What Now

A stunning, soul-stirring, philosophical, and political treatise on what liberation for Palestine and our world will look like in the twenty-first century.

Palestine is a litmus test, argues writer Tareq Baconi. There are only two possible outcomes to the ongoing apartheid and genocide: justice or annihilation.

Drawing from Baconi’s extensive academic and organizing work with Palestinian and international activists, and from decades of long-standing strategies, What Now distills three strategic principles for a free Palestine to guide activists and allies: refuse the prospect of a divided homeland, resuscitate the revolutionary politics of the Palestinian commitment to freedom and justice, and decompose Zionism. Imagining a Free Palestine is not the same as turning back the clock to pre-1948, Baconi writes, but a new struggle for a just future in the aftermath of Zionism—not by fighting Jewish presence in Palestine, but by ending Jewish political exclusivity. A free Palestine would heal the wounds left in the wake of the second world war, by challenging and upturning the colonial and genocidal mindsets that continue to animate Western thought—the ramifications of justice would therefore extend far beyond the shores of Palestine.

Palestine is the epicenter. The outcome of Palestine’s fight for freedom will determine the future of our globe: whether the second wave of international decolonization will succeed or fail, whether our world order will move further toward collective freedom or fascism.

In the literary tradition of Frantz Fanon, Angela Davis, and Edward Said, and perfect for readers of Omar El-Akkad, What Now is a rousing literary manifesto on Palestine and our collective future.