Charlotte Kates

Charlotte Kates

Charlotte Kates is the coordinator of Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network. Based in Beirut, she is the coordinator of the U.S. National Lawyers Guild International Committee and is a member of the Organizing Collective of the U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel.

Married to Khaled Barakat since August 13, 2009.

Bio

From the National Lawyers Guild International Committee website:

Charlotte Kates is the part-time organizer of the NLG International Committee. A graduate of Rutgers University School of Law, she managed the education and advocacy work of the Center for Constitutional Rights’ Guantanamo Global Justice Initiative before working as a disability rights and inclusion advocate in Vancouver, BC. She is the international coordinator of Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network, a member of the organizing collective of the US Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel, and a long-time organizer with Al-Awda-NY, the Palestine Right to Return Coalition.

Pro-Hamas Letter

In the wake of a terror attack by Hamas on Israel on October 7, 2023, Harvard University students signed an open letter blaming Israel. After the students received negative media coverage, the ANSWER Coalition jumped to their defense in an open letter titled: "Open letter against intimidation at Harvard: Defend the freedom to speak in support of Palestine!" Charlotte Kates signed the letter. Excerpt:

We stand together against the racist harassment and demonization of Pro-Palestine student activists at Harvard and elsewhere across the country. These attacks are designed to intimidate, weaken, and silence people's right to speak out in support of the Palestinian people's struggle against occupation and apartheid. Their educational and professional futures are being threatened and right wing political operatives have even rented a TV truck to drive around campus displaying the students' faces. Some are even receiving death threats..."

Political Affairs

As at July 1996, Charlotte Kates was a New Jersey high school student.

Fight Back! supporter

Fight Back! / ¡Lucha y Resiste! is a Facebook group for readers and supporters of Fight Back! / ¡Lucha y Resiste! the newspaper of Freedom Road Socialist Organization/FightBack!

As of July 5 2020 members included Charlotte Kates.

Free Ahmad Sa'adat

July 10th, 2009 International Association of Democratic Lawyers joined an appeal to UN secretary general Ban Ki Moon demanding that he and the United Nations uphold their responsibilities to protect the rights of Palestinian prisoners and secure their freedom.

The appeal was launched by the Campaign to Free Ahmad Sa'adat.

Well over 400 international organizations and individuals have supported this call. Signatories of the letter include youth, student and workers' unions, solidarity organizations, lawyers' associations, political parties, human rights groups, and numerous activists, academics and supporters of Palestine from around the world.

Ahmad Sa'adat, the General Secretary of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and a Palestinian national leader, is a leader in the Palestinian prisoners' movement. His recent hunger strike galvanized attention upon the prisoners' struggle. He is a living symbol of the oppression of the occupier and the steadfastness of the Palestinian people and the prisoners as they struggle for freedom, justice, liberation and return.

Signatories included Charlotte Kates, attorney.

"Morales / Shakur Center" student suspensions event

On October 28, 2013, a City College administrator suspended Tafadar Sourov and Khalil Vasquez, two students who led demonstrations against the administration’s illegal raid and seizure of the Guillermo Morales / Assata Shakur Community Center. The Morales / Shakur Center is a space that has existed at City College for more than 20 years and was first won in 1989 through a mass student strike and occupations throughout CUNY.

In response to the attacks on our student leaders, students and community say: WE ARE NOT AFRAID. Repression will not end the campaign to save the Morales / Shakur Center or the broader struggle to liberate CUNY for the people. Hundreds on campus and in the community will follow their example. Any punitive measures against Taffy and Khalil will only be a lesson to the people that the CCNY administration dismisses the people’s concerns and that the people must escalate their mass actions.

Taffy and Khalil are fighting for the people, defending the last autonomous campus space that serves the community and defending the legacy of the people’s revolutionary heroes. THE PEOPLE MUST DEFEND TAFFY AND KHALIL. The people cannot stand aside and look as the City College administration attempts to isolate them and promote fake sellout student leaders who want to negotiate away the Center. The Center was won through struggle and will be reclaimed through struggle.

Revolutionary Student Coordinating Committee organized a meeting in Edgewater, 160 Convent Avenue,New York, Friday 8 November 2013, to organize resistance. Those indicating their willingness to attend on the Whenever website included Charlotte Kates.

"International Women's Day with Rasmea Odeh"

"International Women's Day with Rasmea Odeh" was held at 37 S Ashland Ave, Chicago Sunday 8 March 2015, organized by Joe Iosbaker.

Special guest Rasmea Odeh. Her courage and strength as she faces ongoing persecution by the U.S. Dept. of Justice has made her a symbol of the resistance by women in Palestine and in the struggles for national liberation all over the world.

Other guests included Mariame Kaba, founder of the NIA Project in Chicago, and one of the members of We Charge Genocide, the group that appeared before the UN Committee on Torture to expose the Chicago Police, Sarah Chambers, a member of the bargaining committee of the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) that led the strike in 2012, and co-chair of the Caucus of Rank and File Educators, leaders in CTU, Kait McIntyre, a leading anti-war activist in Chicago, and a member of Freedom Road Socialist Organization/FightBack!.

Those indicating they would attend on Wherevent included Nadine Darwish, Lisa Grown Johnson, Bonnie Coyle, Kait McIntyre, Yiska Schwartz, Nancy Hammond, Charlotte Kates, Rima Isam Anabtawi, Sarah Wild, Julia Mearsheimer, Ahndrea Nicole Sprattling, Nick Suess, Gofraidh Westberry, Abdullah Al Bayyari Amara, Joe Iosbaker, Alfonso Casal, Timmy Rose, Abdul Rahman Al Sayed-Taha, Dick Reilly, Amoo Sam, Mike Siviwe Elliott, Ben Cline, Zach Taylor, Bill Chambers, Jeff Pickert .

"LEFT FORUM: The Student Movement in NYC"

Revolutionary Student Coordinating Committee organized an Event "LEFT FORUM: The Student Movement in NYC" in North Bergen 524 W 59th St,New York, Saturday 30 May 2015;

This panel will feature speakers from diverse organizations and coalitions that operate in NYC to explore different progressive struggles and how they tie-in to the revolutionary students movement being created by the Revolutionary Student Coordinating Committee.

Those indicating their support/attendance on a Wherevent page advertising the Forum included Lisa Gagliardo, Salma Ayai, Jessie Joyce Meredith, Delta Nueve, Angelica Hernandez|Angie De LaGhetto, Tracy Lall, Mary Kay O'Donnell, Rayn Cornielle, Eva Nidzeeva, Amber Stacks, Susan Kingsland, Amy Jaquez, Millie Roy, Andrea Haulcoch, Paola Andrea Lebron, Mariadefatima Mosconi, Asha Cameron, Adelita Karla Cambio, Mariana Cruz Munoz, Hawa Omar, Emma Pliskin, Sarita Ahmed, Alexia Garcia, Nerdeen Kiswani, Lucy Parks, Izzi Creo, Sulafa Sahel, Avia Avia, Carol Vanessa Hurtado, Nadezhda Krupskaya, Danica Gabrielle Pagulayan, Charlotte Kates, Miguelina Castillo Veras, Cassie Brown, Maha Akhtar, Gabriela Bortolamedi, Alyssia Thompson, Sharmin Sadequee, Ev Er In, Dina Bint Abu Ahmed, Grace Li, Lynn Lewis, Doha Ayad, Kerry McLean, Teresa Alba, Angelica Lara, Melissa Foster, Nana Naomeh, Rowayda Widdi, Elisabeth Koechlin, Char Emma, Sharon Shaji, Lenore Holz, Patti Cruz, Livia Sa, Noran Elzarka, Zeina Alturk, Marisa Dos Santos, Krystle Star, Sydney Denee, Alexandra Chipkin, Julie Chen, Claire Hunter, Amena Othman, Isabelle Nastasia, Sharice Richards, Hanalei Somar, Katherine Azcona, Teressa Raiford, Monica Joy, Katie Merriman, Aliyah Hakim, Lisa Marie Crawford, Michelle Natanzon, Aber Kawas, Ma Mo, Alina Shen, Lourdes Carrasco, Sarah-Ann Mathew, Johanna Galvis, Katrina Cortes, Myrlaviani Perez-Rivier, Lin Biao, Joanna Trimble, Samantha Kostmayer, Nadia Swanson, Leena Weddy, Ameera Habibi Tariq, Tiffany Fotopoulos, Mila Lebron, Patrick Conway, Andrew Rosdolsky, Sonny Obhan, Kassem Nasser, Joshua Eli, Michael Hisry, Jose Ponce, Thomas van Beersum, Richard Finkelstein, Daniel Dunn, Jesse Nevel, Caleb-Michael Files, Il Lupo Cattivo, Jacob Ertel, Eddie Rosa Padilla, Sam Smith, Khalil Vasquez, Benjamin Haas, Mahmood Shabazz, Xavier Renoir, Daniel Gibbons, Sean Kennedy, Jon Laks, Aahil Talal Abdullah, Rey Valentin, Daniel Golebiewski, Javal Ghalil Minor, Marc Durougeot, Agyei Tyehimba, Richard Heart, Percy Lujan, Suro Pak, Rajib Lovesramen Miah, Emilio Zapa, Jose Luis Medina, Deniz Solmaz, Marco Antonio Quiroga, Ateo Laureano Bracero Peruyero, Irving Apantenco, Simon Peter Tangney, Antonis Karatarakis, Abdu Salman, Richard Lynch, Nathaniel Phillipps, Mohammad Hamad, Jan Makovec, Dominic Wetzel, Kevin Kang, Alan Warsaw, Jed Brandt, Aldo Ulisses Resendiz, Frederick Sumpter, Ace LaBeija, Tafadar Sourov, Xsavier Daniels, Jose Ramon Garcia-Madrid, Vic Vaiana, Sławek Krulak, Kazembe Balagun, Ashoka Jegroo, Far Han, David Salay, James Cersonsky, Vic Vaiana, Kareem Michael, Marianna Olinger.

Minnesota SDS

Members of the Students for a Democratic Society at the University of Minnesota Public group in 2017 included Charlotte Kates.