Decades from now, when people wonder what it was like to be alive during the years when our government was funding and arming Israel as its military carried out the Final Solution, annexing the rest of the West Bank and completely annihilating Gaza and all of its inhabitants, half of whom used to be children, what will they imagine? Will they imagine we all knew what was happening, or that most of us basically didn't? Will they imagine large numbers of people were engaged in trying to do something, or that we were mostly being silent and keeping our heads down?
When I look at my Instagram feed I'm seeing huge marches for Palestine along with prominent, prime-time displays of solidarity in huge soccer stadiums in various countries, gigantic Palestinian flags formed by huge crowds of soccer fans, "death death to the IDF" sung by tens of thousands of festival-goers at festivals where musicians make bold statements and face all kinds of legal and other negative consequences as a result.
But here in Portland, Oregon, a city that is sometimes considered to be one of the hubs of radicalism in the US, what was it like during the summer of 2025, in the fifth month since Israel stopped allowing virtually any food or water or anything else into the Gaza Strip, as millions were facing imminent death by starvation, as Gaza City was being relentlessly bombed, as its inhabitants fled to hospitals that were then being bombed, all with US-made fighter jets and US-made bunker-busters?
I don't know what might be out there on Instagram that could give people the impression anything is happening in Portland to oppose this genocide, or that anyone around here is even trying to raise awareness about it. But as I walk all over the city, it bears no resemblance to what most every neighborhood looked like, say, in 2020, when some variety of "Black Lives Matter" could be found in every direction, wherever you looked. Whereas in 2020 some kind of statement against police brutality and racism could be found on approximately one in every three front yards, a Palestinian flag or a statement in solidarity with those being genocided right now can be found on maybe one in a thousand front yards today.
Of course, putting a sign in your front yard doesn't stop police brutality or a war against a population somewhere far away. But speaking out is probably where a lot of movements get started -- people refusing to self-censor, despite the potential consequences. This can be done on an individual basis, with a sign in the yard, but it can be done in a much more powerful and media-savvy way through collective action, at a major event that attracts lots of people and/or lots of media. This is why we see the footage of the football supporters (as they call soccer fans in modern-day British English) at matches with huge Palestinian flags and other statements going out to the stadium and the world beyond. This is why artists like Kneecap and Bob Vylan get thousands of folks at a festival singing against genocide together. It gets out there.
A friend who moved to Portland a few years ago from DC eventually got so tired of just about nothing local happening in opposition to this genocide that we're watching on Al-Jazeera every day, that she started up a weekly vigil in town, every Sunday at noon at 12th and Hawthorne SE. At that vigil both times it's been held so far, there was a woman from the nearby town of Happy Valley who was recounting to me her many efforts to try to bring the genocide to the attention of anyone at the very popular and well-attended Pickathon festival that happens in Happy Valley every summer. At every turn she was told that no one from the stage would be making any announcements about any upcoming events related to opposing this genocide. The theme of the festival this summer was "love is the answer." To what? Who knows. Love is the answer and the Palestinian children may burn, unmentioned, unacknowledged.
The day I got back from touring Australia at the end of July and encountering another large, popular event that happens in Portland every summer was another of those cases in point. The Naked Bike Ride attracts many thousands of participants, I believe upwards of 10,000. The folks constructing their various wildly-decorated bicycles have lots of leeway to make a statement, or to work together with other folks to collectively make a statement. Although this was the first Naked Bike Ride I had ever witnessed, after living in Portland for 18 years, I'm quite certain that five years ago you probably might have seen something about Black lives mattering in the course of the very visible artistic and cultural statement that this event represents. Among the hundreds of bicyclists I watched pass by with my children that evening, I didn't see a single Palestinian flag.
The experience I had last weekend attending my first-ever major league soccer match was identical, sadly. A friend visiting Portland from the east coast got us both tickets to the game on Saturday night, as well as guest passes to the Timbers Army fan club just down the street from the stadium, where the most hardcore Timbers fans hang out, drink beer, and watch soccer games on big TV screens that are happening somewhere else.
Aside from seeing the footage on Instagram and other places of the statements made to the world by fan clubs of soccer teams in places like Scotland, Ireland, Italy and many other countries, I have many friends who are involved with those sorts of groups organizing those sorts of coordinated stadium actions in that part of the world. Over the years I've heard that the vibe at Timbers games can be like that, too. I believe Black lives mattered to Timbers fans five years ago, in fact.
Everybody was friendly in the Timbers Army warehouse and in the stadium. Very easy to imagine they'd all rather just get along and avoid controversial subjects. There was no question that most of the crowd came from the suburbs. My guess is among those who have opinions on political matters, opinions on what's happening in the Middle East right now probably vary as much as opinions on whether Trump's immigration policies are good or bad.
In the Timbers Army warehouse it was mostly local beer being served, no cans of Budweiser to be seen. Most people were dressed in green jerseys, many adorned with logos of sponsoring corporations. Scattered among the green-clad crowd were the occasional older, usually bearded man who wore a vest covered in patches. Some of the guys with these vests were involved with directing the chants and such inside the stadium later, I observed.
In the warehouse there was a banner on the wall in support of trans rights. In the gift shop there was a t-shirt that derided TERFs, and there were patches and other items that included the popular anti-fascist symbol with the three arrows.
Any notion that supporters of the Timbers had any desire to make anti-fascist statements against actually existing fascist, genocidal regimes carrying out an actual, ongoing genocide of an entire civilian population trapped within a walled ghetto right now as we watch this soccer game was completely absent, either in the warehouse or in the stadium. Among all the thousands of people I walked past in that stadium, I was certainly the only one wearing a t-shirt with a Palestinian flag on it, and there wasn't a single reaction from anyone about it either, of any kind. Live and let live, I suppose -- or live and let die, either way.
During the game the chant-leaders led chants of all sorts, a couple of which seemed to include some kind of vague anti-fascist reference. When the Timbers scored a goal, the stadium was filled with acrid green smoke, which was fun. But if anyone thought about challenging the rules of the Major League Soccer organization and using this big forum to speak out against this genocide we're all financing, no one acted on such thoughts last weekend.
On Sunday, at the second in our new series of little vigils at 12th and Hawthorne, as with the previous Sunday, many passing drivers beeped supportively at our "free Palestine" banner and "stop arming Israel" sign. Only one driver sped up aggressively as he passed us, telling us of his disapproval that way, in a manner that only really works because he wasn't driving an electric.
Among the thousands of cars that passed us during the course of the vigil was a convoy of many dozens of cars that were all decked out with signs in opposition to Trump, his immigration policies, and opposition to rule of the billionaires, with the "No Kings" theme dominant.
As with the other passing cars, some of them took the flyers folks were handing out, others didn't. The "No Kings" convoy was beeping incessantly as they went everywhere anyway, so it was impossible to tell if they were beeping in support of Palestine or just beeping, but any sign that they opposed Trump's support of Israel and its genocide of the Palestinian people was completely absent in this convoy, with not a Palestinian flag to be seen, or anything else like that. Not even a damn watermelon.
The silence from all of these Good Americans is deafening.
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