Faizel Patel, Radio Islam News – 26-02-2018
A Syrian-American journalist has told Radio Islam the late US civil rights activist Malik Al Shabazz, better known as Malcom X, was an avid supporter of Palestine.
Malcolm X who passed away in 1965 was an African-American Muslim and human rights activist who advocated for the rights of blacks and indicted white America in the harshest terms for its crimes against black Americans.
He has been called one of the greatest and most influential African Americans in history.
Maytha Alhassen is currently in South Africa for the 14th Israeli Apartheid Week (IAW) with BDS South Africa which takes place from the 12 to 18 March.
Alhassen says Malcom X’s support was not included in his autobiography or the movie about him.
“But it was very prominent when you investigated his trip to the Middle East that was part of my research for my dissertation as well. So Malcom X travelled to Gaza in 1964 when Gaza was under the administrative control of Egypt and then Israel takes it back in 1967.”
Alhassen says Malcom X was deeply affected by a poem recited by a Palestinian poet about the Khan Younis massacre which occurred in 1956 and surviving the onslaught when he visited Gaza and refugee camps.
“In his diary he wrote a stanza of that poem he heard from that poet and it appeared to influence writings that he had produced for international press. He wrote an op-ed called “Zionist logic” that critiqued Zionism and expressed support for the Palestinian Liberation struggle in September 1964.”
Alhassen says she will be speaking more about the last few months Malcom X’s life and going into detail how the trip to Gaza influenced his broader politics.
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