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#being palestinian is hard and seeing this book's announcement broke the camel's back for me
insertocname · 4 years
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STAND UP AGAINST THE BIRTHRIGHT YA BOOK COMING OUT NEXT YEAR
ok, so let’s start from the beginning. 
In March this year, author Haley Neil announced her debut, “ONCE MORE WITH CHUTZPAH”, a YA novel about an American teen who goes on a birthright trip to Israel and dicovers her sexuality. 
This concept is a slap to the face of Palestinians.
Birthright trips are propaganda trips funded by the Israeli government, allowing Jewish young adults from around the world to visit it. THESE TRIPS ARE ZIONIST PROPAGANDA MACHINES. They are insidiously cruel, because they imply any Jewish teen from around the world has a “””right””” to visit historic Palestine, while the millions upon millions of Palestinians who trace their entire family history to that land, and who STILL hold on to the keys of the homes they were forced to flee in 1948 with equal parts hope and desperation, are systematically denied the right to ever set foot in their homeland ever again. 
As you can see, having birthright trips be the backdrop of some teen’s “self-discovery” journey is appalling. HOWEVER, HALEY NEIL CHOSE TO SOMEHOW MAKE IT EVEN WORSE. The practice of using LGBT rights as propaganda to hide Israel’s ethnic cleansing and extreme oppression of Palestinians is known as Pinkwashing, and it’s a propaganda tactic that’s been used for a long time by Zionists. Not only is it pure evil to use apparent progressive values to eclipse ethnic cleansing and apartheid, BUT ISRAELI FORCES RUOTINELY BLACKMAIL GAY PALESTINIANS INTO BEING INFORMERS. THEY COULD NOT CARE LESS ABOUT LGBT RIGHTS, OR ABOUT ANY OF THE BASIC RIGHTS OF PALESTINIANS. 
Palestinian activist Emily Khilfeh tried to vey politely reach out to the author, agent, and editor of the book, and THEY ALL IGNORED HER. THESE PEOPLE WHO PRETENDED TO CARE ABOUT POC IN PUBLISHING A FEW WEEKS AGO IMMEDIATELY IGNORED A WOC EXPRESSING CONCERN OVER THEIR DISGUSTING BOOK. Only after her tweets telling what happened gained traction did they deign to give statements on the issue. 
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This is Haley Neil’s lukewarm, bullshit statement. If you’re not familiar with Zionist talking points, this might seem like an alright response to you, but the absolute uselessness of it can be summarised by noticing how she discussed her “complex feelings” about attending Jerusalem Pride because of the LGBTphobia present in Israel, WHILE NOT EVEN THINKING THAT PALESTINIAN PEOPLE LIKE MYSELF ARENT EVEN ALLOWED INTO JERUSALEM. She didn’t think to employ Palestinian sensitivity readers until AFTER the controversy. She fully intends to publish this Zionist, pinkwashing propaganda with only some “revisions” to appease the more liberal critics. 
THIS WHOLE BOOK IS A MESS AND AN INSULT TO PALESTINIANS SUFFERING FROM HORRIFYING OPPRESSION BY THE HANDS OF ISRAEL. IT HAS TO BE STOPPED FROM BEING PUBLISHED. 
Since these people have shown they only care about making money and maintaining their reputation, the only way to REALLY make them listen is to hit them where it hurts. 
IF YOU CARE ABOUT COMBATING ZIONIST PROPAGANDA AT ALL, PLEASE GO TO THE BOOK’S GOODREADS PAGE, GIVE A ONE STAR RATING, AND WRITE A SMALL REVIEW EXPLAINING WHY. Making a Goodreads account if you don’t have one only takes 5 minutes, and is very easy!!!! It’s also a pretty important site for the publishing industry, especially for debut books like this one!!!!
ALSO, PLEASE TWEET THE PUBLISHER,  @bloomsburykids, DEMANDING THEY PULL THE BOOK, AND EMAIL THEM AT  [email protected] IF YOU CAN. 
Publishing is a money hungry industry that DOESNT CARE about POC, but if they see this kind of debut book is getting this much backlash, then they will think twice about publishing it. HELP PALESTINIANS OUT
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