In shadow of Israel?s war on Gaza, Palestinian diaspora fights to be heard
Montreal, Canada ? Israa Alsaafin?s grief was piling up.
She was already grappling with the loss of her brother, Ahmed, who was killed in an Israeli attack as he fled his home in northern Gaza in October 2023, just days into Israel's war on the Palestinian territory.
And she had spent months trying to get her parents and relatives from Gaza to Canada, a process stymied by strict visa requirements. Ultimately, she was forced to spend thousands of dollars just to get them to relative safety in neighbouring Egypt.
But then an incident about two months ago brought the fear of anti-Palestinian violence right to her door in Ottawa, the Canadian capital.
Alsaafin stepped outside to discover that a sign she had placed on her front lawn, with the phrase ?We Stand with Palestine?, had been vandalised with epithets disparaging Palestinian identity.
?I was terrified. Just think about it. What if that person passed by and my kids were playing around on the front porch? I had nights with no sleep thinking about this note,? the 36-year-old mother of two told Al Jazeera.
?I had to take a leave without pay from my work because I couldn?t focus, I couldn?t function. I couldn?t take care of myself or my family or my kids.?
As Israel?s war on Gaza grinds on ? hitting the one-year mark last week with no end in sight ? Palestinians around the world have spent the past 12 months watching a daily stream of death and destruction.
And while they are not experiencing the same level of suffering as people in Gaza, members of the diaspora have faced their own challenges over the past year ? from online threats and racism, to attempts to silence their efforts to speak out against Israel?s assault.
In Canada, this wave of hate has fuelled a push by Palestinian Canadians to name and recognise anti-Palestinian racism as a distinct form of discrimination ? and take concrete action to address it.
?I know a lot of Palestinians, now they are hiding their identity. They don?t speak up. They don?t say that they are from Palestine because they are scared that they are going to be targeted,? said Alsaafin.
?It?s very important to talk about it, [to] point fingers towards the anti-Palestinian racism situation that we face.?
