Che Guevara and Gaza – By Aidan Ratchford (Counterpunch) / Oct 18, 2023
‘The Cuban delegation extends greetings to the peoples of Southern Rhodesia and South-West Africa, oppressed by white colonialist minorities; to the peoples of Basutoland, Bechuanaland, Swaziland, French Somaliland, the Arabs of Palestine, Aden and the Protectorates, Oman; and to all peoples in conflict with imperialism and colonialism. We reaffirm our support to them.’
– Che Guevara, address delivered to the 19th General Assembly of the United Nations, New York, December 11, 1964.
On 9 October 2023, the 56th anniversary of Ernesto “Che” Guevara’s death, escalation of violence began again across Israel and Palestine, after Hamas initiated a surprise military offensive. Israel’s military offensive on Gaza has been devastating. The coinciding of these events with the anniversary of Guevara’s assassination in Bolivia brings up once more the intertwining histories of Che Guevara and Palestine.
On June 18, 1959, Guevara visited the Gaza Strip, at the request of Egypt President Gamal Abdel Nasser. Egypt– then the United Arab Republic comprising Egypt, Syria, and Yemen (1958-1961– was the first leg of a ‘Goodwill Mission’ led by Guevara on behalf of the new Cuban government. The trip constituted the Cuban Revolution’s first overseas mission and led to the establishment and strengthening of ties between Cuba and Afro-Asia. Guevara secured new diplomatic and commercial relations for Cuba, as it pulled away from US political and economic domination. It was this trip that opened up a new relationship with Africa that has endured to this day, most notably involving substantial Cuban military support in the intervention in Angola as part of the struggle against South African apartheid.
Guevara and the Cuban delegation were taken first to a Palestinian village, which was inhabited by 120,000 Palestinian refugees of the 1948 Nakba. According to Omar Fernández Cañizares, a captain in the Cuban Rebel Army who undertook several important roles in the Revolution – and who accompanied Guevara on this trip– they witnessed miserable conditions. Observing the Palestinian displacement, Guevara remarked to Fernández, “Look, this is the work of the Gringos [United States].” A refugee in Rafah approached Guevara and asked that the Cubans tell the Americas the truth of what they witnessed there. Guevara embraced the refugee and answered that Cuba would denounce what they had seen “before all of humanity.”
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