Artists Against the Blockade raises thousands for Palestinian and Cuban medical relief

By Kush Bulmer and Savannah Payne / Liberation News

On the 71st anniversary of the July 26 Movement, artists, musicians and organizers congregated for the fourth Artists Against Apartheid event in Chicago. This event, called Artists Against the Blockade, raised funds for medical aid in occupied Palestine and Cuba. The event, hosted at healthy hood in the Little Village neighborhood, held more than 300 attendees, 21 art vendors, 16 performers and speakers, and raised nearly $10,000 for medical relief efforts in Palestine as well as the Hatuey Project, an initiative to support Cuba’s health care system, which is strangled by the U.S. blockade on Cuba. Attendees also donated nearly 100 books to support the launch of Nabala Cafe, a new Palestinian-owned cafe in Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood.

Artists Against Apartheid in Chicago

Saja Bilasan, a Palestinian artist and local business owner, began organizing pro-Palestinian cultural events in December 2023, two months into Israel’s bombardment of Gaza. Artists have displayed their art at student encampments and protests, wheat-pasted onto buildings to show their support for Palestine, and held up signs during marches throughout the city. Bilasan decided to organize events to amplify this particular mode of artistic solidarity, and thus, raise more money for relief efforts in Palestine.

“It’s really blossomed into this incredible community — and it’s not just a one time event, it really is a time to bring community together, but also to organize from it,” Bilasan said. “It’s been beautiful how much it’s grown, but also so devastating that we’ve had to keep going this going — the genocide of Palestine’s been ongoing for 10 months now. And so this is our fourth iteration. It will not be our last. We’re gonna keep this going until Palestine is free.”

Connecting the struggles 

After three previous “Artists Against Apartheid” events hosted at the Chicago Liberation Center, healthy hood, and Alhambra Palace, Bilasan and her co-organizers decided to extend the focus of the event to include solidarity for Cuba.

“Both of these … are united in their front against U.S. imperialism,” said Dima, a member of the Palestinian Youth Movement, who asked that only her first name be used. “Cuba is a successfully socialist state, which is their only sin in the eyes of the U.S. imperialist machine.”

July 26th marks the 71st anniversary of what is widely considered the start of Cuba’s socialist revolution, when Fidel Castro led an attack on the Moncada Barracks. This movement led to the eventual overthrow of the Batista regime in 1959, and the subsequent formation of Cuban socialism.

For more than 60 years, the U.S. government has imposed sanctions against Cuba, forming a blockade that has cost the country $144 billion, causing shortages of food, fuel and other necessities. Despite this, Cuba has an expansive and quality health care field and is the country with the highest number of doctors (8.4) per capita. Although Cuba’s residents are provided free and high-quality medical care, the blockade prevents the country from accessing medicine and many basic health care supplies, such as gloves and syringes.

The Hatuey Project, which stands for “Health Advocates in Truth, Unity and Empathy,” was founded in 2022 by social justice organizers and health care professionals. Kathryn Stender, an organizer with the Hatuey Project, was a part of the project’s second delegation that visited Cuba and delivered more than $60,000 worth of medical supplies and medications directly to hospitals in Havana and Santa Clara in May of 2024.

“We’re bringing aid to the Cuban healthcare system, but, ultimately we’re also trying to just build the connections between the working-class people of the United States and of Cuba. Through these solidarity projects, folks in the U.S. coming to Cuba and really seeing what [the socialist project] means, can come back to the United States and then also fight to end the blockade here. Fighting the blockade is fighting U.S. imperialism,” Stender said.

This past July, the Hatuey Project launched a new campaign to raise $150,000 to provide medicine for Cuban children with cancer. One-hundred percent of the proceeds from the Artists Against the Blockade event that were donated to the project will go directly to the purchases and donations of needed supplies.

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For more on the connection between Cuban and Palestinian resistance and solidarity, see From Cuba to Palestine, victory to the revolution! On the 71st anniversary of the 26 July Movement.