There are people in this country who have always opposed the protest movement in support of Palestinian rights.

A movement which has drawn hundreds of thousands of people to demonstrations across this land over the last two years.

What they object to most of all is that people who are not themselves Palestinian should show solidarity with those of us who are.

It is for that reason that 2021 Australian of the Year Grace Tame has come under such virulent attack.

For a celebrated champion of the rights of women and children to be championing the rights of Palestinians is entirely consistent. But in the eyes of our opponents, it is highly undesirable.
That is why we stand with Grace Tame and thank her for her courage and her presence at Monday's Town Hall demonstration.

But we also recognise, as Grace did with her usual insight, that this is not primarily about her.
There has long been a concerted effort by the Zionist movement and its allies in the political and media class to link our non-violent public protests with violence.

This effort has gone into overdrive since the Bondi Beach massacre, a heinous crime committed by people with no known personal or ideological connection to the protest movement.

We reject this attempt at conflation utterly. Our demonstrations not only are non-violent in themselves, but they have consistently called for an end to violence in Palestine.

Those who point to Tame's use of the slogan "Globalise the Intifada" to suggest that we advocate violence need to study the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Both the major Palestinian uprisings referred to by the word intifada began with non-violent protest by Palestinians.

In the first weeks of the intifada of the 1980s, which was marked by shop closures, labour strikes and boycotts of Israeli goods, it was the state of Israel that responded first with live fire and then with a policy of "force, might and beatings". 

The second intifada, from 2000 to 2005, also began with non-violent demonstrations by Palestinians under occupation and those living as citizens of the state of Israel. The response in the first month was the shooting of 12 Palestinian citizens of Israel and the firing of over a million bullets by security forces. 

In each case, non-violent protest by civilians was greeted with sharply escalating violence by the occupying power. This violence generated a violent response, which was then used to justify further crackdowns. 

It is a pattern with which the world should be familiar by now. It must not be used to foreclose our rights to non-violent protest. Nor should it be used to stigmatise advocacy for Palestine and calls for intifada, which now as then are calls for the end of oppression and occupation.

Our opponents seek to erase Palestine and the language of its history from the world. So people around the world became Palestinians and learnt their language.

Grace Tame is one of those people, and she has our gratitude and solidarity in return. But there are thousands of you, from Gadigal to Gaza, and we thank you too.

Keep up the fight. Globalise the intifada.