When Activism Becomes a Circus Called SUMUD
Some people call it Global SUMUD — “steadfastness.” It sounds poetic, almost noble. But in truth, it is terrorism in costume, sailing the seas under the banner of human rights. A flotilla of self-proclaimed peace activists waves banners of freedom, but beneath them flutters the flag of Hamas.
If these were genuine humanitarians, their concern would be universal. They would stand for all victims of oppression, not only those who serve the propaganda of Gaza’s rulers. But their compassion is selective.
The truth is, no flotilla sails for Israeli families shattered by rockets, for children who fall asleep to the sound of sirens, or for the elderly murdered in their kibbutzim on October 7. No ship is launched toward the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh, where Indigenous peoples are uprooted, their villages burned, and their women brutalized by settler militias.
No banners are raised for Christians in Africa persecuted by Boko Haram, or for the Yazidis in Iraq. When Hamas cries, SUMUD sails. That tells you everything.
Oh my goodness! I forgot one thing!
Yes, there is one Bangladeshi activist among its participants who parades himself as a champion of Palestinian rights. Yet in his own homeland, Indigenous communities live under terror. Their land is being seized, their homes are being burned, and their women are being assaulted for decades without justice. The Chakma, Marma, and Tripura endure this violence every day.
And this activist?
He remains silent. Not a word, not a post, not even a breath for the murdered Indigenous. The human rights GPS of SUMUD seems to function only when pointing toward Tel Aviv, and mysteriously dies the moment it turns toward Rangamati or Khagrachari in the Chittagong Hill Tracts.
What this exposes is not solidarity, but propaganda. Every so-called aid flotilla that skirts legal channels does not deliver peace; it delivers publicity. Hamas thrives on these spectacles. It does not need flour or medicine half as much as it needs the oxygen of Western outrage, the applause of activists eager to launder its crimes into “resistance.” SUMUD is not a humanitarian enterprise but a propaganda bureau for Hamas, a traveling theatre in which activists play their roles like extras in a script drafted in Gaza’s tunnels.
Consider the absurdity. If tomorrow a flotilla set sail in support of Al-Qaeda, the world would recoil. If it carried supplies to ISIS, its passengers would be branded terrorist collaborators (Of course, I support neither of them). Yet when it is Hamas, the very same play is recast as noble activism. That is the farce of SUMUD: terrorism marketed as tourism, extremism rebranded as peace.
Meanwhile, Israel is condemned not for waging war but for surviving one. It remains the only pluralistic democracy in the Middle East, a state where Jews, Muslims, Christians, Druze, and others live under the same laws. Yet it is demonized for defending its citizens from a terrorist whose charter openly calls for its destruction. This inversion of morality is precisely what SUMUD exists to sustain: Israel as villain, Hamas as victim, and activists as saints.
But strip away the banners, and the truth is plain. Global SUMUD does not stand for peace, nor for justice, nor even for consistency. It stands only for Hamas, for terrorism with a smiley sticker. And that is why the world may laugh at the absurdity of this circus, but must never dismiss its danger. Because behind the comedy lies a deadly mission: to keep Hamas alive and to keep Israel under attack.
October 4, 2025
Tokyo, Japan
