Instagram (7/29/26)

One person was killed and 29 people injured when a man drove a van into a crowd at a Pride celebration in Berlin in July. The assailant, later killed by police, was a Lebanese-German man.

ACT UP New York (Instagram, 7/29/26) chose to make public a request for comment they received in the wake of the attack from Newsweek. Here are the questions they were urged to respond to:

How do you separate solidarity with Palestinian civilians from any perceived endorsement of Hamas or Islamist movements?

After the Berlin Pride attack, should US queer, pro-Palestinian groups speak more directly about Islamist hostility to LGBTQ rights?

What would you say to LGBTQ Jews or queer Israelis who feel pro-Palestinian activism has made Pride spaces less safe for them?

Where is the line between defending Palestinians and romanticizing “resistance”?

Note Newsweek’s irony quotes on “resistance.”

ACT UP New York said they recognize the effort to get them to denounce solidarity with Palestine, but they aren’t falling for it, especially with media that have a history of using queer people to spread racist and xenophobic lies through pinkwashing.

It goes without saying that had the attacker been a “white” Christian, there would be zero calls for them to publicly distance themselves from Christian groups. Bad faith is bad faith, and hate is hate, however you try and dress it up.

Featured image: Photo from Berlin Pride march that accompanied “The Deadly Truth Plows Through the Delusions of Pride for Palestine,” a Newsweek essay (7/27/26) by Anna Rahmanan (photo: Carsten Koall/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Images).

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