Many organisations try to give an answer to the human, cultural and ecological devastation that is going on in the world today. Many do so with courage and self sacrifice; others simply take advantage of the enormous funds which governments spend to manipulate the politics and economy of dominated countries.

All our respect goes to the first kind of organisation, whatever the ideas they draw their inspiration from may be. We do not want to have anything to do with the second kind.

Sumud is an invitation to go to the root of the matter. Often, behind the horror around us, there are not merely blind forces of nature, but warfare and plundering which have always accompanied imperialism.

Sumud proposes no model from the towering heights of a superior culture. Sumud wants to simply listen and provide support to those who struggle, in the dominated countries, against poverty and for liberation, through a kind of voluntary commitment which is neither sentimental nor condescending, rejecting any kind of complicity with those who think volunteer associations should provide sedation against rebellion.

The name comes from a very ancient Arab root, with many meanings: samda means a rock firmly planted in the earth; mismâd is a camel which goes on giving milk in a drought.

The basis meaning is impenetrability, attachment to roots, resistance. But those who resist, and do not let themselves be overwhelmed or seduced, have an inner richness. This is why Sumud at the same time also means self-sufficiency and freedom.