By Bill Hackwell on September 1, 2025 in Detroit Michigan
all photos: Bill Hackwell
In a tremendous organizing effort, the second annual People’s Conference for Palestine: Gaza is the Compass in Detroit has just concluded after a 3 day convention that organizers report drew 4,600 participants from around the US and abroad. The event flew in the face of Trump and his pro Zionist team who are the underwriters of the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people.
The conference brought together thousands of activists, journalists, labor leaders and people of conscience despite attempts to undermine and prohibit it from happening. “They have tried to intimidate us with smears, with false accusations, and with every single available threat at their disposal to stop this conference from happening, but we will not stop“, said Taher Dahleh an activist and organizer with the Palestinian Youth Movement, the convening organization of the People’s Conference.
all photos: Bill Hackwell
It becomes ever more clear to anyone with their eyes open that the US and Israel, its garrison out post in the Middle East, is not just trying to defeat the armed struggle, but to wipe Palestine off the map and all its people out of existence. Their military operations through relentless carpet bombing and starvation are oriented to kill men, women and especially children who carry the future of the indigenous people of Palestine. The over 250 journalists who have been targeted and killed for exposing the genocide were honored throughout the 3 days that included over 20 sessions and plenaries, exhibits, including Palestinian cultural performances, a vendor fair and art exhibits.
A particularly moving panel on the final day of the conference featured doctors who had worked in Gaza against impossible odds and talked about how all 36 hospitals in Gaza have been bombed and stories about young children carrying their wounded younger siblings miles to barely functioning emergency rooms. To even compound this aspect of the genocidal war, the US has recently stopped accepting anyone with a Palestinian passport from obtaining visas including wounded Palestinian children coming for medical treatment.
Cuban solidarity activists at the Conference
In the tradition of Fidel and the Cuban people, who have always stood for the Palestinian cause, a large group of Cuban solidarity activists from the National Network on Cuba in the US came from South Carolina, California, Tennessee, Missouri, Maryland, Utah, Illinois and New York, attended the conference. Cuba has held large demonstrations in support of Palestine since the Israeli campaign of death and destruction began often led by Cuban President Miguel Diaz Canel. Despite suffering under the longest sanctions regime in history, Cuba has given free medical training to more than 1,500 Palestinian students since 1982. 250 are currently studying in Havana, and an additional 200 places were announced in 2024.
Gaza is a mirror being held up to humanity
Dr. Mohammad Mustafa, a Palestinian emergency doctor, living in Australia, who has done medical missions to Gaza, experienced at al-Ahli Arab hospital before it was bombed perhaps explained it best why Gaza is our compass. Gaza is the measure of our humanity. It is the litmus test that reveals who we are; as individuals, as a nation, as a world.
Dr. Mohammad Mustafa
I am a doctor who was trained to believe in one principal that healthcare is a human right. No discrimination, no exception; but in Gaza that promise is broken. Healthcare in Gaza is not a failure by accident but sabotage by design with doctors killed and aid blocked. That is the reality of Gaza. It is a mirror that is being held up to humanity. Why is it that baby formula is banned from Gaza? Why is it that feeding a child considered a threat? Why are ambulances and hospitals turned into targets of war? When did bread and milk become weapons? When did saving lives become a crime? Gaza is the only place on earth where nourishing a baby is an act of resistance. It is the only place where life itself is viewed as a weapon of war.
The high level of energy and determination to escalate the movement for Palestine in the US was evident throughout the three days of the conference and the urgency was understood.
Source: Resumen Latinoamericano -English
all photos: Bill Hackwell