Minneapolis isn’t Palestine; it’s harmful to compare them

“IDF, KKK, ICE: They’re all the same,” chanted one of the organizers of an ICE protest that I attended at the University of Minnesota campus in Minneapolis. When I initially heard this chant, I rolled my eyes. I thought, “There’s no comparison between ICE’s actions in the Twin Cities and the perpetual oppression inflicted on the Palestinian people by Israel in the Occupied Territories.”

To my surprise, various commentators and activists from diverse backgrounds have recently published statements similarly equating the two. On 26^th January, 2026, journalist Ahmed Eldin argued that the murderous logic “perfected in Gaza” is present in Minneapolis. The following day, American rapper Macklemore wrote that Gaza and Minneapolis are subjected to “the same architecture of harm.” This claim has even reached mainstream outlets. In an article for The Nation, Rainbow/PUSH’s Ariel Gold contended that “Minneapolis right now reminds [her] of what [she’s] seen during [her] time in the West Bank.” Even Thomas Friedman of The New York Times claimed that the murders in Gaza and Minneapolis “have much more in common than you might think.”

While ICE’s actions in Minneapolis are certainly authoritarian and set a dangerous precedent, they pale in comparison to Israel’s conduct in the West Bank and Gaza. As someone who’s lived for extended periods in both settings, equating the two downplays the severity of the oppression that Palestinians face every day in the Occupied Territories.

I’m a political science student at the University of Minnesota. ICE agents regularly show up (and even stay at hotels) on my campus. Unfortunately, ICE agents occasionally question and abduct students. I’ve attended multiple protests, including one at the site of Alex Pretti’s death just two hours after a federal agent shot him. Nevertheless, I’ve always felt relatively safe.

Last summer, I lived in the small Palestinian town of Beit Sahour. For over two months, I worked between Beit Sahour and Jerusalem for a Palestinian Christian-run reconciliation organization. When I lived in the West Bank, I always felt trapped and insecure. Words fail to fully convey the intensity of my time in Palestine. Let me just give three “highlights.” First, I experienced missiles flying over my house every day during the Twelve-Day War without access to bomb shelters. Second, I ran out of running water for four days because of Israel diverting most of the West Bank’s water supply to Israeli settlers. Third, an Israeli soldier attempted to intimidate me by pointing his machine gun at me at Bethlehem’s Checkpoint 300 after I questioned why I was not given back my passport after five minutes.

Yet, these events, which are virtually unheard of in the US, are mild compared to the experiences of ordinary Palestinians. When I visited Hebron’s Old City, I gazed in horror at the netting that Palestinian business owners installed to catch the trash, bricks, urine and other objects thrown by Israeli settlers from above. As I reached the checkpoint separating the Old City from the Ibrahimi Mosque, I witnessed an Israeli soldier physically assault a Palestinian civilian.

This isn’t to say that ICE hasn’t committed atrocities. 2025 was ICE’s deadliest year since 2004, as 32 people died in ICE custody. By mid-December 2025, ICE held 68,440 people, nearly 75 per cent of whom had no criminal convictions. So far, eight people have either been killed by federal agents or died in ICE custody in 2026. Additionally, ICE has utilized racial profiling and committed illegal actions, such as entering homes without the necessary judicial warrant. Finally, it’s also true that some federal agents have been trained by Israel.

However, all of the above does not mean that the situation in Minneapolis is comparable to the one in Palestine.

In Gaza, Israel is conducting a genocide against the enclave’s Palestinian population. Since October 2023, more than 71,000 Palestinians have been killed, at least 20,000 of whom are children. Importantly, these numbers don’t include the bodies of the more than 10,000 Palestinians who remain under rubble. Israeli intelligence estimates that at least 83 per cent of Gazans killed were civilians. According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), nearly “all of Gaza’s current population of 2.1 million people has been displaced, lacking access to sufficient shelter, food, life-saving medical services, clean water, education and livelihoods.” Additionally, the UN found that roughly 80 per cent  of Gaza’s structures are destroyed or damaged. Even during the current “cease-fire,” 2,500 additional buildings have been destroyed.

In the West Bank, Palestinians live under a brutal apartheid regime. Palestinians live under military law and experience regular beatings and home raids, while Israeli settlers live under civilian law. Since October 2023, at least 1,000 West Bank Palestinians have been killed, one in five of whom is a child. Israeli airstrikes that targeted refugee camps in Jenin, Tulkarem, Nablus and Tubas killed a large chunk of these Palestinians. Those who didn’t perish as a result of Israeli airstrikes were displaced. According to UNICEF, over 41,000 Palestinians in the West Bank have been uprooted. More than 12,000 children remain forcibly displaced. In January 2026 alone, Israeli settler attacks displaced 818 Palestinians. Additionally, at least 800 checkpoints are scattered throughout the West Bank, where Palestinians are humiliated by Israeli soldiers daily.

In other words, the situation in Palestine is dramatically worse than what’s happening in Minneapolis, and it’s problematic to compare the two. Right now, I can travel between Minneapolis and St. Paul without a problem. I’m not experiencing genocide nor apartheid (yet). By contrast, when I wanted to travel to Ramallah from Bethlehem, I had to travel through a military checkpoint that was spontaneously closed for an hour. Furthermore, the killings and abductions that sporadically occur in Minneapolis are a feature of everyday Palestinian life.

If words such as “genocide” and “apartheid” have any meaning, they should be used sparingly. Nothing in the US is comparable to the devastation that Israel has inflicted upon the Palestinian people. Observing everything through the prism of “Palestine” risks erasing the actual brutality of life under Israeli occupation.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.