Israel-US terror confronted by Mexican artist

Mexican artist Ximena Castro has harnessed the power of music to take on US-Israel terror. And she thinks that, through its community-building power, uplifting music can be an important tool for challenging imperialist crimes. The Canary spoke to her to find out more.

Opposing Israel and Trump

Castro’s song Manos Blancas (‘White Hands’) has had around 1.5 million plays on Spotify since it broke onto the platform on 6 January 2026. This followed the illegal abduction of Venezuela’s president following months of intensifying US aggression against the oil-rich nation.

The English version of Manos Blancas takes clear aim at Donald Trump’s neocolonial offensive in Latin America, saying:

There’s an adult playing war, like a spoiled rich kid with no shame,

Throwing taxes like loaded dice from a glowing TV throne of flames.

He never walks the burning ground, never pays for what he breaks,

Throws bombs in a public tantrum and calls it ‘what it takes’.

And this was before the US joined Israel in starting the disastrous war on Iran at the end of February.

Castro was dealing with numerous personal challenges at the time, but invested time in creating a powerful rebuke of intensifying US imperialism under Trump. Out of a job and battling depression, she told us that she started:

writing this kind of music in order to feel better.

“The world is on fire,” she said. But we absolutely need “music that is uplifting”. Because “revolution comes from uplifting”.

As the Trump regime carried out illegal extrajudicial executions off the Venezuelan coast, her indignation was already growing and she had begun to write. But after the kidnapping of the country’s president, she released Manos Blancas, which asserted:

For Venezuela, I raise my voice. Don’t turn her into your screen.

Let her choose her own damn future without blockades or marines.

Don’t repeat the same old script of ‘saving’ through domination.

We already know the ending – poverty, cages, and repression.

Disillusionment working as a lawyer

Castro has always loved cooking and photography, but initially became a lawyer to help support her family financially. In the urban giant of Mexico City, she has captured images of the loneliness that people can face despite the fact that:

two seconds later, there’s going to be thousands of people surrounding that person

The Covid-19 pandemic made her confront herself, realise her disillusionment with working as a lawyer, and assert that it didn’t have to be that way. Although it’s hard to make a living from the arts in Mexico, she decided to give it a go. She studied painting and cooking, and ended up with her own exhibition at Carnegie Hall.

Coinciding with Trump’s increasing assault on Latin America, however, Facebook blocked her from speaking to other people for six months. And this has a serious impact on her income. This in turn contributed not only to dark times personally, but also to her decision to turn her art and writing into music.

Castro wanted to make uplifting music that spoke “plain and simple truth” in a way that she didn’t think other music was. So she used the ideas in her head, along with her “straightforward lyrics”, to create the voice and music with artificial intelligence. As she said:

I didn’t use it in order just to feel better. I needed to make the music, because I needed to have it. Nobody was saying something that was so clear as the thing that I needed.

With the illegal abduction in Venezuela giving a clear sign that US imperialism was ramping up again in Latin America, she thought:

I cannot do anything – I have to say something. What can I do in order to put these words or this music together?… I put it together that night. This is for me, my conscience, and my 1,000 friends on Instagram. Then I went to sleep. And everything changed… When I uploaded the song, I don’t know how, I broke the algorithm, and it went viral.

People soon started sending her messages from all over the region and the world.

It gave me more strength. I went out of depression, because I got a community….

90% of the messages that I received talked about community, about what they feel. And they felt included. It touched their soul.

Community is the real tool for resistance

Castro is fully aware of the challenges that artificial intelligence represents. And she clarified that:

It’s community that’s the weapon that is going to try to help us change things. Artificial intelligence can be the tool to make it happen… It’s a tool that can build community… But the ethics has to be of the human being that operates the artificial intelligence…

It contaminates, so if you’re going to use it, use it for the right purpose – not just ‘put my face and make me beautiful’.

She’s clear that she wants to use her work for good. And despite contract offers, she insists that she’s “not going to sell out”. Instead, she’s already moving beyond artificial intelligence by taking singing classes, in the hope of performing the music live.

As Manos Blancas showed, her focus isn’t only on the impact US imperialism has in Mexico. It’s much broader. As she stressed:

If I’m only talking about my problems and trying to solve my problems, and not seeing the problems of the rest of the world and understanding that they are all connected, we’re not going to change anything.

Among other topics, she has already created songs about Israel’s genocide in Gaza and the intensifying US stranglehold on Cuba. The song Desde el Río (‘From the River‘), for example, blends Spanish, English, and Arabic.

Don’t underestimate the power of music

Castro’s story shows the power that music has not only to make us feel better but also to harness our indignation against imperialism to build community and resistance. Latin America has a strong tradition of protest music, and Castro has built on that in a very modern way and context.

Her work isn’t just an artistic challenge to US-Israeli terror. It shows that music and art can be transformative on a personal level too, helping to mould something powerful from our own struggles in a way that not only connects with others but can inspire and uplift them too.

Featured image via YouTube/Ximena Castro