“Refusing to be a victim, refusing to be an enemy”. Form-of-life as resistance in the Palestinian struggle against settler colonialism

Negotiating Colonial Violence: Spaces of Precarisation in Palestine

“…The ongoing legalisation of land appropriations (Joronen ), the use of permit regimes (Berda ), and the demolition of homes often related to colonial planning and rezoning (Chiodelli , ) are all, as I will show below in detail, clearly indicative of how Israel uses administrative processes for spatialising settler colonial violence, particularly in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. While there is a broader agreement within the existing literature on the prevalence of Israel's use of settler colonial means of governing (Pullan and Yacobi ; Shalhoub‐Kevorkian , ; Veracini , ; Zureik ), critics have claimed all too often Palestinian spaces have been framed through, and so sidelined with those of the Israeli occupation (Allen ; Harker ; Joronen ; Kotef and Amir ; Stamatopoulou‐Robbins ). As it has also been argued within the literature critical of governing‐ and governmentality‐centred approaches (Death ; MacKinnon ), focus on the control, government, and conducting of others tends to ignore the “real‐world messiness”, therefore setting aside “the practice, implementation, agency, experience and resistance” of the ones governed (Rosol :75).…”

“…Second, even though precarisation has the power to turn the spaces and lives of the colonised even close to unliveable, it can also operate as a source of action. Induced precarities do not merely passivise those set under the precarious conditions, but engender new forms of action and social practice, ranging from the solidarity within the communities under the threat of settler colonial eviction to the counter‐conducts and counter‐visibilities against the settler colonial ways of precarisation and elimination (see Athanasiou ; Hammami ; Joronen ; Joronen and Griffiths ). Together, these two tensions—the one between the political distribution of precarities and ontological precariousness, and the other between precarity as a source of governing and counter‐conduct—also help in understanding how the corresponding spatialities between the compartmentalisation (as a tactic of spatialising colonial violence) and the negotiated precarities operate in a way that takes into account the irreducibility of Palestinian spaces to the precarities imposed by Israeli settler colonialism.…”

“…This, I argue, highlights the importance of comprehending precarity as beyond the passivising/activating and the governing/governed divides (see also Athanasiou ; Butler ). As shown by several scholars, even remarkable vulnerabilities can create new forms of solidarity (Hammami ), steadfastness (Lentin ), resistance (Joronen ), resilient family practices (Harker ), affectual capacities (Joronen and Griffiths ) and hope (Griffiths ; Joronen and Griffiths ) among the colonised, particularly when shared. Vulnerability can be hence used to perpetuate subjugating governing but also activating resistance; it ensures the governed and the governing alike remain vulnerable, but can also be used as a resource for affirming new action, counter‐conduct and new ways of coping with settler colonial violence.…”

“…prevalence of Israel's use of settler colonial means of governing (Pullan and Yacobi 2017;Shalhoub-Kevorkian 2014Veracini 2006Veracini , 2010Zureik 2016), critics have claimed all too often Palestinian spaces have been framed through, and so sidelined with those of the Israeli occupation (Allen 2008;Harker 2009;Joronen 2017a;Kotef and Amir 2011;Stamatopoulou-Robbins 2008). As it has also been argued within the literature critical of governing-and governmentality-centred approaches (Death 2010;MacKinnon 2000), focus on the control, government, and conducting of others tends to ignore the "real-world messiness", therefore setting aside "the practice, implementation, agency, experience and resistance" of the ones governed (Rosol 2014:75).…”

Hope in Hebron: The Political Affects of Activism in a Strangled City

“… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_yKpu61zM8 (last accessed 5 September 2016). For further discussion of similar assertions in Palestinian resistance, see Joronen ().…”