Radical Books Collective @radicalbooks.bsky.social

In 1993, Michael Jackson penned a song for Palestine that was never recorded. As genocide in Gaza unfolded, MJ fans set this song to music and videos proliferated. This brilliant essay by feminist studies scholar Sherry Zane proves that MJ's political positions on Palestine, Blackness, war & violence, climate justice have always been deemed dangerous and have always been policed. Yet his mutating archive is case study in how solidarity might be erased and repackaged but it can also be recovered. radicalbookscollective.com/p/michael-jack…

India trying to stay relevant as a foolish sub-imperial power by sucking up to Israel while the country is literally being crippled by oil and gas prices thanks to Israel’s illegal war against Iran.

Standing Ovations for Palestinian Pain: On “The Voice of Hind Rajab” and the limits of Western cinema -- @mrmhawish for The Key thekeymagazine.com/p/the-voice-of…

"The same global visibility that enabled Michael Jackson to show solidarity also made those gestures legible to institutions focused on controlling them." By way of James Baldwin, bell hooks & more, Zane's incredible research unearths just how much MJ's politics was policed...

Good news from #France even as another round left to go - "The left party France Unbowed (La France Insoumise, LFI) recorded breakthrough results in the first round of local elections on 15 March. The results represent an elevenfold increase in their performance at this level compared to previous votes—an outcome that even mainstream media could not ignore." -- Ana Vračar for @SavageMindsMag savageminds.substack.com/p/france-unbow…

A pleasure to speak with the fierce @NerdeenKiswani about Mayor Mamdani's recent debacle around Palestine. Madhuri from @project_polis and I asked if the mayor has started backtracking from Palestine and giving in the failed Democrat Party playbook.

Join us — @NerdeenKiswani weighs in on NYC Mayor Mamdani’s recent debacle where he denounced writer @susanabulhawa harshly at a press conference

Backtracking on Palestine? Zohran Mamdani and the Democratic Party Playbook x.com/i/broadcasts/1…

LIVE happening soon -- Palestinian American activist @NerdeenKiswani joins @bhakti_shringa & Madhuri Sastry @project_polis to discuss the recent concerns about NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani backtracking on Palestine. In light of Mayor Mamdani’s harsh words about writer Susan Abulhawa and her powerful video response, the fear of betrayal around Palestine looms large, a core issue for the base of supporters that brought him to power. Join us right here or on youtube or substack... youtube.com/live/5_8EUzTQh…

“Elastic Empire provides us with yet more fodder to pierce the Zionist hegemonic narrative hook of October 7 as the beginning of History. In the arc from the war on terror to now, we see the banal administrative and bureaucratic workings of incremental genocide, the unspectacular and lesser perceived modes through which genocide is not rendered only through the extermination of life but through its very negation.” — Jasbir Puar on ‘Elastic Empire’ by Lisa Bhungalia

Guest essay about Michael Jackson and Palestine is dropping tonight ☄️ Please upgrade your subscriptions, we need your support to keep bringing the edgy cultural politics conversations! radicalbookscollective.com

Thank @BenEhrenreich That was an insufferable thread peacocking about insider connections with “legacy” genocide media

“The time has come to stop prioritizing Western approval, to stop promoting conciliatory frameworks, and to stop treating the strategy of resistance as obsolete. Instead, we must align with the masses in their steadfast fight for liberation.”

Say her name! It’s Leqaa Korda.

Incredible conversation. @oliviasnaije for @arablit

A year of powerhouse Palestinian cinema, all by women directors of Arab heritage 🇵🇸👏🏾❤️ radicalbookscollective.com/p/palestine-at…

“I don’t know what to say. I’m free! I’m free! Finally, after one year.” These were the words of 33-year-old U.S. Palestinian political prisoner Leqaa Kordia upon her release from ICE detention earlier today. In an article published on International Women’s Day on March 8, 2026 she wrote, “I will have spent a year in Prairieland Detention Facility, because I attended a protest and called for an end to the ongoing genocide in Gaza – which has killed nearly 200 of my family members.” Arrested by the NYPD while protesting outside the gates of Columbia University in April 2024, NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch later handed her sealed arrest records over to ICE, facilitating her subsequent detention and efforts by the Department of Homeland Security to deport her. While Zohran Mamdani celebrated news of her freedom and is attempting to take credit for pressuring Trump to release her, he ultimately chose to re-appoint Tisch, the very person responsible for Leqaa’s detention in the first place. This glaring hypocrisy is just another example of his capitulation to those who champion the oppression, violence, torture, imprisonment and genocide of our people. On March 13, 2025 when she arrived for what she thought was a routine immigration check-in at ICE headquarters in Newark, New Jersey, she was abducted, thrown in an unmarked van, and flown to Texas, 1,500 miles from home. Over the course of her detention at Prairieland, she suffered harsh treatment, denial of her basic rights, torture and abuse. For months, she slept in a plastic shell, surrounded by cockroaches and throughout her detention she was also denied reasonable access to halal food. Just days before suffering a seizure, losing consciousness and being disappeared by ICE for over 72 hours in February, Leqaa said she felt like she was slowly dying. While she was hospitalized following the seizure, she was shackled to her bed. Reflecting on the experience she stated, “The best medicine for me and everyone else here is our freedom.” “Ours is a daily battle for basic dignity,” she wrote in January 2026. “None of us deserve to be treated this way. All of our voices deserve to be heard. I think, too, of the thousands of Palestinians languishing in Israeli prisons, who are subject to beatings, torture and starvation. My detention has only increased my resolve to be a more vocal advocate for all people facing injustice.” “Whether it is my family in Palestine, or the other women unjustly confined by ICE alongside me, I will continue to use my voice to speak up for the freedom and dignity of others,” she declared. As we celebrate Leqaa’s freedom during the final days of Ramadan, we amplify her message of solidarity and struggle, and the call to freedom for all of our political prisoners from the U.S. to Palestine. Born in Al-Quds, raised in her early years in Gaza and then the West Bank, Leqaa is a daughter of Palestine whose struggle for justice echoed around the world. The fight to end the ongoing genocide is part of the same fight to free our prisoners, and ultimately for liberation and return within our lifetime. #FreeLeqaa #FreeThemAll