Last week I was pleasantly surprised to see — and to photograph — this mural in Deptford, in south east London, of the imprisoned Palestinian leader Marwan Barghouti, calling for his release and the release of all Palestinian political leaders held by the State of Israel.
Widely viewed as ‘the Palestinian Mandela’, Marwan Barghouti, 66, an elected Palestinian politician and a tireless campaigner for Palestinian independence, was kidnapped by Israeli forces in 2002 and imprisoned for life after a blatantly unjust trial whose legitimacy he refused to recognize, in which he was accused of directing attacks on Israeli citizens and soldiers. He maintained, as he always has, that he supported armed resistance to the Israeli occupation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, but condemned attacks on civilians inside Israel itself.
A subsequent report by the Inter-Parliamentary Union, representing over 180 parliaments worldwide, found that the trial had involved “numerous breaches of international law”, which made it “impossible to conclude that [he] was given a fair trial.”
Polls of Palestinians have repeatedly shown that he is, as a new campaigning website explains, “Palestine’s most popular leader”, and a “powerful symbol of unity” as “a long-time advocate for freedom and dignity for the Palestinian people.”
The ‘Free Marwan’ campaign and website, just launched, is seeking once more to highlight Marwan Barghouti’s unjust imprisonment, and the hope for the future that his release would signify.
The mural I photographed is one of several that appeared across London in the last week, coordinated by Calum Hall, the founder of Creative Debuts, a creative consultancy and art platform, as part of a global campaign launched by Barghouti’s family, based in the West Bank, including his wife, Fadwa, a lawyer and politician, and his four children, especially his son Arab, who has become a prominent and articulate spokesperson for his father’s cause, and the cause of Palestinian independence.
Although Barghouti has spent many years of his long imprisonment in solitary confinement, conditions have worsened since October 7, 2023, as they have across Israel’s entire prison system for Palestinians, under Israel’s far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir.
In August, a frail-looking Barghouti was directly threatened by Ben-Gvir, who visited his cell and filmed a video that was widely condemned worldwide. See this report here.
Barghouti topped the list of political prisoners whose release was sought by Hamas when the new ceasefire in Gaza began on October 10, but the Israeli government refused to free him, of course, because, even after 23 years in prison, his ability to unite the Palestine people terrifies them, and because he remains so clear about how only Palestinian independence can bring peace.
As he said in an op-ed for the Washington Post in January 2002, before his trial and imprisonment, “Israelis must abandon the myth that it is possible to have peace and occupation at the same time.”
Please support my work if you can
I recently marked my first anniversary here on Substack, and would like to thank all of you for following my work. If you’re able to take out a paid subscription to support my work that would be very much appreciated, as I am a reader-funded journalist and activist, and entirely dependent on your generosity. If you can’t afford a paid subscription here (just $8 a month, or $2 a week), you can make a one-off donation via Paypal or via Stripe, where I’ve just established a new donation page.
A shocking update about Marwan Barghouti via one of his sons, Qassam, who was told by a recently freed prisoner that Israeli forces have broken his teeth, ribs and fingers, and have also cut off part of his ear.
As the only individual capable of uniting the Palestinian people, Israel hates and fears him, and is responding to the threat he poses with a typical mixture of cruelty and violence.
Under Itamar Ben-Gvir, the thuggish far-right Minister of National Security in Benjamin Netayahu's genocidal coalition government, his family have been prevented from seeing him for the last two years, as conditions across Israel's prisons for Palestinians have descended into unprecedented depravity, with at least 100 prisoners killed, and countless others subjected to rape and torture.
Here's the campaign. Please get involved if you can: https://freemarwan.org
I'm delighted to note that an extensive list of prominent public figures calling for Marwan Barghouti's release has just been published on the 'Free Marwan' website today.
Signatories include: Ai WeiWei, Angela Davis, Arundhati Roy, Benedict Cumberbatch, Brian Eno, Cynthia Nixon, David Byrne, Eric Cantona, Fatima Bhutto, Gary Lineker, George Monbiot, Ian McKellen, Jarvis Cocker, Javier Bardem, Laurie Anderson, Margaret Atwood, Mark Ruffalo, Nan Goldin, Naomi Klein, Paul Simon, Pedro Almodovar, Philip Pullman, Sally Rooney, Sting, Susan Sarandon, William Dalrymple, Yanis Varoufakis and Zadie Smith.
https://freemarwan.org/public-figures/