Statement against the Murder of Wadea al-Fayoume

October 18, 2023

Madison Tenant Power

Madison Tenant Power joins the world in mourning the senseless murder of Chicago 6-year-old Wadea Al-Fayoume, who was tragically martyred when his own landlord Joseph Czuba broke into a Palestinian family’s home and attacked Wadea and his mother at knifepoint, stabbing the child over a dozen times.

What happened to Wadea and his mother was an Anti-Muslim hate crime, fueled by anti-Palestinian rhetoric that aims to justify Israel's impending genocidal invasion of Gaza. It is especially disturbing that this violence happened in their home, a place this family should have felt and been safe.

This is the violence of occupying someone’s home against their will. Landlord Joseph Czuba (like Montreal slumlord Ian Cucurull, who earlier this year locked a tenant into the landlord’s office at knifepoint) has made the relationship between colonial entitlement, racialized violence, and the violence of capital accumulation explicit.

As our neighbors in Milwaukee Autonomous Tenants Union have said, “Displacement from one’s home, the creation of unsafe living conditions, and the demonization of those who organize to stay in their homes are all features of the unjust American housing system. Similarly, they are features of the attacks on Palestinians.”

To be safe and free from violence is a human right, to be safe in one’s own home is a human right. Displacement is a global catastrophe.