Nearly four thousand pro-Palestinian protests shook the world in the first three weeks of Israel descending upon Gaza. This number has risen significantly since then. Yemen saw huge protests from both sides of the war. Germans took to the streets despite Pro-Palestinian protest being essentially banned. The same is happening in the Indian state of Kerala, as Indian trade unions have rallied against alleged plans to import 100,000 Indian labourers to replace Palestinian labourers. A protestor was killed in Nigeria after gunfire and tear gas was fired into a Pro-Palestinian crowd.

After Palestinian trade unions called for labour action, there has been some response in the form of direct action. A ship allegedly moving arms to Israel from the USA has been intercepted twice on its trip to Israel. Activists blocked roads leading to the ports, scaled the ship, and sailed canoes out into the dock to block the boat’s exit. Similar actions took place in Melbourne days later against ZIM, an Israeli shipping company. Trade unions in Belgium and Catalonia have declared they will refuse to load ships carrying Israeli arms. 

How to explain, however, the minimal amount of direct action compared to the vast reach of the march? Marching seems to be an appeal to the conscience of western states supporting Israel. This is not working. It is not that they are pointless- rather, they should be the tip of the iceberg of the global movement. Instead, they are the mass of it. People are marching in their millions- just as they did against the Iraq war. Have we learnt nothing?

There is a global hesitance to move too far beyond a march. Tacoma activists in the US, after blocking the aforementioned arms shipment to Israel, bemoaned that the organisers held protestors back and turned the protest into more of a spectacle: “It is time to abandon the mindset of policing each other, of photo ops and self-serving, self-congratulatory, empty declarations of victory at the expense of everyone else.” 

We are marching through the streets of our town centres whilst they are loading weapons onto the boats in the harbour, whilst the banks are transferring billions to the Israeli state, whilst thirteen thousand Palestinians (and counting) die at the hands of this money, this state, these munitions and weapons. Do we do this just to feel good about ourselves? For photo-ops? Are we trying to appeal to our governments? If anything, these protests have turned up the anti-Palestinian rhetoric in the corridors of power- “hate marches” to be targeted, not heard. We cannot rely on appealing to authority- we must become the authority. If the power is firmly on the side of Israel- to save Palestinian life, we must become the power, not merely appeal to it.

The BDS campaign is reshaping to fit this new context- follow the boycotts. Direct action is springing up across the world- particularly in the form of Palestine Action in the UK/USA. Organise with your friends, your communities, your union. Keep speaking out, keep sharing- but the movement to fight for Palestinian life cannot be a confused mash of digital information. The violence committed against Palestine can be lessened by the severing of supply lines which fuel the flattening of Gaza. Enough marching- time to bite the hand that feeds the occupation.