Israel : a two-speed LGBTQIA+ progressivism

(Original: french)

Written by: Jeanne Chassereau

Translated by: Mathilde Domont

On June 19, the Israeli government presented to the Supreme Court its decision to grant work permit to 66 Palestinian LGBTQIA+ refugees who fled the occupied Palestinian territories as a result of homophobic discriminations^[1]Peleg, B., & Shezaf, H. (20 juin 2022). Israel to Give Work Permits to LGBT Palestinians Granted Asylum. Haaretz.com. Consulté le 26 juin 2022. At first glance, this news may seem welcome; human rights groups have been demanding for years that Israel grant asylum to LGBTQIA+ Palestinians who are not recognised as refugees. However, this decision only concerns short-term work permits that do not guarantee access to public health services or a long-term residence permit. The stated aim of this measure is to push Palestinian LGBTQIA+ refugees to emigrate to a third country^[2]Boxerman, A. (20 juin 2022). Israel to allow LGBT Palestinians granted temporary asylum to work. Timesofisrael.com and to not stay in Israel. 

This partial victory is surprising, considering the progressive discourse adopted by Israel on the issue of the LGBTQIA+ rights. The Jewish has been a champion, since the 2010s, in queers rights in the Middle-East. Since 1993, This half-hearted victory is surprising, considering the progressive discourse adopted by Israel on the issue of LGBTQIA+ rights. The Jewish state has been a champion of queer rights in the Middle East since the early 2010s. Since 1993, Tel Aviv has hosted the region’s largest Pride march, with over 220,000 participants in the 2022 edition. Israel also boasts several openly queer members of parliament^[3]AFP (22 juin 2020). Israël a le Parlement le plus gay de son histoire. Challenges.fr. and a model army in terms of transgender^[4]Schwartz, Y. (9 août 2016). What the U.S. Is Learning From How Israel Treats Transgender Soldiers. Time.com. inclusiveness. However, many voices have been raised for several years to denounce this apparent inclusiveness. It is said to be motivated solely by Israel’s desire to attract international sympathy in order to make people forget its violations of international law in Palestine. Described as “pinkwashing”, this diplomacy through the political recuperation of LGBTQIA+ struggles hides a two-tier system of inclusion that still strongly segregates Israeli queers on the one hand and Palestinian queers on the other.

Tel-Aviv the flamboyant, progressive showcase 

Implemented by Israel during the second half of the 2000s, the Israeli strategy of pinkwashing is based, according to the anthropologist Sa’ed Atshan, on two pillars: firstly, the promotion of the freedom of the Israeli queers, and the supposed homophobia of Palestinians^[5]Atshan, S. Queer Palestine and the Empire of Critique, 2020. Stanford: Stanford University Press secondly. Thus, many Zionist organisations relay the narrative of Israel welcoming with open arms LGBTQIA+ people who run away from persecutions of a Palestinian population qualified of backward and retrograde. The Zionist association StandWithUS multiplied publications along these lines, going so far as to relay images representing a hammer in the colors of the Islamic flag falling on the LGBTQIA+ flag^[6]Twitter account of @StandWithUs. The organisation also circulated a document to British universities stating that “Some Palestinians seek to harm homosexuals around them” and urging readers to contact Israeli organisations^[7]StandWithUs. (2017). LGBTQ RIGHTS IN ISRAEL AND THE MIDDLE EAST. Los Angeles; StandWithUS. Although the Palestinian LGBTQIA+ community is indeed the target of violences within occupied territories, the use of this type of discourse denies the existence of the many Palestinian LGBTQIA+ actors mobilizing locally to gain recognition of the legitimacy of queer people within the Palestinian people, and invisibilises the wide variety of situations experienced by the Palestinian LGBTQIA+ community by reducing the Palestinian queer experience to one of violence. Juxtaposed, these two discourses aim to prove Israel’s moral superiority over Palestine, and thus divert international attention from the occupation of Palestine by highlighting Israeli progressivism. 

This strategy to position Israel as the epicentre of the queer community in the Middle East was introduced in 2005 as part of the “Brand Israel” campaign, run jointly by the Ministries of Foreign Affairs, Tourism and Strategic Affairs. At the heart of this campaign is the city of Tel Aviv. Chosen for its young population and vibrant nightlife, it has been the target of massive investments from both the state and Israeli companies, focusing on the Pride march and LGBTQIA+ nightlife. The promotion of the city has included sending numerous Israeli delegations abroad, whether to New Zealand pride marches^[8]Joule, L. (22 janvier 2015). Breaking: Israeli Embassy Float Not Returning For 2015 Parade. Gayexpress.co.nz or on the walls of London^[9]Paredes, N. Israel Tourism Ministry say reaction to controversial Tel Aviv Pride ad was ‘priceless’. Attitude.co.uk. Targeting mainly a Western, affluent, male homosexual clientele, this campaign has had the effect of propelling Tel Aviv to the rank of leading destination for gay tourism in just a decade. In 2015, the city welcomed more than 50,000 gay tourists^[10]Hartal, G. (2019). Gay tourism to Tel-Aviv: Producing urban value? Urban Studies, 56(6), 1148–1164. https://doi.org/10.1177/0042098018755068, many of whom used travel agencies offering tailor-made queer holidays. 

All of these mechanisms contribute to the creation of a truly rainbow soft power, which is supported by the country’s particularly inclusive legislation. Discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is illegal in the country and LGBTQIA+ people have the ability to form civil unions as they wish. The only remaining barrier for queer people is that marriage is not legal for same-sex couples. 

However, the pinkwashing accusations to Israel points the finger at its, at least, selective approach of human rights. Firstly, Israel’s stance on LGBTQIA+ inclusion and anti-discrimination is questionable. Like Human Rights Watch denounce in a report of 2021, the Israeli state engage itself on a daily basis to human rights violations within the Palestinian territories occupied since the Six Days War in 1967^[11]Human Rights Watch (27 avril 2021). A Threshold Crossed: Israeli Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid and Persecution. These human rights violations are well documented as crimes against humanity^[12]Human Rights Watch (27 avril 2021). A Threshold Crossed: Israeli Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid and Persecution and include expropriation of land in the West Bank^[13]Assemblée Générale des Nations Unies. (2015). Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and in the Occupied Syrian Golan. Ohchr.org, restriction of movement^[14]UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. (20 mars 2022). Movement in and out of Gaza: update covering January 2022 – occupied Palestinian territory. ReliefWeb.int., arbitrary arrest^[15]UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. (16 juin 2022). UN experts condemn Israel’s arbitrary detention and conviction of Palestinian aid worker. Ohchr.org. and torture of detainees^[16]Baroud, Z. (10 décembre 2021). When will Israel stop torturing Palestinian prisoners? Aljazeera.com. 

For the Palestinian queers, a mirage inclusivity 

A second point also generates multiple international criticisms. For more than a decade, supporters of Israel have argued that Israeli progressivism is an unprecedented opportunity for LGBTQIA+ Palestinians, who often flee their communities to escape homophobic violence. However, this discourse is silent on Israeli policies explicitly aimed at marginalising queer Palestinians. In particular, since the early 2010s, Israel has used outing blackmail methods against LGBTQIA+ Palestinians to force victims to serve as informants within the occupied territories^[17]Rudoren, J. (12 septembre 2014). Veterans of Elite Israeli Unit Refuse Reserve Duty, Citing Treatment of Palestinians. Nytimes.com. Spied on by the Israeli secret service, victims are exposed to having their homosexuality revealed to their families if they refuse to cooperate. The use of such methods endangers LGBTQIA+ individuals who are already victims of high levels of violence in Palestine^[18]Human Dignity Trust. Palestine country profile. humandignitytrust.org 

The endangerment of Palestinian queers by the Israeli state is not limited to the occupied territories. Palestinian queer refugees find themselves treated as pariahs within a state that claims to champion the rights of the LGBTQIA+ community in the Middle East^[19]Atshan, S. “Global Solidarity and the Politics of Pinkwashing”, dans Queer Palestine and the Empire of Critique, 2020.. Israel does not recognize homophobic discrimination as a legitimate reason for Palestinians to seek asylum, making it almost impossible for them to flee in the event of violence. When rare Palestinians manage to reach Israel, they find themselves in a situation of quasi-clandestinity. Although tolerated on the territory, they are unable to work, to benefit from social security and often resort to sex work if they cannot regularize their situation^[20]Aldubi, T. 17 août 2020. Queer Palestinians speak out: “If I return, they’ll shoot me in the leg” . Fairplanet.org. 

A tragic example of this is the death of Zehava, which caused outrage in the Palestinian queer community. In October 2021, Zehava, a Palestinian trans woman from the West Bank, committed suicide in Haifa^[21]Lee, V. & Peleg, B. (19 octobre 2021). What a Transgender Woman’s Death Reveals About Palestinian LGBTQ Community in Israel. Haaretz.com. Persecuted by her family, she had fled to Israel in the hope of obtaining a residence permit. Like many other queer Palestinian asylum seekers, Zehava was only granted a short residence permit, renewable every month, which does not give her the right to work in Israel, open a bank account or benefit from the public health system. Zehava’s case is sadly representative of the situation of queer Palestinian asylum seekers, who find themselves deprived of fundamental rights in a country that claims to be open and inclusive. 

The impossible inclusiveness under a colonial regime 

Questioning pinkwashing does not preclude welcoming Israel’s progress on LGBTQIA+ rights and the many spaces for queer expression that this creates. However, it is also important to understand the situation of queer communities in Israel and Palestine in all their complexity. For example, it seems impossible to speak of true inclusivity in Israel when this is primarily motivated by the desire to present the Palestinian people as homophobic. In fact, in the face of Israel’s colonial violence in Palestine, the sexual orientation of the victims is irrelevant. Whether Palestinians are LGBTQIA+ or not, they are all victims of daily state violence. For AlQaws, the main Palestinian LGBTQIA+ association, “Pinkwashing tells Palestinians that personal liberation can only be found by escaping their community and running into the arms of their coloniser. The pervasive myth that Palestinians find ‘queer refuge’ in Israeli cities runs counter to the real policies of the colonial state, which are based on the exclusion and destruction of Palestinians, whether they are gay, trans or otherwise. The fantasy of Israeli humanitarianism collapses as soon as the colonial situation is taken into account. There is no “pink door” in the apartheid wall^[22]AlQaws. (18 octobre 2020). Beyond Propaganda: Pinkwashing as Colonial Violence. Alqaws.org”. 

To quote this article: Jeanne Chassereau, “Israël : un progressisme LGBTQIA+ à deux vitesses”, 03.08.2022, Gender in Geopolitics Institute

The statements contained in this article are the sole responsibility of the author