newbloomeditorNew Bloom is issuing the following collective statement to voice our solidarity with the Palestinian people. As a leftist pro-Taiwan independence organization, we find it important to make explicit not just our support for a free Palestine because we unequivocally oppose all genocides and settler-colonizer occupations, but also because of the ties between the Palestinian and Taiwanese struggles for self-determination. We believe it is also important to call out those within the Anglophone and Sinophone left who are supportive of Palestine and China purely as a challenge to U.S. imperialism, such as but not limited to the pro-unification left in Taiwan. Our stance as an organization is to continuously be critical of all empires, including non-Western empires such as China and Russia, and continue to stand with those fighting for self-determination, from Taiwan to Ukraine to Palestine. Taiwan itself is the product of multiple empires, undergoing four centuries of serial settler colonialisms that have and continue to affect Indigenous peoples here. We at New Bloom believe in every peoples’ right to self-determination at every level and to be free of their oppressors.
IT HAS NOW been over fifty days since Israel began military strikes on Gaza’s civilian population, following the attack by Hamas that took place on October 7th. As Taiwanese leftists who believe in Taiwan’s political independence–and more fundamentally, as human beings–we stand in solidarity with Palestinians. We are issuing this statement as part of a planned series of events engaging the Taiwanese public and Taiwanese diaspora on present events, and linking Taiwan’s struggle for self-determination to the Palestinian freedom struggle.
Whether in Ukraine, Hong Kong, Tibet, East Turkistan, Palestine, or beyond, we believe in the universal right to self-determination and liberation from oppression. Taiwan’s own democratic freedoms were hard-won after decades of authoritarian one-party rule during the White Terror period, not to mention Taiwan’s own settler colonial history and its lasting effect on Indigenous peoples–it is our history that has led us to this perspective. At present, Taiwan’s self-determination and de-facto independence continues to face daily military threats from China.
Not long after October 7, Taipei 101–Taiwan’s tallest skyscraper–lit up in the colors of the Israeli flag. This is hardly the first time that Taipei 101 has lit up for questionable political actors. In March 2022, Taipei 101 lit up with a message of welcome for former Trump administration Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. It has been the case for a long time that Taiwan has been framed within a campism that dictates alignment with right-wing governments that are believed to have some use in warding off the military threat of China. We know that performances of “support” such as these are cynical and self-serving, and it is with this context in mind that we choose to stand in solidarity with other peoples in the world facing oppression rather than whitewash authoritarian actors as like-minded allies that supposedly share values with us. We believe in the affirmation of humanity and building solidarity between peoples over clambering for conditional recognition from nation-states.
We acknowledge that many in Taiwan draw comparisons not between Palestine and Taiwan, but Taiwan and Israel as benefactor states of US military power. In this comparison, Taiwan is equated with Israel as a small nation-state surrounded by larger powers hostile to it, and China with Hamas as symbols of anti-Western forces threatening democracy and destabilizing regional harmony. This viewpoint highlights a trend in Taiwanese society in which Taiwanese people desire unconditional alignment with what is perceived as “the democratic West,” while failing to acknowledge that the same Western powers that nominally support Taiwan, too, fail in the test of adherence to democratic values.
In the struggle against oppression, there are no islands unto themselves–none of us are free until all of us are free. Yet, we have observed much of the left fall into simplistic binaries that compromise their ability to stand for freedom for all. There has been, for example, the continued willingness of some leftists to ignore the highly questionable views of certain political actors if they are supportive of self-determination for Palestinians–never mind that perhaps they may be the same actors who dismiss the genocide of Uyghurs because of their rose-tinted view of China, justify Russia’s military invasion of Ukraine, or in fact, have a history of promoting white supremacist and anti-Semitic viewpoints.
For one, it should go without saying discrimination in any form has no place on the left and one cannot oppose some genocides while being apparently supportive of others. But this continues the reductive, simplistic worldview of many who are nominally leftists–siding with those who back authoritarian actors of any stripe so long as they oppose the US and “the West”. At the end of the day, this campist worldview is the logical end for any leftist who has come to conflate leftism and nationalism–our basis for supporting self-determination is not rooted in nationalism, whether for ourselves as Taiwanese or other identities.
Neither is China any salvation from the US empire–it is simply another empire. China conducts substantial trade with Israel and provides it with surveillance technologies that have been developed through the digital enclosure and detaining of Uyghurs and other “ethnic minorities.” Discourse from the most hardline Chinese nationalists sometimes speaks of “Keeping the island, not the people” when it comes to Taiwan–genocidal rhetoric not unlike that which Israel uses against Palestinians. At the very least, Chinese invasion means not “liberation” for us but bloody warfare and interminable military occupation.
But China sees fit to embrace the Palestinian cause to try and erode the US’s claim to a moral high ground. And we are fully aware of how the Palestinian Authority has historically backed China’s claims over Taiwan–though let it be said that neither the Palestinian Authority nor Hamas are the Palestinian people, and one should never conflate states with peoples. This conflation is precisely what the Israeli state does in justifying genocide with the veneer of eliminating Hamas and attempting to claim that any who criticizes Israel is anti-Semitic.
Historically, there has been little connection between Taiwan and Palestine, but much more informal diplomatic activity between Taiwan and Israel since 1993. Hence, the persistence of such views come as no surprise–and we are very familiar with how calling for self-determination for one’s self unfortunately does not always entail calling for self-determination for all peoples. Islamophobia and racism are present in Taiwan, which has perhaps led to greater attention to events in the world elsewhere, such as seen in Taiwan’s response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. And by contrast, Taiwan has stronger trade and technological ties with Israel.
To this end, we find it concerning that many of the voices who have expressed solidarity for Palestine in Taiwan on the left have only been those voices who are of the Taiwanese pro-unification left. As with their Western counterparts, such individuals express support for Palestine and opposition to Israel because they see the shadow of the US empire behind Israel. And, similarly, these are individuals silent on the crimes that take place in China against Tibetans, Uyghurs, and others–they, too, are among those that may be vocal on some genocides in the world but entirely silent on those committed by their preferred empire of choice. Those in Palestine or who stand in solidarity with Palestinians should not misread them as true allies who act on the basis of genuine moral conviction, but rather as opportunistic actors who nominally support Palestinian liberation while being bad faith actors elsewhere.
The presence of bad faith actors in the global Palestinian solidarity movement–particularly in Taiwan–points to how many on the left who otherwise claim to be internationalists are attentive to genocides in select regions of the world but not others, and at times, even being active genocide deniers.
A famous video from the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests shows a young man riding on a bicycle toward the demonstrations. When questioned by a Western journalist why he is going there, he cheerfully replies, “It’s my duty.”
This, too, is what we believe to be our duty. We support Palestinians’ right to self-determination not out of self-interest, and irrespective of what their views on Taiwan are–just as we also supported the A4 Movement in China even if it may be that many Chinese did not have views supportive of Taiwan’s self-determination. To this end, we support Indigenous peoples’ struggle for self-determination in Taiwan as they resist Han settler colonialism, and recognise the necessity of working towards truth, reconciliation, and transitional justice in the Taiwanese independence movement. Our support for Palestinian self-determination is politically and morally consistent with our advocacy for Taiwanese independence. From the river to the sea–freedom for Palestine means a step toward freedom for us all.
In closing, we would like to offer the following resources for constructing solidarity between peripheries.