Co-defendants Raunaq Alam and Afsheen Khan on the Tarrant County courthouse final week (photograph by and courtesy Stacey Monroe)
Texas prosecutors are in search of 10-year jail sentences for activists accused of anti-Zionist graffiti.
The three defendants — Raunaq Alam, Afsheen Khan, and one other unnamed particular person — had been indicted on vandalism prices with hate crime enhancements after allegedly defacing a church with pro-Palestine stickers and the phrases “F*** Israel” written in pink spray-paint alongside three inverted triangles. The incident occurred in March 2024 at Unusual Church in Euless, which was flying an Israeli flag on the time of the incident.
Final week, a jury convicted Alam of committing a felony prison mischief however rejected the hate crime prices. The trials for Khan and the unnamed co-defendant are scheduled for September 30.
Adwoa Asante, Alam’s legal professional, informed Hyperallergic that her shopper’s actions clearly stemmed from political protest, declaring that the church is a staunch supporter of the Israeli navy, as indicated by a number of Fb posts.
“ My client was accused of writing, ‘F*** Israel’ … That is hands-down political speech when someone says, ‘F*** your country,’” Asante mentioned.
Asante additionally defined that the incident, which occurred a yr in the past, began out with a misdemeanor graffiti cost. However “everything went haywire” when the state appointed Tarrant County District Legal professional Lloyd Whelchel, who has beforehand dealt with instances in regards to the loss of life penalty, as prosecutor, he mentioned.
“[Then] the state indicted this case and accused my client of anti-Jewish faith discrimination, and conflated the State of Israel with Judaism,” Asante informed Hyperallergic.
Although the conflation of anti-Zionism and antisemitism is just not new, the growing criminalization of the previous within the final two years has raised alarms. Within the tradition sector, artists have reported being silenced or censored for condemning Israel’s ongoing siege and mass killings of Palestinians, which have been deemed a genocide by a number of human rights teams, together with Israeli organizations.
Final yr, three people had been charged with “making a terroristic threat as a hate crime” for vandalizing the properties of 4 Brooklyn Museum leaders, together with Director Anne Pasternak. (Of the 4, solely Pasternak is Jewish.) The spray-painted messages additionally included inverted pink triangles, symbols which are generally utilized by activists as a present of Palestinian resistance. Use of the form’s emoji was restricted by Meta final yr on the premise that it may point out help for Hamas, however the image has additionally been traced to the Palestinian flag and to broader anti-fascist actions.
Alam now faces as much as two years in state jail and a reported $10,000 tremendous, though the jury really useful 5 years of probation, which incorporates 180 days in a county jail. Khan and the opposite defendant are nonetheless dealing with prison prices with hate crime enhancements.
Asante mentioned that the Nationwide Attorneys Guild (NLG) is “elated” that the jury acquitted Alam on the hate crime prices, however remains to be disillusioned within the prison mischief conviction.
“The NLG is deeply concerned because at the national, state, and local level, we’re seeing repression in the form of criminalization against those who oppose the genocide in Palestine,” Asante mentioned.
