Freedom Advocacy Network

Hello friends,

I’m truly grateful to have recently connected with Dr. Izat El Amoor. After a few thoughtful virtual conversations, I feel honored to be welcoming him as a guest speaker on October 8, 2025. Dr. El Amoor is a queer Palestinian citizen of Israel, and he will be sharing his personal journey and lived experiences across Palestine, the U.S., and beyond. Too often, discussions about queer Palestinians are shaped by Israeli lobbyists and supporters, rather than by queer Palestinians themselves. This conversation is an important opportunity to listen directly to Dr. El Amoor, to learn from his story, and to center Palestinian voices rather than Israeli propaganda.

Agenda: Izat El Amoor (he/him) is a queer Palestinian (citizen of Israel) who will share his personal journey of coming out in the Palestinian society and family, combined with political and social reflections on queer life broadly. Izat will speak on his research on queer Palestine, and share his experience in academia being a queer scholar who recently decided to quit a job as a college professor in the U.S. and return to Palestine.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/izat-el-amoor-ph-d-08745a374/

https://www.apogeejournal.org/pieces/queer-visions-capturing-life-and-identity-in-palestine

https://journal.fi/sqs/article/view/154750

Notes:
Lives in Sefe, Occupied Palestine, near Dead Sea
Left Occupied to escape the country, region – but doesn’t see
Left his US Arkansas college May 2025 because the president was a Christian Zionist
Started as a Masters student – tried to find LGTBQ teachers
Struggled with studying at Palestinian schools as well due to social challenges
Finished going through his Phd
Wanted to look at conflation of Palestinian queers experience of homophobia vs Israel weaponizing and pinkwashing Israeli oppression and colonization
Looked at LGBTQ spaces, found them to be too political, but then realized that even more needs to be done than what they are already doing
Dissertation: Ethnography of LGTBQ 18-45 all over occupied Palestine – lots of variation, religion, political opinions, discussion around approach to Palestinian liberation
Often struggling with “how do I talk about my experience without that being used against me… but also make sure to address the homophobia within the community”
Everything I saw now builds on the legacy of AlKaus and Alswat (need to double check spelling)
Has perspective on the SWANA (aka Middle East) region
Queer repression in SWANA countries “is actually tied directly to Western hegemony in the region”
The dictator in the regions are weaponizing queer liberation
Egypt’s is the second largest recipient of military aid after Israel – but it really gets used to repress pro liberation aspects
Palestinians are living under apartheid and occupation – but they are also a bit more assimilated
Palestinians always had a secular movement that was not influenced by the west
Palestinians because of their struggles also often question their thought more
“Israel does not protect us … as a queer”… If Israel cared about Palestinian queers, it would care about all Palestinians – but they don’t care – about schooling, infrastructure, etc.
Palestinians have an agency and history of questioning everything
Even before 1948 there is a history of Palestinian women being leaders in a revolutionary manner
Apartheid: The fact that we are segregated from other Palestinians, that’s definitive proof of Palestine
People assume that I am safer in Israel as a queer people – but I don’t trust the police. I don’t feel safe. If I call the police, they will not show up as fast as you would be in other places. Black people in the US don’t feel safe calling the police because of systemic racism. Apartheid is very apparent – just by driving around in Muslim and Jewish towns next to each other.
Pinkwashing has grown more aggressive since Oct 7 – but later it slowed down and went into the shadows because of the scale and brutality of the genocide
Real pinkwashing started about 20 years ago – when the world started transitioning from heteronormativity to homonormativity
Israel doesn’t really provide rights to queer people similar to other places around the world, but, still does a lot of propaganda around pinkwashing
The tropes are still similar to before – colonialism and Islamophobia are key part of pinkwashing
Pinkwashing is not just domestically, it is done more international
“Israel is known for manipulating everything it can possibly manipulate”
It goes beyond typical propaganda that other nations state in
In all genocidal campaigns, minorities are affected first
Soon after Oct 7, queer Palestinians were weaponized to justify genocide
“Homonationalism” – builds on homonormativity – calls for “exceptionalism” – where nations think about “who’s worthy of what” – and “who’s worthy of sovereignty” – “you are not even worthy of a nation”
Overtime I learned that my survival doesn’t mean that I have to fit in Western queer patterns
“Palestinians don’t function by disowning their own family members”
“They will do anything and solve any problems before cutting someone off”
“Palestinians because of communal cultural lifestyle avoid scandal”
“As long as it’s not drastically public… who gives a shit”
“I realized that my community is not my enemy”
“No Palestinians owe this kind of discourse to the West”
“Living in Israel right now is not fun… not pleasant… I prefer to stay in my village or my town… sense of discomfort”
Reem: “The assumptions of queer theory are colonial or at least western centric. Seems to me given the culture discussion.”
“My sister didn’t feel comfortable leaving because of her hijab”
“Israel is a military base masking as a country”
“E.g. majority of the people at bus stations are people in uniforms and weapons”
“Since Oct 7, a lot more people are carrying weapons”
“I have always had trouble with connecting with Zionist queers… recently all bridges bridges have been closed”
“I don’t feel safer… lots of people carrying weapons everywhere… I don’t feel safe”
“I am happy that I left the US, despite the difficulty of being in Occupied Palestine”
I was at US Arkansas university and had a history of taking students to birth-right like trips to Israel
“People in the US are not much concerned about anything outside of their borders… they refuse to see the connection … with foreign policy…”
“I am happy I left the US and probably won’t come back easily”
How to be a better queer ally:
Queer struggle for Palestinians is not separate from the Palestinian liberation
Fund raise for AlQaus and Alswat (will put links here –
Fight oppression by your own governments
Recognize our diversity – it’s okay if Queer palestinians disagree on what Palestinian liberation looks like
Support whether they choose to stay or leave – if they decide to leave, that doesn’t mean they don’t have connection and right to leave
If they do choose to leave, try to help asylum process, housing, etc.
Learn queer history – we have learned homophobia from our colonizers