alks

response to attempts at badjacketing (sowing doubt & suspicion without evidence or political analysis): https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1734094319328628804.html links to interview translations into more than 10 languages: https://cryptpad.fr/pad/#/2/pad/view/bXukGKl7ZbP2hEIsMALt8xfasPksxcWVtLFC+mY9uTU/ links above originally via https://linktr.ee/abolishtheusa this group is being condemned using standards that many white anarchists don't meet if you don't trust them just mind your business

– received anonymously

the following is a lightly edited transcript of the screenshots found in the submitted thread.

@/abolishtheusa on instagram addressing and debunking the fedjacketing of palestinian anarchist group fauda. don't do this shit without evidence, you're hurting people facing an active genocide.

Another response to the severe bad-jacketing of our Palestinian comrades in Fauda, this time by Russian anarchists in their viral article on avtonom.org.

Please share.

Here are some claims from the article about the Fauda spokesperson's video, translated into English from Russian.

“This is a non-native speaker who tried his best to imitate a Levantine accent (shamiy / شامي) while delivering written speech because he wanted people to believe that he was speaking from a Palestinian. This is 10,000% fake, even the phonetics of simple words are pronounced incorrectly, and it is obvious that it is not a Palestinian speaking. Also, some letters sound terrible when spoken.”

More quotes from the article:

“And the Arabic language is so bad that it is unlikely that this was a refugee, even one who left the country some time ago:”

“If you’re Palestinian, you get the vocabulary right, which isn’t really evident from the pronunciation. A much more plausible explanation is an attempts to portray a local person as a non-local. This person cannot pronounce the sound ح [h], no matter where it is in each word. And the fact that he pronounce it softer/harder is actually a decent clue to suggest that he never spoke Arabic as a first language.”

This is the latest video they are speaking of. First of all, this video, like all videos published by resistance groups in Palestine, is spoken in perfectly clear, well-pronounced Modern Standard Arabic, the letter ح (h) is said in the very first sentence 3 whole times with consistent and absolutely correct pronunciation.

So their “evidence” is actually very convincing to non-Arabs which is a problem… these are the same exact points Arabs made when the IOF tried spreading this video of the doctor actor who tried spreading this video of the doctor actor talking about hamas.

Palestine and (and the Levantine in general) have SO MANY different dialects and accents, there is no 1 Palestinian dialect.

For example Palestinians in Gaza speak a dialect very very close to Egyptian, while Palestinians in the inner occupied territories have their own dialect.

This is why official resistance announcements whether from Hamas or Fauda or whoever are always in official Arabic, so that everyone can understand.

Their next claim is,

“Recently, the alleged Palestinian anarchist organization Fauda (Chaos; the same name as the popular Netflix series) has gained popularity among Western leftists activists.”

Fauda has gained it’s largest solidarity and support for anarchists in Indonesia, Korea, Egypt, Morocco, Brazil, Turkey, India, Japan, and even some in Greece. Thanks to the incessant bad-jacketing, orientalism and racism of western anarchists, their support has been lesser here compared to other places.

Their next claim is

“No photographs from any protest in Palestine, even with masks or painted faces,

no leaflets pasted on the walls.”

Fauda began posting on Telegram in April 2021. Since then they have shared many photos over the years of their flyering. Here is just some.

Regarding not sharing photos of their faces even with masks on-

1. Even without that they are getting arrested, put on house arrest, and surveilled by both the PLO and the occupation in their homes and on the streets.
   

2. They never take their phones to any actions, protests, or meetings.
   

3. They do not take photos together, and they never store any photos of themselves on their phones.
   

Their next claim is

“Fauda (Chaos; the same name as the popular Netflix series)”

FAUDA فوضى means Anarchy in Arabic. It only translates into Chaos if you are using Google Translate, the same way most people outside the left think the word “anarchy” means chaos, of because this is how it is defined in the dictionary. Claiming they are fake because they chose the name of a netflix show is BEYOND disrespectful and disingenuous. How many television show have used the english word “Anarchy”? Would we call western anarchist fake because they use the word anarchy?????

I will not stop calling myself an anarchist or using the word anarchy for my organizations and activities because awful, mis-representstive (sic) mainstream TV shows with names like “The Anarchist” exist.

Their next claim is,

“A more plausible version of the Israeli comrades is that the “Fauda” label was invented by the Israeli intelligence services in order to “catch with live bait” – to monitor the moods of gullible Western and Russian-speaking leftists writing to Fauda's contacts and take them into account. (Fauda has a resource in Russian). A possible motive for the fraud is collecting money from Western leftists, as in the poster picture for the post.”

Regarding their “resource in Russian”

That was our interview translated into Russian by a great comrade into Russian and it will be shared here along with more internationally coordinated translation efforts amongst amazing comrades soon!

Fauda is not an IDF trap.

The comrade who originally did the It's Going Down interview that bad-jacketed Fauda is now interested in interviewing Fauda* after our direct, secure discussion about our vetting process of & relationship with Fauda.

Stop the speculation. Stop the bad-jacketing. Stop the racism.

Our Fauda comrades, in high school and college while their friends went off to join Hamas, bravely decided to try to build something different, based on a desire for a broad and religiously-inclusive movement, based on an analyses of what became of the once-revolutionary PLO, based on a desire for leaderlessness and nonhierarchy, and based on inspiration from Black anarchists in the US during the Floyd rebellion.

Regarding our comrades being a money-laundering scheme:

If you read interviews with Fauda, and in our direct relationships with them, they repeatedly state that their BIGGEST ask and MOST important ask is to share news from Palestine, voices of Palestinians, and to counter western propaganda.

Anything beyond that, they can take it or leave it.

If you actually got to know our comrades instead of accusing them of being fake, you'd know:

• they are dealing with severe violence and repression & have intentional security culture norms
  

• they have really meaningful, deep, and persuasive analyses and stories to share about why anarchism is helpful for them as a political tradition within the context of Palestinian resistance alongside the religious, hierarchical, capitalist, and marxist groups of the Moqawama.
  

• they are loving, generous, traumatized, paranoid, funny, grieving, brilliant, deeply thoughtful, and great people in Palestine, with often awful internet connection, but connection sometimes good enough for very long, in-depth live talks.
  

• You'd know they have limited capacity and extreme amounts of stress
  

They are in the process of trying to publish interviews and media with several major anarchist media outlets and podcasts, but that it's very slow-going because of the repression, bad internet connection, and burn out they are facing.

Who needs Russians and Americans bad jacketing Fauda when BIPOC global majority anarchists are standing with them, anyways?

in addition to the above, @/abolishtheusa had also published previous post that are transcripted here as well from screenshots found here and here

Rather than bringing drama to the internet where we are all anonymous, I am instead addressing it directly with Scott*, with the support of so many amazing Black, Brown, Indigenous, and international comrades who also have deep relationships with and love for our Fauda comrades, as well as with the support of my anarchist mentors & comrades with other large, respected anarchist media outlets.

As someone who has cultivated a deep relationship with Fauda comrades, I barely have the emotional strength to address the reactive, un-investigated, unsubstantiated bad-jacketing of Fauda on the latest It's Going Down episode.

Yes, Fauda has been properly vetted and vouched for. Yes, they do have relationships with the ISM. Yes, we have comrades who have IRL relationships with Fauda. Yes, it is acceptable for people on the ground in Palestine to ask for donations of e-SIMS and money to buy supplies without having to go through massive nonprofits.

And no, support for Fauda isn't just a bunch of white westerners donating money and wiping their hands clean. Anarchists all over Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America, outside of the fucking so-called usa are showing up hard for Fauda. Anarchists in support of Fauda are also on the frontlines of automous direct actions, blockades, and protests.

And a final note on our Fauda comrades, no, they don't have “broken arabic.” Most of them only speak Ameyeh, or the Palestinian spoken dialect of Arabic. One of them has broken English.

Vetting and vouching are skills all wise anarchists must cultivate. Bad- jacketing has detrimental consequences. It is important to share our concerns, critiques, and reactions and not silence ourselves, ever, but it is wise to balance that with clear framing of when things are opinions, strong opinions, facts, when things have been confirmed or not. As a journalistic account, I value these things deeply.

A month and a half ago I shared many of the concerns and bad-jacketing themes with Fauda comrades, and while they wanted to address it publicly, they ultimately realized they didn't have enough fucking time amidst war conditions to assure English speakers of their legitimacy. They repeated so much, “Palestine has always been alone and forgotten, this isn't new to us.” Maybe they will address it someday, but for now I am praying each night for their safety, and emotionally and materially supporting them along with comrades internationally.

*: I had received this submission on the 16th of December and first reached out to Scott that very day stating my desire to verify the accuracy of an information, the ones herein annotated. Perhaps recklessly impatient for his response, I decided to publish this article on the 20th then received answers to my questions on the 23rd.

So, Scott clarified that he is “not particularly interested in interviewing [Fauda]” and “not actively pursuing such an interview” but “not opposed to doing one either.” While he did not object to this article, he has however voiced his displeasure at the out-of-context publication by abolishtheusa of what he considered private conversation to both me and them.

We both decided that I would edit the article with a summary of our exchange, which has been collaboratively reviewed with Scott before publication.

Whether or not you consider Fauda as legitimate, the Palestinian genocide must be of the utmost concern. Furthermore, do keep in mind that this edit does not in any way invalidate the critique for badjacketing.

– please feel free