Michael Gast

Dad, son, $ organizer, niners and warriors fan, proudly middle aged, lover of movements and funny people.

[Maurice Moe Mitchell 🐺 @MauriceWFP]

If you’re in a room and you know and agree with everyone, you’re not in a big enough room.

If you can only organize with people who agree with all your ideas, then you don’t have the stomach for the fight ahead.

[Michael Gast @migast]

well, shit

[Michael Gast @migast]

I'm so hopeful about today and this week.
I came home from doorknocking with @seed_the_vote and @unitehere this weekend in Reno, feeling like we got this. Having a ground game matters. Relational organizing matters. It's not gonna be easy, and we got the right team for the job.

[Disability Culture Lab @disability_lab]

We're excited to share this powerful new ad along with our friends at @disabledsouth, @aapd, and @disabilitypower. The disability vote is huge – 61 million adults in the United States. We won't be counted out!
https://t.co/kVt3yPVzhT

[Michael Gast @migast]

Yes! Thanks @solidairetweets for sharing this quote from our conversation. I loved talking to Sawyer Tracy and learning more about Wisdom & Money and their work.

[Solidaire Network @solidairetweets]

Sawyer Tracy works w/ Wisdom & Money, a spiritual community that helps people of wealth find greater inner and outer alignment of their money with their values. She spoke to our beloved member @migast about her work. Read the full interview https://t.co/mcYtheuhAJ

[Solidaire Network @solidairetweets]

5 reasons why there is no effective, progressive organizing of the rich without those efforts being well nested within poor and #workingclass -led movements 🧵

From @migast's latest on Organize the Rich: "Organizing the rich is NOT the key project" https://t.co/zHNbrSJy99

[Solidaire Network @solidairetweets]

What are Ludovic Blain's (ED of the California Donor Table) top lessons from working with wealthy people to build progressive electoral power for the multi-racial working-class majority? Read part 1 of his interview with @migast on Organize the Rich

https://t.co/fehT8fehTx

[Solidaire Network @solidairetweets]

"If unions & progressive elected officials, both of whom are elected (and funded) by large bases, are not amongst the folk we are listening to & following, philanthropy won’t succeed."

Read Ludovic Blain, CA Donor Table ED for Organize the Rich w @migast
https://t.co/tHLzbZiepr

[Michael Gast @migast]

I'm attending Showing Up for Racial Justice's event, “White Men Against MAGA” - sign up now to join me! https://t.co/0FWRO9LNFd

[עומדים ביחד نقف معًا Standing Together🟣 @omdimbeyachad]

Wow! Thousands of Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel packed a major hall in Tel Aviv, for the biggest conference since October 7th that calls to end the war on Gaza and the occupation, to return the hostages, and to advance towards Israeli-Palestinian peace. 💜

[Solidaire Network @solidairetweets]

Is manufactured insecurity hindering wealth holders from investing in the very types of social movements that would give us all true security? Solidaire member @migast reflects on the adage "Always Compare Up" in his latest article on Organize the Rich -- https://t.co/HbcAyxuI2o

[Ami Dar @AmiDar]

This, by the Palestinian American designer Mo Husseini, is fabulous. It is rare, and wonderful, to read a list of 50 items and agree with every word. "I am a Palestinian American who is tired of stupid people...." Amen, brother.

https://t.co/GiDuCl2pJe

[Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib @afalkhatib]

What being pro-Palestine means to me / my platform: I'm passionately, unequivocally, and without hesitation, a proponent of the Palestinian people’s just and urgent aspirations for self-determination, liberation, sovereignty, and safety. I grew up in Gaza, where I experienced Israeli violence and bombardment, including one incident that almost killed me and caused me permanent hearing impairment; my family is still in Gaza and has suffered dozens of deaths during this latest war; my grandparents were expelled from their ancestral homelands in 1948 and fled to the Gaza Strip; and my parents were raised in a refugee camp in Rafah during the 1950s. This background informs and influences me and speaks to why I care about the Palestinian issue and consider myself pro-Palestine. I am motivated by a sincere desire to see my people obtain their legitimate and undeniable rights, which they have not had for decades.

Yet I, and many others, especially those who are silent or are forced to be quiet, struggle with finding a political home in today’s pro-Palestine movement. Increasingly, it feels as if pro-Palestine activism is dominated by maximalists (wanting all of historic Palestine and other zero-sum positions and approaches), slogan-driven voices, and narratives. There is a lack of pragmatic and humanistic ability to hold multiple truths at once and to advocate nuanced and color-rich positions and views that are not black-and-white depictions and understandings of the Israel and Palestine conflict.

Here’s what, to me, an effective and meaningful pro-Palestine platform entails:

1. Supporting the right of Palestinians to a sovereign and independent state living in peace side by side with Israel.

2. Condemning Israeli government actions, policies, priorities, and decisions that kill, harm, undermine, or oppress the Palestinian people.

3. Criticizing and decrying the conduct of the war in Gaza, the military occupation in the West Bank, and the Israeli government’s disregard for Palestinian civilian lives, and the destruction of property and cities.

4. Rejecting, denouncing, and exposing the theft of Palestinian lands in the West Bank and the sprawling settlement enterprise and settler violence.

5. Supporting highly targeted, specific, and effective sanctions against individuals, groups, and entities that are enabling the unjust and illegal occupation of the West Bank and harming Palestinian civilians.

6. Denouncing and combating the dehumanization of the Palestinian people or the denial of their existence as people with the right to live on the land they called home for generations.

7. Acknowledging the tragedy experienced by hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians from 1948 and giving them/their descendants the right to return to the lands of a future Palestinian state in the West Bank and in the Gaza Strip.

8. Understanding past and contemporary mistakes that have set the Palestinian people back by decades and made them pawns in ideologies and geopolitical programs, agendas, and designs.

9. Developing a pragmatic and realistic framework for recognizing Israel’s existence, right to exist, and the inevitability of its continued existence, all of which should inform how a solution is approached.

10. Dispensing with delusional and destructive elements of the Palestinian narrative and acknowledging that there will not be a full liberation of all of Palestine, there will not be a right of return to what is now mainland Israel, and that Israel cannot and should not be confronted militarily or through any form of violence.

11. Promoting a cultural shift away from revolutionary rhetoric, martyrdom, and armed resistance, and instead, rebranding coexistence and peace as a courageous and necessary evolution to preserve Palestinian lives, lands, and heritage and foster a new generation of nation-builders who are focused on doing the most with what the Palestinians currently have and can have in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

12. Denouncing and rejecting antisemitism while also acknowledging that Zionists and Israelis are a diverse group/people and that the Palestinians have to work with all of these segments to have sustainable coexistence and peace.

13. Understanding how violent/hateful rhetoric, actions, and mistakes are detrimental because they empower right-wing and extremist forces in Israel who are opposed to Palestinian rights and that persistent mistakes and incendiary rhetoric and proclamations erode support for the Palestinian people and cause.

14. Recognizing Palestinian agency, responsibility, and accountability when taking actions that have negative consequences and outcomes and acknowledging that, while there’s an asymmetry of power dynamics, Palestinian leaders, political groups, and prominent figures should make rational and responsible choices to optimize for better prospects.

15. Accepting that even with East Jerusalem as the capital of a future Palestinian state, access to holy sites must always be shared and open to all.

16. Realizing how nefarious regional players like the Islamic Republic of Iran and its proxies are not sincere or helpful allies to the Palestinian people and have done so much damage to the entire region and the Palestinian cause.

17. Developing the capacity to hear Jewish perspectives and grievances, historical and contemporary, to understand why pro-Israel supporters believe what they do and why Israel means so much to so many, even if one disagrees with those opinions and views.

18. Understanding that Hamas recklessly endangered Palestinian lives and placed the people of Gaza in significant harm and that the group relies on Palestinian suffering as part of its strategy to delegitimize Israel globally while perpetuating the conflict without any meaningful resolution.

19. Registering the dangers of Islamist rhetoric and ideology that seeks to Islamize Palestinian society and to turn the Palestinian national project into a religious one in pursuit of an Islamic state that, by default, will be exclusionary and incapable of accommodating diverse residents in a future Palestinian country.

I am compelled to share the aforementioned because, for far too many people, pro-Palestine activism has been reduced to incendiary language that fails to capture the multiple moving parts of what is needed to advance the just and urgent Palestinian aspirations for freedom and independence. While many students, activists, advocates, academics, and analysts have their hearts in the right place, many cannot present viable and pragmatic ideas that are not mere rhetorical statements and empty slogans.

I know that many strongly disagree with my views and opinions, and that’s entirely fine. Still, many more are eager to see a recalibration of pro-Palestine activism to actually help the Palestinians achieve statehood instead of inflaming division and fostering hostility towards supporters of Israel and the Jewish community. Many in Palestine are aware of the need to be pragmatic and don’t think that angry protests, BDS, antisemitism, endless academic lectures, social media activism, or “feel good” slogans will actually make a difference.

It’s time for a rejuvenated pro-Palestine movement that serves as a big tent to encompass multiple views and opinions and to invite and promote broad alliances, especially with mainstream Jewish and Israeli communities, to work towards a just and sustainable resolution of the conflict once and for all. This is entirely attainable and achievable with humility, civility, patience, compassion and kindness, perseverance and determination, a willingness to accept reasonable compromises and accommodations, and, most importantly, the recognition of both sides’ undeniable and mutual humanity.

[Michael Gast @migast]

@bencsin where is that in tokyo?

[Rural Power Now @RuralpowerNow]

⚡Our new animated short, “Power to the People: The Story of Rural Electric Cooperatives,” illustrates how rural America can learn from the past and lead the clean energy transition to a greener, more equitable future. 💡#RuralPower

https://t.co/jJSW6xgOGv

[Michael Gast @migast]

silence isn't just violence. it can be disagreement or fear, ignorance or reflection. it can be so many things. for those who organize, its something to listen to and get curious about. shaming people for their silence doesn't build our base or grow our power.

[Michael Gast @migast]

@intldogooder 💛💛💛 thanks for the shout out @intldogooder

[Ami Dar @AmiDar]

A strong statement yesterday by 30 leading Israeli human rights organizations. Yes. YES. Please click on the link to read it:

https://t.co/l5eqX3xqpY

[Michael Gast @migast]

one of my favorite fundraising sayings..."if you want money, ask for advice. if you want advice, ask for money."

[Michael Gast @migast]

this right here! thank you @BenLorber8

[Ben Lorber @BenLorber8]

If you think Israeli civil society is one space worth contesting-- whether on moral or simply strategic grounds-- it seems utterly reactionary & unserious to oppose initiatives like this which work w/in present conditions to challenge folks to stretch their political vision