Times of Israel: Indigenous leaders rally in Jerusalem

By GIANLUCA PACCHIANI
First Published by Times of Israel

A group of about 60 Indigenous representatives from around the globe gathered at Jerusalem’s Western Wall Plaza on Monday, joining hands to show their support for Israel and the Jewish people.

The unique delegation marched from Jaffa Gate to the Western Wall through the alleys of the Old City, many of its members decked out in colorful traditional attire from a wide variety of Indigenous cultures, with beaded headbands, feathered headdresses, embroidered shawls, and woven textiles creating a lively and striking contrast to Jerusalem’s gray limestone walls.

Among the crowd, alongside symbols of Indigenous cultures, many waved Israeli flags to express their support for the country in a time of war. But the delegation was uniquely positioned to also convey another message: Jews are indigenous to the land of Israel.

The march was organized by the Indigenous Embassy Jerusalem (IEJ), a nonprofit established in February with the goal of providing representation in Israel’s capital for indigenous people from around the world, independently from their countries of origin.

“We really wanted to show our support for the Jews as indigenous people of this land,” said Sheree Trotter, co-director of IEJ together with former member of the New Zealand House of Representatives Hon Alfred Ngaro. Trotter, a Maori scholar and activist, is also a founder of the Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation in her home country of New Zealand.

“There is a false narrative that has taken hold of the Western world, including the country where I live, that paints the Jews as the foreign colonizers who have dispossessed the indigenous Palestinians. We want to change that narrative,” she told The Times of Israel.

Those seeking to delegitimize the State of Israel often make the argument that Israel is a settler-colonial entity that should be dismantled and replaced with a Palestinian state “from the river to the sea.”

The Palestinian narrative is rooted in highlighting the Arab historical connection to the land, and Palestinian leaders and scholars assert that their ties precede the mass immigration of Jews that moved to the land with the Zionist movement in the 19th and 20th century — often omitting the thousands of years of deep connection between the Jewish people and the Land of Israel.

As the cohort reached the Western Wall plaza, its members caught the eye of worshipers, intrigued by their exotic outfits. Many cheered on the visitors and approached them to take photos with them, including a group of IDF soldiers, excited at the unusual encounter. A haredi man unexpectedly turned into a choir director and led the delegation in traditional Jewish songs such as “Hava Nagila” and “Jerusalem of Gold.”

For many in the delegation, the journey to Jerusalem represented more than just a physical pilgrimage. It was a meaningful public expression of their kinship with the Jewish people and their Zionism, which would be frowned upon in some of their countries of origin, even within their own tribal communities.

Asked whether participants in the march may be presented with a one-sided view of the conflict, Trotter said, “This delegation has a commitment: The majority of them are Christian, and that gives them that commitment to this place.”

Harvey Yesno, a Grand Chief of the Ojibwe tribe from Canada, during a visit organized by the Indigenous Embassy in Jerusalem. (Gianluca Pacchiani/Times of Israel)

The religious affiliation of the participants emerged immediately in conversations. Many said they believed that God promised the Holy Land to the Patriarchs of the Jewish people, as written in the Bible.

Harvey Yesno, a Grand Chief of the Ojibwe tribe from Thunder Bay, northwestern Ontario, Canada, said it had been a dream to set up a permanent representation for indigenous people in Jerusalem, and that one of its main purposes was to counter the misinformation about Israel not being indigenous.

“We have the same thing in our lands,” he said, speaking of the attempt to delegitimize his people’s rights on their ancestral territory.

“We’ve had treaties with Britain and other colonial powers. Our work now is to correct the narrative that is out there. We believe that Israel is indigenous to this land,” he said. “History proves it. Archeology proves it.”

Nicholas Gurub Nawab, a chieftain from the Khoisan people in southern Africa, acknowledged that sentiment in his community of origin is often hostile to Israel.

Semesi Naciqa, a tribal leader from Fiji, during a visit to Jerusalem organized by the Indigenous Embassy, October 28, 2024. (Gianluca Pacchiani/Times of Israel)

“We are busy winning over our tribe so that they can see that we must align with our elder brothers, the Jewish people,” he said. “We, as the first indigenous people who have been colonized and have known oppression, identify with our Jewish brothers and what they are suffering in their own land.”

Semesi Naciqa, a tribal leader from Fiji, is married to an Inuit woman and lives in Nunavut, in the Canadian Arctic. Standing on the Western Wall plaza, he said that he joined the delegation to make a statement.

“We don’t agree with what the media and the news are saying that it’s an occupied territory. We believe that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, our God also, has given this eternal land for Israel as a covenant to Abraham and his descendants,” Naciqa said. “The Israeli people have a right to be in this land, and they are indigenous, just like us.”

Fighting anti-Zionism with the tools of academia

Natan Sharansky

In setting up the Indigenous Embassy in Jerusalem, Trotter had a specific strategy in mind. As a scholar with a PhD in the history of Zionism in New Zealand, she realized that much of the anti-Zionism and antisemitism in the public discourse originates from academia, and consequently must be fought with academic instruments.

Dr Sheree Trotter

The Embassy has set out to promulgate research to disprove claims that Israel is a settler colonialist enterprise and reassert the Jewish people’s ties to their ancestral homeland.

“We want to build a body of material that speaks back to those false narratives,” Trotter told The Times of Israel.

Dr Charles Asher Small

The day after its march to the Western Wall, the IEJ held an academic symposium at the Bible Lands Museum in Jerusalem, in which a dozen scholars presented their research.

Prof Wayne Horowitz

The confab saw a keynote speech by Natan Sharansky, an icon of the struggle for Soviet Jewry. Among the speakers was antisemitism researcher Izabella Tabarovsky, a Senior Fellow at the Z3 Institute for Jewish Priorities in California, who gave a presentation on the late-Soviet propaganda to deny the Jewish connection to the Land of Israel, and prevent Jews from emigrating from the Soviet Union.

Prof Gil Troy

Wayne Horowitz, an archeology professor at the Hebrew University, delivered a fascinating overview of his research on ethno-astronomy and the affinities in the cosmological traditions of ancient Israel and the Gwich’in Tribe in Arctic Canada.

Canadian First Nations activist Karen Restoule spoke of how the cause of Indigenous peoples has been co-opted for nefarious purposes. At a rally outside the Canadian parliament in Ottawa in December, Restoule denounced the use by anti-Israel protesters in Canada of terms such as “settler” and “decolonize” to justify terror and violence against Israeli civilians.

IEJ co-director Trotter also took the stage, and discussed the “hijacking of indigeneity” in favor of the Palestinian narrative in the Maori discourse on the conflict in her native New Zealand.

In the early weeks of the war, videos went viral of Maoris performing the traditional Haka dance at pro-Israel demonstrations. Trotter said that while those public displays of support represent the sentiment of many Maoris, they do not reflect the political leadership of the community, or of New Zealand politicians in general.

“New Zealand has become very anti-Israel. It’s part of the progressivist, woke trend. That whole package has taken hold of our country and some of our politicians, and so it’s very difficult. We don’t get a balance, and I’m really sorry. It’s all one-sided,” she said.

“Part of our work is really to educate, to advocate, and to build a community of Indigenous people who understand the history. We’re doing an academic conference, and advocacy on social media, to change the culture,” she said.