{ "article": { "title" : "You Should Hear This: A Playlist by Taliwhoah", "author" : "Taliwhoah", "category" : "music", "url" : "https://everythingispolitical.com/readings/playlist-taliwhoah-you-should-hear-this", "date" : "2025-03-21 17:19:00 -0400", "img" : "https://everythingispolitical.com/uploads/taliwhoah-d87f4742-55f9-46ec-9d27-15d2f4495333.jpg", "excerpt" : "", "content" : "https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7syLFxQM2q2dgg0Vyh0Uds?si=6ab5e2683be04bf2I believe that women and music are inherently political because the music industry has long attempted to suppress women, yet they have continually persevered. Despite systemic barriers, women have carved out significant influence—not only as artists but also in executive roles within major music corporations, where they are increasingly securing higher-paid positions and leadership titles. Beyond personal success, women in music are actively uplifting one another, using their cultural influence and community- building efforts to create opportunities for others. Music has always been a battleground for self-expression and liberation, and I admire the resilience of women who refuse to back down from the challenge." } , "relatedposts": [ { "title" : "Against Dictators and Intervention: Sahar Delijani on Iran", "author" : "Sahar Delijani, Céline Semaan", "category" : "interviews", "url" : "https://everythingispolitical.com/readings/sahar-delijani-on-iran", "date" : "2026-02-01 16:53:00 -0500", "img" : "https://everythingispolitical.com/uploads/2026_01_29_Sahar_Interview_1.jpg", "excerpt" : "CÉLINE:These are very difficult times as we are watching what’s happening in Iran unfolding in such a rapid pace, there are numbers that are coming out in the news: first we saw a few thousand, then we saw 5000 reported on Democracy Now! and recently, we have gone from 30,000 to 45,000 people massacred in Iran. What is the latest that you’ve heard from your end, from Iranian sources?", "content" : "CÉLINE:These are very difficult times as we are watching what’s happening in Iran unfolding in such a rapid pace, there are numbers that are coming out in the news: first we saw a few thousand, then we saw 5000 reported on Democracy Now! and recently, we have gone from 30,000 to 45,000 people massacred in Iran. What is the latest that you’ve heard from your end, from Iranian sources?SAHAR DELIJANI:I’m hearing the same numbers, I’ve heard anything from 20,000 to 30,000 to 40,000. It’s really hard to verify for the people on the ground and for people human rights organizations, even though I know that they’re working around the clock to be able to identify bodies, but the regime is really trying as much as it can to repress the information coming out. We are even hearing news of mass graves, of bodies that were just taken from the morgues and never seen again. We hear news of families that have been just going from morgue to morgue, station to station, hospital to hospital, looking for their loved ones, and they still haven’t found them.We hear news of doctors who were helping the wounded who are now imprisoned under the charge of collaborating with Israel or waging war against God, which is one of the charges that usually Islamic Republic uses to push for execution. Terrible news coming out from all these small towns, all these areas in Iran where thousands of people have been killed, and a lot of them with gunshot wounds at close range in their chest or their neck or their heads.So it’s an absolute to nightmare. I don’t even know what the right word is, but it’s one of the biggest slaughters of civil uprising we’ve ever seen in our recent history.CÉLINE:Thank you. And I know that now everyone is watching, holding their breath for what is potentially a US intervention. The situation is escalating. There are the people of Iran are facing their own government oppression, and they might be also under US bombs. Do you have any family members in Iran? How are you coping with the news, and what are the best ways to follow what’s happening now closely on the ground?SAHAR DELIJANI:Yes, I do have family and friends, and it’s just devastating that they are now sort of trapped between these two absolutely brutal forces. One is the Islamic Republic on the ground, just slaughtering its own people. And then you know, the threat of wars and bombs and the devastation that we know it will bring. The tragedy is immense. I don’t even have the right words to talk about it. Iranian people have worked so hard in the past 30-40 years to be able to build a democratic society, to be able to have freedom for everyone, for minorities, for women, for a society to be built on equality and justice.This isn’t the first time the Iranian people have been fighting against this regime — this has been a long, long fight, and I feel like it has reached a point of no return. We will not be the same people. I am not the same person as I was just a few days, few weeks back. And you know, this is also, in some ways, the story of our of our region. There’s just too much blood, too much violence, and there’s this open wound that had been in Iran since the 80s, with the mass executions of political prisoners, including my own family members, and that wound was still open, and now we have this we have this slaughter. Our region needs and deserves something more than wars or dictatorship. We deserve to be able to fight for what we want. We deserve to be able to live in safe societies, to live in dignity, to live in freedom, and the right to fight for it.CÉLINE:An attack on Iran is an attack on the region, on the Iranian people, first and foremost, but also has repercussions on the entire region. A lot of people think that the Iranian government is holding the Palestinian cause, and is the only force that has been against Israel. How is it looking like from your perspective, as someone who is understanding of the Palestinian cause and seeing what’s happening and unfolding today?SAHAR DELIJANI:I think any attack on any country in the region is an attack on the region. I don’t think this is only about valid for Iran. When Iraq was attacked, it was an attack on the region, when Afghanistan was attacked, when it was an attack on the region, all of our fates are intertwined, they’re not separate from each other. They’re not isolated. I do not believe that the Iranian regime has been fighting for the Palestinian cause. I believe that, yes, the Iranian regime is the enemy of Israel. That doesn’t mean that it has the Palestinian cause in its heart. It only means that it has its own geopolitical interest and advancements that it wants to push forward.It wants more power and more influence in the region. And it uses the Syrian civil war, it uses the opportunities it has in Iraq, and throughout the region, it’s only pushing forward its own agenda. I think that is very important to note also, because a country that has been torturing and killing its own people, how could it liberate another people?What does that liberation even look like when we talk about America bringing this rhetoric of liberation, why don’t we believe it? Because we know what it means, because we’ve seen it historically, and we also see what it does to its own people. If an American power that speaks of liberation for the Iranian does this to its own people—kills them in broad daylight, their shoots them in the face, in their car, or arrest protesters, abducts people. Same goes for Iran and Palestine. What kind of liberation does Iran have in mind for Palestine, if it’s killing its own people, if it’s repressing its own people?I believe that anti war movements, anti imperialist movements must go hand in hand with anti dictatorship movements and pro democracy movements. Otherwise, it’s just empty shells, it changes nothing for the people on the ground. We need to want the same things for everyone, we can’t pick and choose whose liberation we want or whose repression is okay for now, no one’s repression is okay. Because I think more everybody wants the same thing. We might have different ways of expressing it, but people want to live in dignity and safety and equality, right? Everybody wants that, so we need to listen to them, instead of imposing our own geopolitical agendas or our own interpretation of the region, without listening to the people living that reality.CÉLINE:Absolutely. How can a dictator that is also violating the rights of their own constituents and their own citizens in the United States, such as Donald Trump, want the best for Iranians? That’s where the cognitive dissonance happens online when we have members of the Iranian diaspora who are calling for US intervention, and in that same breath, harassing or attacking or creating a campaign against anyone who is raising a flag that US intervention might not lead to liberation for Iranian people. US intervention has a track record of being disastrous, from Iraq to Afghanistan to what’s going on in Venezuela around the world, wherever the United States came in to “save” it never really ended up being for the people. How do you make sense of this call for US intervention?SAHAR DELIJANI:I think in the diaspora, we have a responsibility not to call for more violence, especially when we’re not going to be the victims of that violence, not being in Iran ourselves. Because when we say no bombs, no intervention in Iran, we mean it for everybody. But the people in Iran who are asking for [US military intervention] are not just completely crazy—just think about the reality that the extremely difficult, violent reality that the Iranian regime, the Islamic Republic, has made for people, that they’ve reached a point that they’re thinking, “Oh, maybe bombs, at least would save us from this violence.”People who have lived through a tragedy, a massacre of 30,000 people in just a few days, you know, there is just so much pain. There’s so much pain, okay, but you’re saying, you know that the foreign intervention is dangerous, but look at what is happening to us now. The only way we are credible to the people on the ground if we want to stand against this sort of imperialist interventions and forces, is if we stand as strongly against the dictators that are killing them. Now, if we are just a little bit hesitant, even a tiny bit hesitant, to stand against those dictators, we are being huge hypocrites, and nobody will believe us. Nobody will believe that we have their liberation in mind when we stand against imperialist intervention. You are just telling us to choose between two types of killings. We need to stand against all types of oppression, no matter who’s doing it. It’s not about who does it, it’s about what we can do to bring it to an end." } , { "title" : "Renaissance Renaissance’s Cynthia Merhej on Why Fashion Is Always Political", "author" : "Cady Lang", "category" : "interviews", "url" : "https://everythingispolitical.com/readings/renaissance-renaissance-cynthia-merhej-interview", "date" : "2026-01-28 11:42:00 -0500", "img" : "https://everythingispolitical.com/uploads/Cynthia-Merhej-Portrait---November-2024-by-Michele-Aoun-3.jpg", "excerpt" : "The Beirut designer talks making sustainable clothes in a fast-fashion world and NYC First Lady Rama Duwaji’s inauguration coat.", "content" : "The Beirut designer talks making sustainable clothes in a fast-fashion world and NYC First Lady Rama Duwaji’s inauguration coat.Photo Credit: Michele AounFor the Palestinian-Lebanese fashion designer Cynthia Merhej, fashion is both an art practice and a way to honor her family’s legacy. A third-generation couturier and the founder and creative director of the Beirut-based brand Renaissance Renaissance, the Central Saint Martins-educated designer makes clothes that speak to the duality of the modern woman. Her designs are experimental yet rooted in tradition, unapologetically feminine but gender-bending, and playful yet elegant: in any given collection, you could find dreamy tulle skirts and sweet bows alongside meticulously constructed jackets and crisp shirting. It’s all part of Merhej’s design philosophy, which is rooted in sustainability, craftsmanship, and a healthy dose of tenacity—creative pillars she learned as a child, while observing her mother, Laura, at work in her own Beirut atelier. These were also lessons passed down from Merhej’s great-grandmother, Laurice Srouji, who opened her own successful atelier in Jaffa, Palestine in the 1920s.While Merhej first debuted Renaissance Renaissance in 2016, the label has been generating lots of buzz of late—getting shortlisted a second time for the prestigious LVMH Prize in 2025, and in January 2026, making headlines around the world after New York City’s new First Lady, Rama Duwaji, wore a striking chocolate brown fur-trimmed coat from Merhej’s F/W 2023 collection. When it came to Duwaji selecting Renaissance Renaissance for this historic occasion, Duwaji’s stylist, Gabriella Karefa-Johnson, explained on Substack that this too, had significance. “On her first official day as First Lady of New York, Rama is wearing a small, independent woman designer from the Middle East,” Karefa-Johnson wrote. “That representation resonates. It reverberates. Because fashion communicates. It sends a message.”Merhej spoke with writer Cady Lang about carrying on her family’s fashion legacy, creating timeless clothing in a fast fashion world, what it feels like when your designs make international news, and why fashion is always political.This interview has been edited for length and clarity.How are you? How are things for you right now in Beirut?It’s good. I mean, at the moment, there’s a threat of escalation of violence from Israel, but they’re bombing in the south of Lebanon, which is not very near where I work. It’s about two hours away, so we don’t really feel much here. But they’ve been threatening to escalate for the last three months. So who knows? You just live your life.It’s crazy to think that you’re designing under these conditions, with the world being in the state that it is.Yes, I think [it is] for everyone, not just me, because I feel like the whole world is in turmoil at the moment. The fashion world, particularly, has been imploding for the last four years. I think everyone is generally trying to find steady ground in this current environment.I want to talk to you about how you started your brand, Renaissance Renaissance; you are a third-generation couturier, and your great-grandmother and your mother were also fashion artisans. Can you share your earliest fashion memory?In the beginning, my mom’s atelier was also a shop. The front of the atelier was the store, and the back was the atelier. My earliest memories are being shuffled from the front to the back, depending on if a client was there. That’s probably one of my earliest memories in general, because my mom would take us to work with her. She has three kids, so after daycare or after school, we would usually be there with my mom in the space, but we didn’t get the chance to do much [with the atelier] because she was working. I actually had to learn a lot when I started my brand. All the technical things, like making patterns and sewing, I didn’t know at all.Are there lessons that you’ve learned as a designer from your great-grandmother and your mother?We don’t have anything left from my great-grandmother, unfortunately, because the 1948 [Nakba] happened, and they had to leave everything. But there’s this very strong and inherent influence that comes from just being around really strong women who taught themselves and had dreams. They taught themselves everything, and most of their teams were also women. I think the influence is in the way we design and the way we look at things, without a doubt. I don’t want to say it’s more pragmatic, but it definitely is—there’s a closeness and a compassion to the people you are addressing, because we’re living it as well.It’s definitely a legacy. Do you see a dialogue between your brand and their work?I’m very proud to be a part of this; I think if I didn’t have this legacy, I wouldn’t have had the courage to do what I did. But I had this precedent, two amazing women before me who made me realize it’s possible to do it, and that’s huge. I don’t want to gender things too much, but in the way I’m designing and the way I’m approaching clothing, there’s always this inherent, constant intuition on how to approach the female body—how I dress her and how I want women to feel.There’s another whole aspect with the quality of the clothes and how we approach that. My mom was sustainable before sustainability was even a thing. Her mantra is always working directly with the client, really going out of her way to source the best fabrics, to make sure the finishing was perfect, always taking that extra step to make sure the garment will last. And they have lasted, some over 30 years.Renaissance Renaissance’s SS26 Collection “La Touriste.” Courtesy of the designer.On the topic of sustainability, when talking about the brand, you’ve said your goal is to “create garments that can transcend time.” In a world of fast fashion, how do you design pieces to be timeless?It’s always thinking about the woman, about her body, asking myself, “Is it wearable?” All those things, like adding pockets or making sure the length is right, making sure structurally it will last. In terms of the design, I’m not looking at what’s trendy at all. Of course, I’m looking at the street and what people are wearing in their day-to-day lives. But I’m not looking at what this designer is doing or what influencers are posting about. It’s about following my instinct and my intuition, rather than doing something just because it’s trendy or it’s cool.The funny thing is, you start like that, but then it becomes a trend. I guess that’s the normal cycle of fashion. You start off making a garment, and you’re scared because it doesn’t look like anything else out there. And then three or four years later, you’re going into Zara or any fast fashion website. You see your design, that thing that wasn’t cool, is now copied. It’s like life and death. You have to accept this is the rhythm of life in fashion. In a way, it sucks, because indirectly, it’s like I’m contributing to it. It doesn’t make me sad that they copied me, but what does make me sad is like, “Fuck, I’m giving them more things to copy, giving them more ideas to steal so they can keep this horrible business going.”In light of that, how do you continue to feed your creativity as a designer and keep up the energy to create?It’s not difficult to stay inspired. What’s really difficult is when you have an independent brand, there’s no money, and you have to do everything yourself. Burnout is a constant thing for me. It’s very difficult because if I’m in a good state of mind, and I have a little bit of stability, a bit of money in the bank, and I know I can relax for a week, then I can come up with a collection in a week. It’s tough to have your own business and to deal with admin stuff all the time because every day, there’s a problem…But I’m also noticing this pattern with other designers where we’re finding our own way to do it. We’re not going to try to compete with big brands, not going to try to compete with fast fashion, because it’s just literally impossible. It’s exciting to find alternatives.Renaissance Renaissance’s SS26 Collection “La Touriste.” Courtesy of the designer.To return to the brand for a moment, could you tell me more about why you founded Renaissance Renaissance and how the name came about?I started the brand because I wanted to be a creative director, and I thought the best way to do it was to start my own brand because at the time and still now, we don’t see people like me, Arab women, in these positions. The name came about because I like the idea of duality and also of cycles. I like the idea that a woman can constantly have many lives in one lifetime. And it’s the same idea with clothes as well. A garment can come with you through the different stages of your life.2026 has just started, but your designs have already been in the spotlight this year, after Rama Duwaji, the new First Lady of New York City, wore a Renaissance Renaissance coat to the mayoral inauguration. Your designs have also been garnering a lot of industry attention; you were shortlisted for the LVMH Prize in 2021 and again in 2025 and won the 2023 Fashion Trust Arabia Prize for evening wear. What does it feel like to have your work be recognized at this scale?It’s amazing. It’s amazing because we work our asses off—me, my mom, and our seamstresses, all the factories and artisans we work with in Lebanon, plus so many other people like [my publicist] David and his team, and our commercial director, Rodrigo. Of course, it feels really good when the work gets recognized, because it feels like it’s for something—maybe we are not making millions, but at least, people are getting it, it means something to the world…It doesn’t change the reality of being an independent brand, and it’s not changing the day-to-day reality of things. But it definitely feels really good for everyone, not just me. It makes me feel like we’re going in the right direction.In the week following the inauguration, a lot has been made about the symbolism of what Rama wore to the ceremony. Your collections have never shied away from finding the political within the personal. What does it feel like to see your clothing now being a catalyst for larger discussions?When you’ve been doing this for the last 10 years, sometimes you think you’re fucking crazy because you’re doing something that’s meaningful in an industry that doesn’t usually value it. I think if you look at the last decade of fashion especially, it’s been a lot of irony—this idea of quiet luxury. I feel like sincerity was looked down on. Femininity was looked down on. So it’s very nice, because I haven’t changed what I stand for, but people caught up.I don’t know how long it will last, but for me, these are my personal values, the things I always believe in. It’s not going to change now, because other people are writing about it, but it is nice to know that I’m not just having the dialogue by myself or with the wall anymore.Why is fashion political? And what do you think the role of fashion is in this moment?Anything we put out in the world, including fashion or any art you do, is going to be interpreted in the context of whatever is going on. [Rama Duwaji’s] coat is an amazing example, right? There was such a crazy reaction to it, and it was just a coat, but it’s about the meaning and what it stands for and what it symbolizes. Fashion is really important in that way. It helps express ourselves outwardly, and whether we put meaning to it or not, someone is going to put meaning to what we wear. Fashion will always be political. I think it’s very political now because it’s becoming so inaccessible. This is something I’m really thinking about, and I really want to work on in the next year with my brand, because when you’re selling a bag or a shirt for like, $1000-2,000, what are you trying to say with that? Our whole world right now is becoming more and more polarized because of economics, and fashion is no stranger to that.That’s why it’s so important if you have a brand today and if you are a small brand, you can’t afford to not be political, to not take a risk. And when I say political, it’s not necessarily about doing posts about whatever is going on in the news. I’m looking at pricing, how people are shopping, or what they can’t access. I’m looking at how the system treats independent designers. Even with my heritage, to be able to say I’m a Palestinian-Lebanese designer in the U.S. press, for me, was something I could not imagine reading when I was growing up. I couldn’t even imagine it five years ago. To make a decision to be in Beirut, to produce here, was a message. I want to find my own way of living sustainably in a way that benefits mental health and our well-being. I want to make clothes that are great, beautifully designed, but are not going to cost $20 billion unless they’re justified. All these challenges are happening now, and these are all very political. It’s all tied into what’s going on, the bigger picture." } , { "title" : "From Seoul to Gaza: How a Grassroots Coalition Is Rewriting the Politics of Solidarity", "author" : "Joi Lee", "category" : "essay", "url" : "https://everythingispolitical.com/readings/from-seoul-to-gaza", "date" : "2026-01-27 11:59:00 -0500", "img" : "https://everythingispolitical.com/uploads/0E89D45E-03BB-47EC-BFC6-6DF3F851FCA3_1_102_o.jpg", "excerpt" : "Korea is not a country known for its multiculturalism. But the Palestinian movement is rewriting what solidarity looks like here.", "content" : "Korea is not a country known for its multiculturalism. But the Palestinian movement is rewriting what solidarity looks like here.Most Koreans didn’t know much about Palestine when Nareman moved from Bethlehem to Seoul in August 2023.“Oh, you’re from Pakistan?” Koreans used to ask, brows furrowed. It was not a question designed to offend, but instead reflected a deeper reality: South Korea’s distance from the Middle East, geographically, politically, and imaginatively.“No, from Palestine,” She would repeatedly correct. It wasn’t long before she grew resigned to the fact that her homeland barely existed in Korean public consciousness.Then came October 7. And suddenly, everyone had an opinion.Overnight, the anonymity that had once alienated her – but also shielded her – evaporated. Now, her homeland was thrust into the spotlight, but she felt more misrepresented than ever. Instead of “Pakistan,” the new response she heard was, often tinged with fear or distrust: “Hamas.”Like much global media coverage since October 7, Korean news substituted “Palestinian” with “Hamas,” collapsing a people into a faction. An early survey in November 2023 showed that the Korean public was more than twice as likely to blame ‘Hamas’ for the war.Alone in a foreign country, disconnected from other Palestinians, she felt alone and terrified.Now, she hesitated before answering the question, Where are you from? One day, out of panic, she answered, “Egypt!”But just a week later, something shifted. She found herself standing at one of Seoul’s first pro-Palestinian solidarity marches after October 7. There, in the streets, she saw other Palestinians and Arabs – students, workers, families – many meeting one another for the first time. She felt something she hadn’t felt since leaving Bethlehem: she wasn’t alone.That protest would become the seed of a movement.A Country Not Known for MulticulturalismSouth Korea is one of the most ethnically homogenous societies in the world. Koreans routinely call their country danil minjok – one people, one ethnicity. While that identity has shifted in recent years, the myth still shapes social attitudes, particularly toward Muslims, Arabs, refugees, and migrants.Public discourse is dominated by anxieties about multiculturalism, demographic decline, and cultural purity. Islamophobia remains widespread, reinforced by sensationalist news coverage and limited exposure to Muslim or Arab communities.Before October 7, Palestine was barely part of Korean political vocabulary. As activist Irang Bak recalled, previous “one-off” mobilizations were often symbolic gestures, often organized by Koreans, in which Palestinians were invited only briefly to speak.The events of 2023 changed that.The birth of a coalitionWhat began as a handful of scattered activists – Korean leftists, Egyptian refugees, a few Palestinian students – grew into what is now called the People in Solidarity with Palestine, a coalition of over forty-five organizations.In the earliest days after October 7, two communities were already mobilizing: the Egyptian community in Seoul, many of whom had fled persecution under the Sisi regime, and Korean activists long rooted in anti-imperialist and labor struggles, especially members of the Workers Solidarity Movement (WSM).Irang Bak, a member of WSM and one of the coalition’s core organizers, said that previous campaigning created the common ground to come together.  “We had already organised with the Egyptian community before around refugee and migrant rights – so when October 7 happened, we called them and they called us.”On October 11, just four days after the attack, they held their first march, a modest but defiant gathering on a tense political landscape. Korean media accused them of “supporting Hamas,” an accusation that revealed the public discourse in the country.But something happened that day that changed the direction of the movement entirely.During that march, a small group of Palestinian students approached the organizers.“We want to organize the next protest together,” they said. And so, Palestinians joined the coalition alongside the Egyptian and Korean activists.This shift, from having Palestinians as symbolic presences to having them as co-organizers, became foundational.Irang remembers that moment clearly. “Before, Koreans organized and Palestinians came as guests to speak. But now it was a movement we were building together. We were learning in real time.”Left to right: Sihun Lee, co-founder of Subak Student Group at Seoul National University, Nareman Samir, Palestinian organizer, and Irang Bak, Korean organizer.Centering Palestinian VoicesCentering Palestinians became a core part of what set the coalition apart.Sihun, another key organizer of People in Solidarity with Palestine and co-founder of the Subak (Watermelon) Student Group at Seoul National University, explained it this way:“Having Palestinians as agents, not guests, changed everything. We support Palestinian resistance because resisting colonization is a universal right.”In a society that often valorizes Korean perspectives above all else, this approach was radical. Many organizations, Sihun noted, feel pressure to frame issues in “Korean terms” to attract media coverage or political attention. But the coalition rejected that.“We try to avoid making Korea the center,” he said. “This movement is not about us.”For Palestinian members like Nareman, this was transformative. “People in Solidarity with Palestine trusted our voices, and supported our narrative – which has historically been overlooked. That’s why I’m still with them,” she told me.Within a month of attending her first protest, she was invited to become a representative. In the process, she met other Palestinians. “It became a community for us,” she said. “A place to find other Palestinians, to organize, to breathe.”This may seem small, but for a diaspora as dispersed and fragmented as Palestine’s – especially in a country with a tiny Palestinian population – it meant everything. The movement created an infrastructure of belonging.A Different Kind of SolidarityIn the time since October 7, People in Solidarity with Palestine organized teach-ins, marches, vigils, art builds, public discussions, film screenings, and student actions across Seoul. At first, the crowds were small but they were consistent, and the crowds began to grow and relationships started to deepen.Today, they have organised over 110+ marches in Seoul, nearly every single week since October 7, helping raise visibility on Palestinian issues. Now, they are one of several different coalitions and organising blocks in the wider Korean Palestinian movement, such as Urgent Action by Korean Civil Society in Solidarity with Palestine and BDS Korea.Activism was also being revived on university campuses. At the second protest, Sihun met a fellow student at Seoul National University, a third generation Palestinian. “Let’s start a club,” she said. And so they did, naming it Subak, which is Korean for watermelon.By spring 2024, the ripple effects of U.S. campus encampments were spreading globally. When students at Columbia University erected tents demanding divestment, Korean students watched closely. Sihun and his co-organizers decided: If they can do it, so can we.At Seoul National University, South Korea’s most prestigious campus, they launched a solidarity encampment that lasted six weeks. It was the first of its kind in the country.“At first it was mostly international students,” Sihun said.“But then more Koreans began joining too.”Tents multiplied. Discussions grew deeper. Faculty began stopping by. Students who had never attended a protest found themselves sleeping on the ground for Gaza. Soon, other universities also started following suit – with encampments popping up in other top tier institutions Korea University and Yonsei University.What emerged was not just solidarity with Palestinians, but a reawakening of Korean student activism itself, something many organizers hadn’t seen since before COVID times.Whether in the campuses or on the streets of Seoul, for many Koreans, it was the first time they had encountered Palestinians not as headlines on the news, but as classmates, neighbors, and fellow organizers.For many Palestinians, it was the first time they felt seen without having to justify their existence, or explain their grief, or sanitize their political demands.The People in Solidarity with Palestine coalition’s  intentionally Palestinian-centered approach became a quiet form of political education. Koreans learned to follow rather than lead.A Cultural Shift in Public OpinionEven as the Korean government maintained close military ties with Israel, public sentiment has shifted dramatically. A 2024 survey showed a steep decline in Korean favorability toward Israel, moving from slightly negative to overwhelmingly negative – a bigger drop than in many wealthy countries.This wasn’t only due to global media coverage. It was also the product of grassroots education. Korean organizers translated Palestinian testimonies into Korean. They held weekly street marches. They brought Palestinian speakers into classrooms and union halls.For the first time, Palestine became part of Korean political consciousness.But what’s happening in Seoul is not just about Palestine. It’s about the possibility of building movements that are transnational, multilingual, multiethnic, and deeply collaborative even in a society that is not known for multiculturalism.And it’s about recognizing that communities living far from each other can still shape each other’s survival.Coalitions like People in Solidarity with Palestine are far from mainstream. But its impact, and its approach, offers a model for what solidarity can look like in countries where diaspora communities are small, where misinformation is widespread, and where geopolitical narratives feel distant.A year after arriving in Seoul, Nareman can answer the question “Where are you from?” without hesitation. She now says “Palestine” with the confidence of someone who knows she has a community behind her.She is one of the coalition’s most active organizers, helping shape actions, messaging, and marches. The movement has not erased her grief, nothing could, but it has given her belonging.“We need Palestinian voices,” she told me. “And here, we’re leading the movement.”That is the quiet revolution unfolding in Seoul.In a city thousands of miles from Gaza, activists are building a new politics of solidarity, one rooted in trust, relationship, and collective liberation. One where Koreans, Egyptians, and Palestinians fight not just for each other, but with each other.And in that world, Palestine is not far away at all." } ] }