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BREAKING THE SILENCE ON PALESTINIAN ARMED STRUGGLE  
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Ramzy Baroud - Romana Rubeo
April 8, 2025
Counterpunch
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_ We asked Prof. Falk specifically about the Palestinian people’s
right to defend themselves, and, specifically, about armed struggle
and its consistency (or lack thereof) with international law. _

, Image by Dylan Shaw

 

On February 22, 2024, China’s Ambassador to The Hague, Zhang Jun,
uttered the unexpected.

His testimony, like that of a number of others, was meant to help the
International Court of Justice (ICJ) formulate a critical and
long-overdue legal opinion on the legal consequences of Israel’s
occupation of Palestine.

Zhang articulated
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the Chinese position, which, unlike the American envoy’s testimony,
was entirely aligned with international and humanitarian laws.

But he delved into a tabooed subject—one that even Palestine’s
closest allies in the Middle East and Global South dared not touch:
the right to use armed struggle.

“Palestinian people’s use of force to resist foreign oppression
and complete the establishment of an independent state is an
inalienable right,” the Chinese Ambassador said, insisting that
“the struggle waged by peoples for their liberation, right to
self-determination, including armed struggle against colonialism,
occupation, aggression, domination against foreign forces should not
be considered terror acts”.

Expectedly, Zhang’s comments didn’t reverberate much further:
neither governments nor intellectuals, including many on the left,
used his remarks as an opportunity to explore the matter further.
It’s far more convenient to assign Palestinians the role of the
victim or the villain. A resisting Palestinian—one with agency and
control over his own fate—is always a dangerous territory.

Zhang’s remarks, however, were situated entirely within
international law. Thus, we couldn’t miss the opportunity to discuss
the topic in a recent interview
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with Professor Richard Falk, a leading scholar in international law
and former UN Special Rapporteur for Palestine.

Falk is not merely a legal expert, however accomplished he has been in
the field. He is also a profound intellectual and an astute student of
history. Though he speaks with great care, he does not hesitate or
mince words. His ideas may appear ‘radical’, but only if the term
is understood within the limiting intellectual confines of mainstream
media and academia.

Falk does not speak ‘common sense’, according to the Gramscian
principle [[link removed]], but ‘good
sense’—perfectly rational discourse, though often inconsistent
with mainstream thinking.

We asked Prof. Falk specifically about the Palestinian people’s
right to defend themselves, and, specifically, about armed struggle
and its consistency (or lack thereof) with international law.

“Yes, I think that’s a correct understanding of international
law—one that the West, by and large, doesn’t want to hear
about,” Falk said in response to the February 24 comments by Zhang.

Falk elaborated: “The right of resistance was affirmed during the
decolonization process in the 1980s and 1990s, and this included the
right to armed resistance. However, this resistance is subject to
compliance with international laws of war.”

Even the preamble to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states
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that “whereas it is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have
recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and
oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of
law”.

Israel does not comply with international laws of war—for example,
the entire situation in Gaza is one of the most flagrant violations of
Israel’s complete disregard
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not only for the laws of war, but for the entire apparatus of
international and humanitarian laws.

Palestinians, on the other hand, who are in a permanent state of
self-defense, are driven by a different set of values of Israel. One
is that they are fully aware of the need to maintain moral legitimacy
in their methods of resistance.

Thus, ‘compliance with the laws of war’ would imply
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a commitment to protect civilians; respect and protect the “wounded
and sick (…) in all circumstances”; “prevent unnecessary
suffering” by restricting “the means and methods of warfare”;
conduct “proportionate” attacks, among other principles.

This takes us to the events of October 7, 2023, the Al-Aqsa Flood
Operation [[link removed]] inside
what is known as the Gaza Envelope region in southern Israel.

“To the extent that there is real evidence of atrocities
accompanying the October 7 attack, those would constitute violations,
but the attack itself is something that, in context, appears entirely
justifiable and long overdue,” Falk said.

The above statement is earth-shattering, to say the least. It is one
of the clearest distinctions between the operation itself and some
allegations—many of which have already been proven false
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what may have taken place during the Palestinian resistance assault.

This is why Israel, the US, and their allies in Western governments
and media labored greatly to mischaracterize the events that led to
the war, resorting to utter lies
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about mass rape, decapitation
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of babies, and senseless slaughter of innocent participants in a music
festival.

By creating this misleading narrative, Israel succeeded in shifting
the conversation away from the events that led to October 7 and placed
Palestinians on the defensive, as they stood accused of carrying out
unspeakable horrors against innocent civilians.

“One of the tactics used by the West and Israel has been to almost
succeed in decontextualizing October 7 so that it appears to have come
out of the blue,” according to Falk.

“The UN Secretary-General was even defamed as an antisemite for
merely pointing out the most obvious fact—that there had been a long
history of abuse of the Palestinian people leading up to it,” he
added, referring to Antonio Guterres’ simply stating
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that October 7 “did not happen in a vacuum”.

The words of Falk, an iconic figure and one of the most influential
academics and advocates of international law in our time, must inspire
a real discussion on Palestinian resistance.

The history of Palestinian resistance is not a history of armed
resistance, per se. The latter is a mere manifestation of a long
history of popular resistance that reaches all aspects of societal
expression, ranging from culture, spirituality, civil disobedience,
general strikes, mass protests, hunger strikes, and more.

However, if Palestinians succeed in placing their armed
resistance—as long as it complies with the laws of war—within a
legal framework, then attempts at delegitimizing the Palestinian
struggle, or large sections of Palestinian society, will be challenged
and ultimately defeated.

While Israel continues to enjoy impunity from any meaningful action by
international institutions, it is the Palestinians who continue to
stand accused, instead of being supported in their legitimate struggle
for freedom, justice, and liberation.

Only courageous voices, like Zhang and Falk, among many others, will
ultimately correct this skewed discourse of history.

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_Listen to Ramzy Baroud on the latest episode of CounterPunch Radio
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_Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and the Editor of The Palestine
Chronicle. He is the author of five books. His latest is “__These
Chains Will Be Broken_
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Palestinian Stories of Struggle and Defiance in Israeli Prisons”
(Clarity Press, Atlanta). Dr. Baroud is a Non-resident Senior Research
Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA), Istanbul
Zaim University (IZU). His website is __www.ramzybaroud.net_
[[link removed]]_ _ _Romana Rubeo is an Italian writer
and the managing editor of The Palestine Chronicle. Her articles
appeared in many online newspapers and academic journals. She holds a
Master’s Degree in Foreign Languages and Literature, and specializes
in audio-visual and journalism translation. _

* Palestine's International Rights; The Laws of War; October 7;
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