11. Why do Palestinians name streets and schools after “terrorists”?
The term “terrorist” is not neutral — generally and historically, it is used by Western imperial and colonial states in order to delegitimize or degrade the actions of non-state actors, particularly those who use armed force and whose actions don’t align with US imperialist interests. As we have seen in the case of Syria, the label is not permanent and can be lifted if these actors choose to align themselves with imperialist interests.1
In Palestine, the people referred to by Israel and zionist commentators as “terrorists” are usually Palestinians engaged in some form of resistance against the state and its various mechanisms of control and violence against the indigenous people. These people are most often killed extrajudicially by Israeli forces, or imprisoned and subjected to legal proceedings that are designed to find them guilty and keep them incarcerated for as long as possible.
For Palestinians, resistance — and the remembrance of those engaged in meaningful resistance — is not abstract, but a meaningful act toward a future of liberation in which Palestinians can return to their homes and be reunited in a liberated Palestine. Remembrance is part of protecting and maintaining a long history of indigenous refusal to accept occupation, oppression, and colonization. Palestinians don’t just name streets and schools after those who have been killed or imprisoned in the struggle toward justice, but adorn streets with murals of their names and faces and recount famous quotes by resistance fighters and philosophers. Their presence in public spaces is an insistence on the collectivity of the struggle for liberation, and a declaration that they are not “terrorists” who are distinct and separate from Palestinian society. It is a refusal to allow their dehumanization or erasure from history.