“EAducation: Letters from Hawai‘i to Palestine”
By Māhealani Ahia and Cynthia Franklin
Our contribution engages the power of stories through letter writing to build solidarity from Hawai‘i to Palestine. Members of Students and Faculty for Justice in Palestine at the University of Hawai‘i (SFJP@UH) emphasize building pilina (relationships) with visiting Palestinian scholars and artists during annual Decolonial Novembers. Repeated connections within and beyond our classrooms and organizing spaces create bonds of friendship which are at the core of the political community, strengthening what Steven Salaita calls “inter/nationalism” and what Haunani-Kay Trask calls “the rope of resistance.”
POETRY AND MUSIC!
Our letters discuss a number of offerings, by way of oli and songs, presented to our Palestinian friends. We share some of these here, as amateur video recordings (taken by Cynthia on her phone).
The oli that Māhea wrote, that opens our AQ contribution, is one she performed at an afternoon of poetry and song for Malak Mattar on October 19, 2023. Here is the recording!
We also write about Brandy Nālani McDougall’s poem “Resist,” which she also shared with Malak, at that same gathering. Here is the recording.
Another performance we discuss at the conclusion of our letters is the song ‘Ihilani Lasconia and Kauwila Mahi wrote on the occasion of Sumaya Awad’s 2022 visit. “Pae ‘Āina to Palestine” has subsequently become an anthem of solidarity, performed numerous times for visitors and at marches and rallies. This song is also featured on Volume 2 the Amplify Palestine BDS Mix Tape project. Here is their first performance of this song, for Sumaya, at the University of Hawai‘i, in the Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies.
As for the other songs of solidarity from Hawai‘i to Palestine that we discuss in our letters, you can listen to Punahele Kūkailimoku Kanikapila’s “From the River to the Sea” here, and Kai Boy, The Steppas, and Hawane Rios’s “No More War” here.
ART!
The portraits of Haunani-Kay Trask and Fadwa Tuqan, both fierce poets who gave voice to anticolonial resistance, that Malak Mattar painted and presented to her audience during her 2023 Decolonial November visit, are powerful testaments to Hawaiian-Palestinian solidarity and the connections between the Palestinian and Hawaiian people. As we discuss in our letters, to be able to have this artwork in the University of Hawaiʻi English Department, in our Colloquium Room, is a daily inspiration, and a responsibility to work to realize Mattar’s, Tuqan’s, and Trask’s insistences that we fight to realize a world in which we all can be free.
LECTURE!
This is the lecture Malak Mattar delivered at UH Mānoa for Decolonial November on Oct. 19, 2023, before she unveiled her portrait of Fadwa Tuqan. As she delivered this lecture, her family was under direct bombardment in Gaza. You can watch “Art, Gaza, and Decolonization” here. Thank you to videographer Oren K. Tsutsumi.
PHOTOS!
In this “Beyond the Page” entry, we include more than the videos, songs, and custom art discussed in our essay. Since our letters foreground practices of solidarity that emerge from friendships, shared stories, and EAducational events, we also include photos from Cynthia’s personal archive that we hope capture some of these exchanges, and the ways joy and love are not ancillary to, but a crucial part of, the solidarity upon which practices of anti-colonial resistance and decolonial world-making depend.
The Lānai
In our AQ contribution, we write about Cynthia’s (and Shankar’s) lānai as the site from which we wrote our letters, as well as an SFJP@UH gathering place for building pilina from Hawai‘i to Palestine. We share a few photos here that capture the spirit of these gatherings.
On the left, the photo is from 2019 during Decolonial November, and the 2019 American Studies Conference, when Yousef Aljamal (far left), Nour Joudah (next to Yousef), Noura Erakat (center), and Rana Barakat (to the right of Noura) were all able to spend time with us. Also pictured (from left to right): Joy Enomoto, ‘Ilima Long, and Puna Kalipi.
Next to that photo, on the top right, is a photo taken during Tariq Luthan’s 2018 visit. He sits to the right of Ali Musleh. The photo directly below is of an SFJP@UH gathering held during Sherene Seikaly’s 2024 visit.
The photos below those are, on the left, one from 2024, when SFJP@UH folks met with Palestinian and Palestine-solidarity scholars in town for the NCORE conference, and, to the right, in 2023 during Malak Mattar’s Decolonial November visit.
Lectures, Panels, and Workshops!
Below to the left, is the First Decolonial November in 2014 with Noura Erakat. Following the horrific violence Israel unleashed on Gaza during the summer of 2014, Noura’s lecture put “Gaza in Context”. To the right is a photo of Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian, giving a lecture at St. Clement’s Church in 2016. In “Palestine/Israel: Bridging Past and Present,” Nadera addressed present-day conditions for Palestinians living in Occupied East Jerusalem, and how these conditions are part of an ongoing history of settler colonialism. Both of these lectures remain ever more relevant as conditions worsen with Israel’s campaign of genocide in Gaza, and their escalating violence throughout Palestine. The Israeli police’s arrest and torture of Dr. Shalhoub-Kevorkian in April 2024 for comments made on a podcast a month earlier is but one example of this. She and Sarah Ihmoud discussthis persecution as part of a pattern of Zionist violence on Democracy Now!
The photo on the bottom left is from Ramzy Baroud’s 2015 Decolonial November visit, where he delivered lectures, and also participated on a panel at the UHM Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies: “The Last Earth and New Horizons in Inter/Nationalism: From Palestine to Hawai'i.”
On the right is a photo taken March 27, 2024, at “Turning to the Archives to Decenter the Settler State," a roundtable discussion with Sherene Seikaly (honored guest), Noah Dolim, Sarah Kuaiwa, Kauwila Mahi and ‘Ihilani Lasconia (moderator).
Next to the poster of Malak Mattar’s October 2023 visit below left, is a photo taken at Aupuni Space with Malak’s art gracing the gallery walls. “Art and Activism: From Hawai‘i to Palestine” was the roundtable discussion with Māhea Ahia (moderator), Malak Mattar, Nicole Naone, ‘Ihilani Lasconia, and D. Kauwila Mahi.
Sarah Ihmoud’s community workshop "Love Letter to Palestine: Freedom Within Reach" in November 2022 at Native Hawaiian Student Services, inspired our own letters, poetry, and small group presentations, including one captured in the photo below on the left with collaborators (standing) Ali Musleh, Puna Kalipi, and Māhealani Ahia. The photo on the right shows Sarah leading the group in deep reflection on the process of crafting love letters.
EAducation Beyond the Classroom!
We also write in our letters about ways EAducation takes place over shared meals, and at the beach, and on DeTours and other huaka‘i.
The photo below left is a beach day with Steven Salaita during his 2017 Decolonial November visit (pictured left to right: Steven Salaita, Joy Enomoto, Kim Compoc, Cynthia Franklin); to the right, a lunchtime gathering at the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa campus. Pictured from left to right: Joy Enomoto, Kim Compoc, Māhealani Ahia, Kahala Johnson, Ali Musleh, Steven Salaita, and Candace Fujikane.
Beneath that are beach days. On the left, Sumaya Awad in 2022 holds a shirt with the classic Haunani-Kay Trask quote; on the right, Ali Musleh and Remi Kanazi in 2016.
Visits have also included DeTours–pictured below, for example, on the top left, is a photo taken during Sumaya Awad’s visit, of a DeTour of Ka Papa Lo’i o Kānewai led by ‘Ihilani Lasconia, followed by an “Ola i ka Wai” discussion. Below that, a photo from a 2016 Environmental Bus Tour led by Candace Fujikane and The Concerned Elders of Waiʻanae, with students Mai Hasan and Nour Daghlas from Birzeit University (BZU), who stayed with us for a week as part of a “Right to Education Tour” organized by BZU and National Students for Justice in Palestine (NSJP). On the right, Kyle Kajihiro and Terri Kekoʻolani are with Steven Salaita on a demilitarization DeTour.
In 2019, as part of SFJP@UH’s Decolonial November, Cynthia, Rana Barakat, Yousef Aljamal, and J. Kēhaulani Kauanui traveled to Mauna Kea, where they joined Māhea and other kia‘i at the Puʻuhonua, taught classes at Puʻuhuluhulu University, and, in ways discussed in ʻUahikea Maile’s article, “Let Gaza Change You,” participated in ceremony, and made a formal offering, or hoʻokupu, to the kūpuna gathered in the tent on the Maunakea Access Road, also known as Ala Hulu Kūpuna or the Road of the Revered Elders. The photo on the left is the schedule of classes for one of the days of the visit. The middle photo is taken on Ala Hulu Kūpuna (from left to right, Cynthia, Yousef, Kēhaulani, Rana). Yousef and Rana are pictured on the far right, standing before the Palestinian flag, with musician and activist Punahele Kūkailimoku Kanikapila, recently back from a Palestinian Youth Movement trip to Palestine.
Webinars!
COVID-19 moved many events online and revealed how we could still connect virtually across vast distances and time zones.
When the fires ravaged Maui in August 2023, at Sarah Ihmoud’s initiative, our Palestinian friends came together and organized a fundraiser and teach-in for Maui. Pictured below (clockwise from top left): Nour Joudah, Sarah Ihmoud, J. Kēhaulani Kauanui, Māhealani Ahia, Rana Barakat, Cynthia Franklin, and, on the bottom row, Kahala Johnson. You can watch the webinar here!
Hala Alyan discussed what it means to write poetry in a time of genocide, and how to practice self-care not as a form of withdrawal but as a way to re-enter the world. Pictured below (clockwise from top left) are Hala Alyan, Cynthia Franklin, Alia Jeraj, Josie Brodie, and Māhealani Ahia. You can watch the webinar here.
Devin Atallah and Sarah Ihmoud offered deep inquiry and intimate insights into grief as a portal and love as a practice in their webinar in April 2024. The poster on the left features a painting by Devin taken from their piece "A World Without Palestinians.” Devin and Sarah appear in photos next to Malia Atallah (top right) and Alia Jeraj. You can watch here.
TEACHING RESOURCES!
We include here readings and videos we have mentioned in our letters.
Rafeef Ziada “We Teach Life Sir”
MANA statement, published in Noura Erakat’s “Aloha Aina: Notes from The Struggle in Hawai‘i” published in Jadaliyya on Dec. 15, 2014.
SFJP@UH video response USACBI with Kaleikoa Kaeo
Mauna Kea Syllabus Project:
EAducation, Ally solidarity section, interviews with Yousef Aljamal, Rana Baraka, Noura Erakat
Sheik Jarah letter link from Palestinian Feminist Collective
CONCLUSION
We dedicate these storied memories to those Palestinian kin, Kānaka Maoli, and allies who have visited, befriended, and deepened our solidarity from Hawaiʻi to Palestine. These friends include (at the time of publishing): Devin Atallah, Rabab Abdulhadi, Yousef Aljamal, Hala Alyan, Sumaya Awad, Rana Barakat, Ramzy Baroud, Noor Daghlas, Angela Davis, Noura Erakat, Mai Hassan, Sarah Ihmoud, Nour Joudah, Remi Kanazi, J. Kēhaulani Kauanui, Tariq Luthun, Malak Mattar, Nadine Naber, Steve Salaita, Sherene Seikaly, and Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian. We look forward to strengthening these bonds as well as building pilina for many years to come, until we see a Free Hawaiʻi and a Free Palestine!
Eō Palesetina!
