Drashti Mehta
Soc Sci 198
April 1, 2021
Report # 1
1. Describe how Black feminism is related to the liberation of Palestinians in Israel.
Israel’s war against Palestine affects and targets Palestinian women in every way, this is
why it is related to Black feminism. Palestinian women face systematic oppression and
are denied freedom from a variety of things. They are denied access to education,
opportunities in work, care for their reproductive health, and so many more. They are
subjects to gender-based violence and this what turned the liberation of Palestinians in
Israel a feminist movement. For this reason, it is related to Black feminism because Black
women also continuously face systematic oppression for not just gender but for race as
well. A lot of the issues that Palestinian women face are the same as the ones that Black
women often face due to racism, poverty, and gender, and class. The struggles that Black
women face of racism in the US is related to the oppression that Palestinians face by
Israel, as both are centered around feminism.
2. Describe private security groups and their connection to the prison industrial complex.
Private security group named Group 4 Security is the third-largest private security group
in the world. This company profits from racism, anti-immigrant practices, and other
punishments in Israel. This private security is directly connected and responsible for the
incarceration that Palestinians experience, imprisonment in South Africa, prison-like
schools in the U.S., the wall along the US-Mexican border, and it operates the sexual
assault centers in Britain. A lot of lives all over the world suffer due to G4S such as
people in Britain, the US, and Palestine. The Group 4 security is connected to the prison
industrial complex because private security groups such as the G4S are responsible for
private prisons as well immigrant detention centers, and it helps bring more profit to the
prison industrial complex. The private prison industrial complex includes many sectors of
public and private prisons, as well as, juvenile facilities, military, prisons, and
interrogation centers. As mentioned in the reading, one of the most profitable sectors of
the private prison business is immigrant detention centers and a part of the G4S group is
to profit off of anti-immigrant practices, which is why G4S is connected to the prison
industrial complex. ︎ ︎ ︎ ︎ ︎
3. What is BDS? Even if you have never heard this term before, describe movements/causes
where you have heard of people or groups using this tactic to create social, political, or
cultural progress.
According to the reading, BDS stands for the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions
movement. I have never heard of this movement but I have heard of people using one
movement that overlaps with another movement to help their voices be heard and to
intensify the effects of the movement. In the reading, the BDS movements goal was to
end support from the outside of Israel’s oppression and since it is clear that Israel is
isolated politically and economically, they are using that to further stop Israel's unjust
practices on Palestinians. One way I have heard of groups merging to create progress is
when Feminism helped pave the way to equal marriage. Supporters of the feminist
movement joined the fight for same sex marriage because they share the same values, this
made the fight for equal marriage easier because the feminist movement is already so
huge and they have a lot of supporters to begin with. Their support for equal marriage
helped supporters of equal marriage have more hope.