ongoing genocide in Gaza.
Palestinian American journalist Ali Abunimah, pinkwashing in this context describes how calculated gestures of LGBTQ acceptance are used to legitimize settler colonialism, distract from human rights violations, and promote an unfounded image of democracy or liberalism. There are numerous examples, long predating the current assault on Gaza: In 2011, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Congress that “gays are hanged” in the Middle East; this past November, the Embassy of Israel used similar language, claiming that Hamas tortures and murders LGBTQ people. Even Israel’s official Twitter account often features images of same-sex proposals between Israel Defense Force (IDF) soldiers—despite the fact that same-sex marriage remains illegal in Israel. Taken as a whole, these messages work to simultaneously condemn Palestinians—and Middle Easterners more broadly—as regressive homophobes, while bolstering Israel’s self-proclaimed status as a “civilized” liberator of queer people. https://www.yesmagazine.org/social-justice/2024/02/05/israel-palestine-gaza-genocide-queer
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