Palestinian Political Prisoners are the Moral Compass

Friends, neighbors, and comrades,

In moments of deep injustice, when the world feels disfigured by violence and repression, we look for a moral compass—something, or someone, that points steadily toward dignity and freedom. For many of us engaged in the movement for a liberated Palestine, that compass has long been the political prisoners who continue to resist from behind bars.

Their circumstances are harsh, their visibility limited, yet their clarity is often unmatched. Political prisoners live at the sharp edge of state power: subjected to surveillance, detention without trial, and conditions designed to extinguish hope. And still, they speak. They organize. They insist on their humanity and on the humanity of their people. In doing so, they remind the broader movement of what is at stake—not abstract geopolitics, but real lives, real families, real futures.

In Cleveland, far from the walls that confine these men, women, and children, it can be easy to lose sight of that truth. We are inundated with headlines that flatten the story or frame it solely through the lens of policy and diplomacy. But political prisoners offer a different story—one written through sacrifice, endurance, and a refusal to surrender their sense of justice. Their letters, testimonies, and steadfastness serve as a grounding force, reminding us that the struggle for liberation is not symbolic. It is lived.

To say they are our compass doesn’t mean we romanticize their suffering. Instead, it means we take seriously the perspective of those who endure the most direct consequences of occupation and oppression. It means we recognize that their continued resilience is a form of leadership: teaching us to stay principled, to stay focused, and to stay human in our response to inhumanity.

Here in Cleveland, our role is to listen, to amplify, and to act with the kind of unwavering commitment that political prisoners demonstrate every day. Whether we show up in the streets, push for policy changes, or build community solidarity, we do so knowing that the movement’s direction is shaped by people who refuse to let their circumstances dictate their conscience.

Their courage does not absolve us from responsibility—it calls us to it.

In solidarity and in struggle,

Robiah Darwish 

The People’s Press Cleveland