Why Israel is calling Palestinian rights groups 'terrorists'
In October, Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz declared six Palestinian civil society organizations “terror groups." In this episode of Unsettled, we look closely at one of those groups, Al-Haq: its founding principles, its role in Palestinian society, and the impact of Israel's terror designation on its ability to continue documenting Israeli human rights abuses.
In October, Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz declared six Palestinian civil society organizations “terror groups." These groups work in issue areas like women’s rights, children’s rights, and agricultural labor. The "terror" designation is based on alleged connections to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a small political faction. But so far, Israel’s evidence has failed to convince many international leaders. In this episode of Unsettled, we look closely at one of those groups, Al-Haq: its founding principles, its role in Palestinian society, and the impact of Israel's terror designation on its ability to continue documenting Israeli human rights abuses.
This episode was produced by Ilana Levinson and features Jonathan Kuttab and Khaled Elgindy. Archival footage courtesy of Al-Haq.
RESOURCES
Tareq Baconi: Hamas, Explained (Unsettled Podcast, 5/17/21)
‘They targeted us for one reason: We’re succeeding in changing the paradigm’ (Yuval Abraham, +972 Magazine, 10/25/21)
Israeli dossier on rights groups contains little evidence (Joseph Krauss, AP, 11/6/21)
Israel/OPT: Designation of Palestinian civil society groups as terrorists a brazen attack on human rights (Amnesty International, 10/22/21)
Naomi Shihab Nye: Poetry as Refuge
Naomi Shihab Nye is a Palestinian-American writer, educator, and editor. Her published work includes poetry, children’s books and essays, and she has been awarded a Lifetime Achievement award from the National Book Critics Circle. She has also spent decades as an educator, visiting classrooms all around the world.
In this episode, producer Emily Bell speaks with Naomi Shihab Nye about finding inspiration in her father's notebooks, processing grief, and writing about Palestine. Naomi shares a selection of old and new works, including two from her book "Transfer."
““Grief is something that, alas, as human beings we’re just going to keep experiencing over and over and over again in all of its many manifestations. And I think poetry can help us know that we’re not alone in experiencing it, that it’s a place to place our pain, and to place our unresolved questions, our mysteries.””
Naomi Shihab Nye is a Palestinian-American writer, educator, and editor. Her published work includes poetry, children’s books and essays, and she has been awarded a Lifetime Achievement award from the National Book Critics Circle. She has also spent decades as an educator, visiting classrooms all around the world.
In this episode, producer Emily Bell speaks with Naomi Shihab Nye about finding inspiration in her father's notebooks, processing grief, and writing about Palestine. Naomi shares a selection of old and new works, including two from her book "Transfer."
CREDITS
Unsettled is produced by Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, Max Freedman, and Ilana Levinson. Original music by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions.
(Episode Image: Dominican University/Flickr)
(Headshot: Michael Nye)
BIO
Palestinian-American writer, editor and educator Naomi Shihab Nye grew up in Ferguson, Missouri, Jerusalem, and San Antonio, Texas, where she continues to live.
She is the Young People’s Poet Laureate of the United States (Poetry Foundation). Her late father Aziz Shihab was a journalist and author of Does the Land Remember Me? A Memoir of Palestine. She has been a visiting writer in hundreds of schools and communities all over the world for more than 40 years and has written or edited 35 books including collections of poetry, novels for teens, picture books, essays, very short fictional stories, anthologies of poetry. Her books Sitti’s Secrets, Habibi, This Same Sky, & The Tree is Older than You Are: Poems & Paintings from Mexico have been in print more than 20 years. Her volume 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East, was a finalist for the National Book Award. Recent books include Everything Comes Next, Cast Away, The Tiny Journalist, and Voices in the Air. She is on faculty at Texas State University and won recent Lifetime Achievement Awards from the National Book Critics Circle and the Texas Institute of Letters. The Turtle of Oman (Greenwillow) a novel for children set in Muscat, will soon be followed by its sequel The Turtle of Michigan.
RESOURCES
“This Court Decision in the Gavin Grimm Case Will Bring Tears to Your Eyes” (American Civil Liberties Union, 4/10/17)
“A memorial to a great Arab American Journalist, Aziz Shihab” (Ray Hanania, The Arab Daily News, 10/28/07)
“Texas journalist Aziz Shihab on 'Does the Land Remember Me?: A Memoir of Palestine'" (Michael King, The Austin Chronicle, 7/20/07)
Marwa Fatafta: Digital Rights
In the spring, the prominent twin activists Muna and Mohammed al-Kurd were regularly speaking out about an Israeli settler takeover of their home in Sheikh Jarrah in Jerusalem. But just after Muhammad and Muna started to get international attention, they were detained and interrogated by Israeli authorities. The al-Kurd twins are not alone. Palestinians say they’ve been subject to censorship from social media companies and by the Israeli authorities for decades. On this episode of Unsettled, Marwa Fatafta, the Middle East and North Africa Policy Manager at Access Now, talks about censorship of Palestinian voices.
In the spring, the prominent twin activists Muna and Mohammed al-Kurd were regularly speaking out about an Israeli settler takeover of their home in Sheikh Jarrah in Jerusalem. But just after Muhammad and Muna started to get international attention, they were detained and interrogated by Israeli authorities. The al-Kurd twins are not alone. Palestinians say they’ve been subject to censorship from social media companies and by the Israeli authorities for decades. On this episode of Unsettled, Marwa Fatafta, the Middle East and North Africa Policy Manager at Access Now, talks about censorship of Palestinian voices.
CREDITS
Unsettled is produced by Ilana Levinson, Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, and Max Freedman. Original music by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions.
Marwa Fatafta leads Access Now’s work on digital rights in the Middle East and North Africa region as the MENA Policy Manager. She has written extensively on technology, human rights, and internet freedoms in Palestine and the wider MENA region. Marwa is also a Policy Analyst at Al-Shabaka: The Palestinian Policy Network where she co-led the organization's policy work on questions of Palestinian political leadership, governance, and accountability. Previously, Marwa was the MENA Regional Advisor for Transparency International Secretariat in Berlin and served as the Communications Manager at the British Consulate-General in Jerusalem. Marwa was a Fulbright scholar to the US, and holds an MA in International Relations from Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Syracuse University. She holds a second MA in Development and Governance from University of Duisburg-Essen.
RESOURCES
Access Now's statement on Facebook and Twitter systematically silencing protests (5/7/2021)
Access Now's 'Facebook Stop Silencing Palestine' campaign
"Elections or not, the PA is intensifying its authoritarian rule online" (Marwa Fatafta, +972 Magazine, 4/29/21)
“Facebook's Secret Rules About the Word 'Zionist' Impede Criticism of Israel" (Sam Biddle, The Intercept, 5/14/21)
Introducing Groundwork
Groundwork is a new podcast about Palestinians and Jews refusing to accept the status quo and working together for change. When war broke out between Israel and Gaza this past May, some of the worst inter-ethnic fighting in Israel’s history erupted between its own citizens. The violence showed that even in mixed cities, where people often talk of coexistence, there are deep political, ethnic, and economic divides.
Groundwork is a new podcast about Palestinians and Jews refusing to accept the status quo and working together for change. When war broke out between Israel and Gaza this past May, some of the worst inter-ethnic fighting in Israel’s history erupted between its own citizens. The violence showed that even in mixed cities, where people often talk of coexistence, there are deep political, ethnic, and economic divides.
Lod was the epicenter of this recent violence: there were shootings in the streets, neighbors attacking one another, lynching. In this episode, Groundwork’s hosts Dina Kraft and Sally Abed speak with Lod activists Rula Daood and Dror Rubin about the complicated history of Lod, what they think led to the violence in May, and what’s next.
CREDITS
Sally Abed is a staff member and an elected member of the national leadership at Standing Together. In recent years, Sally has become a prominent Palestinian voice in Israel that is putting forward the holistic view that identifies the interrelation between the ongoing occupation of Palestinian territories, growing social and economic disparities within Israeli society, the threat of climate change, and attacks by the government on democratic freedoms and Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel.
Dina Kraft is a veteran foreign correspondent based in Tel Aviv where she’s The Christian Science Monitor correspondent. She began her overseas career in the Jerusalem bureau of The Associated Press. She was later posted to AP’s Johannesburg bureau where she covered southern Africa. She’s also reported from Senegal, Kenya, Pakistan, Jordan, Tunisia, Russia, and Ukraine. Dina has taught journalism at Northeastern University, Harvard University, and Boston University. She was a 2012 Nieman Fellow at Harvard University, and a 2015 Ochberg Fellow at the Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma at Columbia University.
Dina hosted “The Branch” podcast, about ties between Jews and Palestinians and her work has also been published in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, and Haaretz among other news outlets.
Yoshi Fields is the co-founder and producer of Groundwork and has worked in the podcast industry for about 5 years. In 2018, he moved to Israel-Palestine and has worked on several podcasts in the region, focusing on both political and human interest stories, including as a producer at Israel Story, The Branch, and Unsettled.
Through his work, Yoshi aims to empower the voices of others, and facilitate the expression of their stories. He has previously hiked the Himalayas while carrying out a research study on the intersection of love and Buddhism, and worked in a hospice for a year writing about the experience of mortality for health workers.
Groundwork is powered by the Alliance for Middle East Peace and the New Israel Fund.
Jonathan Brenneman and Aidan Orly: Christian Zionism
As international attention turned to Israel-Palestine this May, Jonathan Brenneman and Aidan Orly co-authored an op-ed for Truthout titled “Progressives Can’t Ignore Role of Christian Zionism in Colonization of Palestine.” In this episode, producer Emily Bell interviews Brenneman and Orly about the origins of Christian Zionism; the relationship between Christian Zionism, Jewish Zionism, and U.S. foreign policy; and what it means to challenge Christian Zionism.
“So long as we’re not talking about Christian Zionism, we are complicit in allowing them to continue to be influential and be powerful, and that is a huge threat to Palestinians, [a] huge threat to Muslims, and also a huge threat to Jews.”
As international attention turned to Israel-Palestine this May, Jonathan Brenneman and Aidan Orly co-authored an op-ed for Truthout titled “Progressives Can’t Ignore Role of Christian Zionism in Colonization of Palestine.” In this episode, producer Emily Bell interviews Brenneman and Orly about the origins of Christian Zionism; the relationship between Christian Zionism, Jewish Zionism, and U.S. foreign policy; and what it means to challenge Christian Zionism.
credits
Unsettled is produced by Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, Max Freedman, and Ilana Levinson. Original music by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions.
Jonathan Brenneman is a Palestinian-American Christian. He has undergraduate degrees in History and Philosophy from Huntington University, and in 2016 completed a Masters at the University of Notre Dame’s Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies. Before going to Notre Dame, Jonathan was part of Christian Peacemaker Teams Palestine project in Hebron/Al-Khalil, where he worked in solidarity with Palestinian communities to challenge unjust Israeli policies and the structures that uphold them. Today, he continues his advocacy in the United States primarily through challenging Christian Zionist theology.
Aidan Orly is an Israeli-American Ashkenazi Jew who is active in donor and social justice organizing, especially around issues related to Jewish communities, the Christian Right, and Palestine.
RESOURCEs
“Progressives Can’t Ignore Role of Christian Zionism in Colonization of Palestine” (Jonathan Brenneman & Aidan Orly, Truthout, 5/20/21)
“Will this Palestinian matriarch get to keep her Jerusalem home?” (Unsettled, produced in collaboration with +972 Magazine, 4/12/21)
“Inside the Most Insanely Pro-Israel Meeting You Could Ever Attend” (David Weigel, Slate, 7/22/14)
“An unholy alliance” (Natasha Roth-Rowland, +972 Magazine, 11/5/20)
“The Terrifying Alliance Between End Times Christian Zionists and Donald Trump” (Sarah Lazare, In These Times, 10/5/20)
“AIPAC Isn’t the Whole Story” (Jonah S. Boyarin, Jewish Currents, 3/4/19)
Kathleen Peratis: Visiting Gaza
Two million people live in the Gaza Strip, and they’ve endured over a decade of air raids, and an economic blockade that deprives them of basic necessities, like power and clean water. But in the Jewish community, conversations about Gaza tend to focus only on Hamas terrorism and claims of widespread antisemitism. Kathleen Peratis has been to Gaza five times in the last decade, and what she saw there tells a very different story. In this episode, Kathleen talks about what she learned from her experiences in Gaza and the people she met while she was there.
The Gaza strip has been under Israeli siege for 14 years, with cycles of violence happening over and over again. In the latest round of fighting, at least 254 Palestinians and 13 Israelis died. 2 million people live in the Gaza strip, and they’ve endured over a decade of air raids, and an economic blockade that deprives them of basic necessities, like power and clean water. But in the Jewish community, conversations about Gaza tend to focus only on Hamas terrorism and claims of widespread antisemitism. Kathleen Peratis has been to Gaza five times in the last decade, and what she saw there tells a very different story. In this episode of Unsettled, Kathleen talks about what she learned from her experiences in Gaza and the people she met while she was there.
Unsettled is produced by Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, Max Freedman, and Ilana Levinson. Original music by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions.
Kathleen Peratis is a Partner at Outten and Golden, an employment justice law firm in Manhattan. She's also the Co-Chair of the Middle East and North Africa Division for Human Rights Watch, and the former director of the Women’s Rights Project at the American Civil Liberties Union, succeeding Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Kathleen's published works on her time in Gaza:
Unsettled's 4-part series on Gaza:
Update from the South Hebron Hills
The recent escalation of violence in Israel-Palestine seemed to be happening everywhere, all at once. But one place that’s been getting less public attention is a rural part of the West Bank called the South Hebron Hills. Last weekend, Jewish settlers set fire to Palestinian fields and tried to destroy a cave in the village of Sarura.
We have dedicated two past episodes of Unsettled to the story of this cave: how it was first reclaimed four years ago by Palestinian and Jewish activists; and how it has remained in local Palestinian hands ever since, thanks to a group called Youth of Sumud. Today, we’re sharing those two episodes as one.
The recent escalation of violence in Israel-Palestine seemed to be happening everywhere, all at once. But one place that’s been getting less public attention is a rural part of the West Bank called the South Hebron Hills. Last weekend, Jewish settlers set fire to Palestinian fields and tried to destroy a cave in the village of Sarura.
We have dedicated two past episodes of Unsettled to the story of this cave: how it was first reclaimed four years ago by Palestinian and Jewish activists; and how it has remained in local Palestinian hands ever since, thanks to a group called Youth of Sumud. Today, we’re sharing those two episodes as one.
Unsettled is produced by Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, Max Freedman, and Ilana Levinson. Original music by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions.
“Palestinian children travel dangerous route to school in At-Tuwani” (DCI Palestine, 9/10/13)
Amira Hass and Hagar Sheizaf, “The Village Where Palestinians Are Completely Powerless” (Haaretz, 1/5/21)
Spotify playlist: Unsettled essentials, May 2021
transcript
MAX FREEDMAN: Hey, this is Max, one of the producers of Unsettled.
One of the unique things about this moment in Israel-Palestine is that violence has been escalating everywhere, all at once. We’ve talked on the show about Jerusalem, Gaza, Haifa, and Lydd, just to name a few.
But one place that’s been getting less public attention so far is the South Hebron Hills, a rural part of the West Bank where I spent time in late 2019 and early 2020. Settler violence, which is a constant in the South Hebron Hills, has been ramping up too.
Last weekend, Israeli soldiers and police looked on and did nothing as masked settlers set fire to Palestinian fields. A local activist named Sami Huraini put this video on Facebook.
SAMI HURAINI: English now. So now we are live from the village, near the village of Tuwani in the South Hebron Hills. A lot of settlers are attacking in this moment the Palestinians. Under the protection of the Israeli occupation soldiers. A while ago, the settler just set up a fire in al-Haruba that’s very near from here 5 minutes. With as we can see we are hearing the shooting of the tear gas and sound bombs by the Israeli settlers against the Palestinians. At the moment the settlers are… looks like going back. Or no, they are still here. The soldiers are shooting rubber bullets. The soldiers are shooting the rubber bullets against the Palestinians.
MAX: While Sami and his friends were busy documenting the settlers and dodging rubber bullets, another group of settlers saw an opportunity. They went to the Palestinian activists’ cave in a nearby village called Sarura. Here’s another video posted to the Facebook page of Sami’s group, Youth of Sumud.
ACTIVIST: I’m here in Sarura. Settlers have put fire to the cave inside. I don’t know if you can see. And also to the field outside. We have policemen standing on the hill and they’re not doing anything. They saw the settlers come, they saw them light the fire, they’re continuing to stand there. We’ve called the police a dozen times and they’re not responding. And the land is continuing to burn. This is in Sarura in the South Hebron Hills.
MAX: According to Sami Huraini, the settlers burned furniture and a generator inside the cave, destroyed the wall of their kitchen, their water tanks, and their bathroom.
This cave is not just a cave. This cave is so significant that we have dedicated not one, but two episodes to its story: how the cave was first reclaimed by Palestinian and Jewish activists four years ago, and how it has remained in local Palestinian hands ever since. Today, we’re sharing those two episodes as one.
Up first is our very first episode, from way back in August 2017.
PART 1: SUMUD FREEDOM CAMP (2017)
TOM CORCORAN: We are live here at Sumud Freedom Camp in the Palestinian village of Sarura, where the Israeli military has moved in and started to take down our tents and push back on nonviolent protestors…
ILANA LEVINSON: Today’s episode takes place in the South Hebron Hills, where activists including Tom Corcoran, whose voice you just heard, gathered in May. The South Hebron Hills is an arid area of the West Bank that is part of Area C — under full control of the Israeli military.
With the systematic expansion of Israeli settlements and pressure from the military, the Palestinians who live in the area are at constant threat of home demolitions and displacement. And in some villages, no structures or people remain.
Fadal Amer used to call the cave-dwelling village of Sarura home, but he was forced out in 1997 by violence from nearby Israeli settlers who burned his crops and poisoned his wells. Two years later, the IDF declared Sarura part of Firing Zone 918, evicting the remaining residents. Though Fadal was forced to leave 20 years ago, the key to his cave still hangs off of his belt.
This May, Fadal Amer attempted to return home, with the support of a historic coalition of Israelis, Palestinians, and diaspora Jews. Marking the 50th year of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, the activists gathered together to establish Sumud Freedom Camp, with the hope of reclaiming Sarura not just for Fadal, but for the whole community to someday return.
Sumud, built where Sarura once stood, translates in Arabic to steadfastness. Sumud became not just the name of the camp but also the coalition’s rallying cry, as activists took to social media with the hashtag #WeAreSumud. But despite the historic coalition, and social media efforts, the story of Sumud has largely been absent from mainstream news.
As fear and uncertainty overwhelm the region, it's hard to imagine such an unprecedented coalition of Israelis, Palestinians and diaspora Jews coming together. But today we’ll dive into just such a story. But today we'll hear from three American Jewish activists that were there, with their Palestinian and Israeli partners, building Sumud together, from the ground up.
I'm Ilana Levinson, and welcome to Unsettled.
MUSIC: Unsettled theme
ILANA: Unsettled is a new podcast about Israel-Palestine and the Jewish diaspora. We’re here to provide a space for the difficult conversations and diverse viewpoints that you might not hear in institutional American Jewish spaces.
I'm one of the producers of Unsettled and your host for today's episode.
While many different people were involved in building Sumud Freedom Camp, in this episode we’ll hear the perspective of three American Jewish activists who helped establish the camp, including Tom, who you heard from at the very beginning. Just a few weeks after returning to the US, they sat down in my living room in NYC to tell their story.
JEREMY SWACK: My name is Jeremy Swack, and I’m most recently involved in Open Hillel, though I’ve been involved in various other organizations including IfNotNow and J-Street U.
TOM CORCORAN: My name is Tom Corcoran and I’m a member of IfNotNow based in New York.
NAOMI DANN: I’m Naomi Dann and I work with Jewish Voice for Peace.
ILANA: Jeremy, Tom, and Naomi were there with the Center for Jewish Non-Violence, one of the organizations that formed the coalition. And after months of planning, they along with more than 300 activists prepared to march to Sarura on Friday, May 19. But secrecy was needed.
JEREMY: because it was uncertain that we would even be able to access the land.
ILANA: In fact, most of the group was kept in the dark about some key details until the very last minute--including the name and location of the village itself.
NAOMI: We didn’t know what it was, no one knew what it was, that was like the most closely kept secret cuz we knew that the army could easily put up a checkpoint and prevent us from getting to the land we were going to.
JEREMY: That’s why part of our group went down the night before and slept in a village nearby to ensure that at least some of us would be able to get there.
ILANA: Tom was one of those who camped close to the meetup site.
TOM: There were about 60 of us, we stayed on a roof, it was pretty uncomfortable actually.
ILANA: The next morning though, the army didn't stop anyone, and the activists from the 6 organizations: the Center for Jewish Nonviolence, Combatants for Peace, Holy Land Trust, Youth Against Settlements, All That’s Left: Anti-Occupation Collective and Popular Resistance Committee for the South Hebron Hills came together to march to Sarura. Fadal Amer led the group, as people chanted and waved flags. Issa Amro, founder of Youth Against Settlements, was among those who led chants.
ISSA AMRO: 1-2-3 (1-2-3) / Palestine will be free (Palestine will be free)
ILANA: But while there was lots of excitement, there was also discomfort.
NAOMI: I know that most American Jews have never been in a rally with Palestinian flags, and often that’s really triggering or scary or super uncomfortable for people, and all of a sudden, it was this really politically diverse group of Jews, working like very much following the lead of Palestinians who had designed this camp, and working alongside Israeli activists and Palestinian activists, and people had a Palestinian flag in their hands for the very first time, and I looked a couple of people, and they looked at their hand, and looked at the flag, and it was okay! And it was great. And it was like, this actually feels right in this moment.
TOM: One of the most powerful things was waving Palestinian flags, joining together as a coalition and coming into the land, a land that people had not been able to be in for decades.
ILANA: When the group arrived at Sarura, there was barely a trace of the cave dwelling village that had once stood there - a few broken down walls in an otherwise deserted landscape.
TOM: After 20 years of not being used, there was a lot of work to do.
ILANA: Knowing that settlers or the army could arrive at any time, the activists got to work. Some followed Fadal Amer to his cave
NAOMI: He was wearing a key that hung off of his belt: a big rusty key that fit the lock on the gate that entered the cave that he had been born in and that we were reclaiming with him
ILANA: Like Fadel Amer, many Palestinians still carry the keys to their old homes. The key is a symbol of the “right of return,” a movement that began in 1948, when Palestinians were displaced during the establishment of Israel.
NAOMI: A lot of people left with their keys in their pockets, and didn’t know that they would never be able to go back, and so those keys are really powerful, and it was amazing to see--he was literally wearing that key, and we could be there for the moment where he could use that key again.
TOM: Seeing Fadel returning to his cave, finally opening that door for the first time, that was something that was just undeniable, it felt right to be there and to be doing this work and supporting that work.
ILANA: In order to build the camp, as well as restore the caves, groups of activists hurried to rebuild stone walls -- and cleared out bugs from inside caves. Others began setting up a large tent:
TOM: The simple act of doing that physical labor together: digging out rocks, moving them around, setting up a wall, setting up a tent--being able to do that, it was a huge equalizer, and it was really humbling.
ILANA: As work progressed, Fadel Amer spent time with the activists. While he spoke both Arabic and Hebrew, some of the Americans only knew English.
NAOMI: he was the most warm and welcoming person and you didn’t need a shared language to know that. Like, full of smiles, and he was greeting everyone, constantly checking in on everyone.
JEREMY: I think he really spoke to the Palestinian culture of not just hospitality but immense generosity. He was really hosting us in a lot of ways, even though we were hoping to build Sumud Camp, this was his home, and he had invited us to his land and to his home to do this work.
ILANA: Still, even this homecoming was shadowed by the threat of confrontation.
NAOMI: We started establishing things that felt more permanent, and we started looking over our shoulders, like “Okay, when’s the army going to come?” We know that this is a firing zone, they’ve forbidden Palestinians to be here, and they could come at any time and kick us out.
ILANA: But as the sun set, those in the camp who observed shabbat gathered together. Amid more traditional shabbat music, Souli Khatib from Combatants for Peace played the flute.
JEREMY: I think there was a certain point, after we had been there about a day, I felt very comfortable in the camp, and believed that the camp would continue to thrive, even though in the back of my head I intellectually knew that the camp was probably going to be destroyed, which it ended up being. And that was just a really big wake up call. I think for me and for many of us, was a tiny window into what living under occupation is, is you’re not sure when the army is going to come and destroy anything.
ILANA: The next day, as some continued to observe the sabbath and rest, others continued to work. While cement was mixed and poured on the floor of Fadal Amer’s cave, music played, people danced and there was even a makeshift game of limbo.
Saturday night the group gathered in the large tent for Havdalah, a Jewish ceremony marking the close of Shabbat. Among the songs they sang was an adaptation of the anti-Apartheid song, “Courage.”
ACTIVISTS: Sarura / My friend / You do not walk alone / We will / Walk with you / And sing your spirit home
NAOMI: it was late midnight on Saturday, we had bonfires going, we had music playing, people were still cooking food, and all of a sudden, there were a series of lights that came over the hill, and within like 10 seconds we all realized that the army was coming into the camp.
TOM: They went straight for our generator, they went straight for some of the tents and structures we had set up.
ILANA: Many of the activists began recording and livestreaming on Facebook, creating hundreds of witnesses around the world. Despite having no demolition order, the army quickly destroyed most of the camp.
NAOMI: We went back and forth between being totally totally powerless, because there was nothing that we could do, because we were up against such a force that had so much power, and also so powerful, to be holding hands with people who I trusted, who I’d built community with.
ILANA: When all that remained was the large tent, the activists responded quickly. Jeremy and others who made it inside, linked arms in the darkness. The army began tearing down the tent and tried to break the group apart:
ACTIVISTS: You’re hurting him! You’re hurting him! You’re hurting him! You’re hurting him! You’re hurting him! Please! Please! We are nonviolent! We are sitting in our campsite in peace!
ILANA: Gathered close, and low to the ground as the soldiers loomed over them, they turned to song.
ACTIVISTS: We will build this world with love / Dai dai dai dai dai dai dai dai / We will build this world with love / Dai dai dai dai dai dai dai dai
ILANA: Outside the tent, Tom and the rest of the activists were steps away from another group of soldiers. As they chanted and sang, Tom livestreamed the raid:
TOM: We are here because we believe in freedom and dignity for all peoples. We believe in the right of Palestinians to their lands. We are here protesting against fifty years of occupation. And we are here as part of a nonviolent resistance.
TOM: I saw what we were doing, the risk we were taking, and I knew the risk our Palestinian partners, that Fadal, that the people who were returning to Sarura were taking just by being there, and the risks that they face every day, and for me, that was something where we had to film it, we had to report back on it, because there was something so viscerally brutal.
ILANA: With the tent almost fully collapsed, the activists stood in a tight formation and grasped at the tarp in fistfulls. At the direction of a Palestinian leader, they lowered the tarp and sat on top, relinking arms. From Jeremy's recording you can hear as the army continued to cut and tear the tent from underneath them.
ACTIVISTS: When the world is sick / Can no one be well / But I dreamt we were all beautiful and strong
ILANA: After about an hour - almost no structures remained. With part of the tarp confiscated - the army began loading back into their trucks. As the army left, the activists chanted a promise.
ACTIVISTS: We will rebuild (together)! We will rebuild (together)! We will rebuild (together)! We will rebuild (together)!
ILANA: The group gathered amid the strewn mattresses and belongings. The medics attended to those who had been punched, kicked and choked. Others sent messages and updates to the world. A fire and sleeping space was quickly assembled.
While some went to rest, Tom joined the nightwatch in case settlers or soldiers returned again. Tom recounted sitting around the fire with Palestinians, including three men from the town of Umm-El Khair who had partnered with their group - the Center for Jewish Nonviolence- earlier in the week.
TOM: We were tired, we were cold, we were out there, and then they were just there making tea for us, or didn’t have sugar for tea so instead gave us some mango juice, and it was just like this thing where, okay there’s work to be done and we need to set up and this was a hard moment, but we can still spend time with each other and take care of each other and sit around a fire in the middle of the night. And so that was something where, though I was exhausted, being able to have that experience immediately after was really moving and really healing.
ILANA: When the activists woke up on Sunday morning, the army had not returned. Before starting to rebuild they gathered in a circle.
ACTIVISTS: Light is returning / Even though this is the darkest hour / No one can hold back / Back the dawn
JEREMY: It was definitely a moment for me that solidified what Sumud means: Steadfastness. In that, immediately as Tom said, some people began to rebuild, and when we woke up in the morning, we were rebuilding that camp.
ILANA: Using the tarp that the army had not confiscated, they rebuilt the tent in front of Fadel’s cave. Though there was more work to be done, the Center for Jewish Nonviolence delegation had to leave later that afternoon.
TOM: there was this really deep feeling that we were just leaving the people that we had worked with and built this camp with, and even though that was always part of the plan, that as the Center for Jewish Nonviolence we were going to be there for that specific amount of time and then leave… I don’t know, I felt a lot of guilt. And I think that it’s our responsibility to bring this message back. But it also felt hard to not still be there and keep the work going.
ILANA: But before they left, Fadel addressed the group outside his cave.
JEREMY: He spoke to us through a translator, and he actually apologized for the events that had happened in the Israeli raid the previous night, which… is just unbelievable, that he apologized to us for that. That was...really something. I don’t know what to say about it.
ILANA: Two weeks after returning from Palestine, when we recorded this interview, Naomi, Jeremy and Tom were still processing their time at Sumud. We asked them how the story of Sumud was being received by the American Jewish public.
NAOMI: Well… I don’t know how many people in the American Jewish community know about it still. And I think the point of the trip was to be American Jews there experiencing occupation and taking part in this direct action that would get some press that would tell a story to people back home to change their minds? And I think that was the right approach and strategy for that plan, but there hasn’t been enough attention on it.
ILANA: Naomi gave a couple reasons for this, including Donald Trump’s visit to Israel which happened at the same time, but also:
NAOMI: It didn’t make as much news because I think the army played us really smart. They didn’t destroy the camp totally, they let us rebuild, they didn’t arrest people so there wasn’t something to rally around, and the media wasn’t there that first day because there wasn’t violence and the media follows violence, and so it wasn’t as big of a story as we had hoped it would be.
ILANA: And some who have heard about Sumud have criticized the action, arguing that no one is allowed to live in Sarura, and the army’s destruction of the camp was justified. They argue that the activists should not have been there in the first place. But Naomi sees it differently.
NAOMI: I mean, that is the whole history of civil disobedience, is about breaking laws that we believe are unjust, and so people who make that argument are missing the point. The reason we were there to say these laws are unjust and the way the system is set up is unjust. And so that’s why we’re going to go directly against it. And some of the most powerful civil disobedience actions are when you literally break the law you’re going to change in order to make a statement about how it needs to change.
ILANA: The people of Sarura and others from evicted villages in Firing Zone 918 have been fighting in the Israeli courts to have their homes back, but not only have they not been allowed to return, they also haven't been given any compensation for the land they lost.
TOM: It’s not possible for a Palestinian to get permission to build on that land. Even while at the same time there’s a settlement that we could see, the entire time, just right there.
ILANA: But, they still felt that their presence - the American and International presence at the camp - had enabled the the story of Sumud to reach more people than it otherwise would have.
TOM: People i know in my life, or people in the lives of people who were on the trip who paid attention because they were there, or because American Jews were there. Whereas if it were just something happening to palestinians, or some Israelis in support, it wouldn’t have gotten as much attention. That’s absolutely true.
ILANA: Furthermore, the story of Sumud’s construction wasn't just an attempt to make news or about the resulting nighttime raid, which is what the news so often focuses on.
TOM: And then the other part is that it wasn’t just for show. It was fadal, his family, people actually coming back to Sarura and being able to enter their homes for the first time in at least 20 years. So knowing that this possible and that that is still happening, that’s really powerful, and that’s also a story that we need to be sharing and we need to be continuing to get out there.
ILANA: But perhaps the greatest obstacle for sharing this story is how hard it can be to talk about the occupation
NAOMI: I talked to a lot of people who feel really disempowered to talk about what’s happening, and they say “Oh, like Israel-Palestine conflict…” I’ve been told “It’s too complicated, I have never really been there, I don’t feel like I’m an authority to be able to speak about it.” I work really hard to help people dispel that fear. Yes it’s complicated, yes there are multiple narratives, yes, the history is really complex, and also it’s very very clear that something really wrong is going on what’s happening right now is a pretty simple wrong.
JEREMY: Since I’ve been back, when people have asked me “What was it like, how was your experience”-- the only thing I’ve really been able to muster is, saying at first, “The occupation is really really really really bad.” And I think that speaks to what Naomi was saying, that this is simply a wrong. There is complexity and narratives and history and whatnot but the occupation itself is wrong, must be ended, and we as diaspora Jews hold immense power in ending it.
TOM: It’s not just a distant system, it something that people enforce, and it’s something that many enforce with cruelty. UM and that’s something that I think people need to know, that it’s not just about, oh, there are all of these competing narratives. It’s also a lived reality, where people’s movement and rights and lives are restricted. I think that’s just something that being there, was so undeniable. And that’s something I’m committed to continuing to make that known to people who are in my life and people I have these conversations with. It’s...yeah. It’s not a myth. It’s very very real.
PART 2: YOUTH OF SUMUD (2021)
MAX: So ever since we released that episode in 2017, I’ve been wondering... what happened to Sarura after the internationals left? And about a year ago, I got to see for myself. In fact, I spent New Year’s Eve in the very same cave.
That was only possible because of a group called Youth of Sumud, which was created in the wake of that 2017 action. How they have maintained this cave for almost four years, and the risks they have taken to do so -- that’s the subject of this episode.
My name is Max Freedman, and this is Unsettled.
MUSIC: Unsettled theme
MAX: Samiha Huraini is one of the founders of Youth of Sumud. When we spoke, on December 31, 2019, she was 20 years old, studying English literature at university.
The part of the West Bank where Samiha lives, and where Youth of Sumud does most of their work, is called the South Hebron Hills. It’s also known as Masafer Yatta, in reference to the nearby city of Yatta. Over the last couple of decades, a lot of people whose families have roots in this area have had to move to Yatta -- for jobs and education, but also often because Israeli authorities have confiscated or destroyed their homes, and prevented them from building any infrastructure. Many experts say that this is part of a broader strategy of packing Palestinians into cities, so as to open up more and more of the land of the West Bank for Jewish settlement.
As I sat with Samiha on a couple of big rocks near her home village of Tuwani, all around us, there were activists planting olive trees. In the road just below us was a unit of Israeli border police, watching. And behind them, perched on the top of a hill, a walled settlement.
Here’s my conversation with Samiha Huraini.
MAX: So my friend Emily was here a couple of years ago and she was at the sumud freedom camp with CJNV. Was that before or after you started youth of Sumud?
SAMIHA HURAINI: No. Uh, you know, at the beginning of the, uh, of the camp of the idea of this village, there there was a lot of international people, uh, Jewish, uh, fighting for, uh, against occupation, non violent, uh, that were supporting this, uh, this idea just, uh, step by step that people to start to leave and leave so the people start to be few and then everyone leaved. So the village became alone again. So that here Youth of Sumud born that, uh, we have to complete what the others was doing and to lead this idea until the end.
MAX: Since they built the camp in Sarura with the caves. So you. Since and the internationals left. So youth of Sumud you had to stay there every night in order to keep it from being torn down. Is that what did what did you have to do in order to keep it from being destroyed?
SAMIHA: We have to stay there 24 hours. They have to feel that there is a Palestinian people there and we have to back the family again. We have to encourage the family to back again because it just the one solution that we can protect the village. You have done it to encourage and to make the people interesting to back again. You know, it's really difficult to back up like people for their own houses, or own cave. After twenty years, you cannot imagine what violent that they saw. That they feel. That how much was hard for them to leave their home. Just they leave it because I'm, I'm sure that they saw very big of violent they was scared about their children life, their own life, their wife life. So they just escape from that because that the the more the violence that they saw when they live in that village every night and every morning. And. And as I told you, there is no life service no electricity no water nothing. Also encourage you to stay. So there was there was stopped anything that you are going to do to make you strong and stay there. They cut the water. They cut the electricity. There is nothing, nothing to make you stay there. So they make you weak and weak and weak. Just go. And scare you scare your children. For so that people for sure was scared for their children and for their life. So they just go. So now it's really difficult to back them again. So after one year of cleaning, restorate and, uh. Bring attention and make it bigger and cleaning, everything's preparing. We decide they came like three or four times in the weekend. And slept and preparing their stuff. And in their caves. [104.1s]
VOICE: One minute.
MAX: Someone has approached Samiha with news. They speak in Arabic for a while. Remember, it’s December 31st.
SAMIHA: So I'm preparing for the evening things, evening party, and he was asking me to go for the camp now.
MAX: Okay, you need to go now?
SAMIHA: All of us.
MAX: Oh okay. We all need to go now.
SAMIHA: Yeah. Because they make this area closed military zone so we cannot do our activity here. So we have to move.
MAX: How did you find. How do you find out when they decide it's a closed military zone?
SAMIHA: It just stops. Well, I don't know. You know, this is crazy that something you are planning for it like months. And they just come and tell you you cannot do that closed military if you will be there. You'll be arrested or you'll be. It's something.
MAX: So so the place where we were going to do the event, the party tonight. We can't do it there anymore? Is that what he said?
SAMIHA: Yeah. And we have to go to do it in the camp. In the cave.
MAX: We have to go and do it in Sarura.
SAMIHA: In the cave yeah.
MAX: Instead. Okay.
SAMIHA: Yeah.
MAX: So that's where we're gonna. We're gonna go to Sarura now.
SAMIHA: Yeah. Was planning to light that big tree in the Sumud Freedom Garden that also it's one of the ideas of Youth of Sumud. Just it will not go. It will not work. All of us will be arrested. And we don't want that for anyone. And they will confiscate everything you will have it here, so. We can go there to do it. They will not stop the idea just they stop us to be here in the place. So, just we will celebrate it together in Sarura.
MAX: So so the family that the family that used to lived in Sarura a long time ago, they have not moved back.
SAMIHA: No, because it was destroyed before we start to work on it. It's really was destroying. There was no life, nothing. It was really just, uh, caves full of stone and rubbish that the settlers was putting inside to make it's dirty, to destroy it, to don't make it's able to be life again. The old people that they used to live, the grandfather of mom and dad's caves that was they was died. So now their sons and their daughters that living in Yatta that we are encouraging them to come back. So now weekly, they came three, four time and, uh, they came start to bring their stuff. They started prepping their caves with their stuff. So it's for us a big succeed.
MAX: So they're so there are still people from there, still people from youth of Sumud who stay there 24 hours a day, all these years later.
SAMIHA: Yeah. Yeah for sure. So some of us is here. Some of them was in the camp. So we cannot leave it like all of us come and focus on this action and leave the caves. No. You have to always be, uh, some of us have to be there. To be, uh, not one. For sure.
MAX: And at the beginning, all of the young people in youth of Sumud, they were all from Tuwani and the villages around here.
SAMIHA: Actually, when we start, we start a few people, I was me, my older brother, there was a friends around was really fewer like when I was six seven. It's not enough for them. They can arrested us in one minute, in one Jeep even they don't be so tired. So we decide also to bigger the idea of to bigger the group to be more strong, because if we still few under this occupation we would be all arrested or will be attacked and we will be in stuck and we will never succeed to create the idea of the Youth of Sumud. So we started to public the idea around. For example, for me in my university I speak with everyone who was interesting or who's ready actually to be with this part. If he want to be an activist and he want to resist for Palestine. Also, my brother do the same. Our friend the same. We have now numbers of people like you can see we're around 20. So it's, uh, for us, it's not a very big number, enough number to protect this village and, to be enough to going around. Some people stay. Some people go to act.
SAMIHA: And one of the important things that we used to do as a Youth of Sumud that I am really proud of that. As I told you, we are a human rights defender and we are trying to to help the people that their rights is violated. The important right it's education. That is really violated in this place. For example, there is, uh, uh, schoolchildren that they came from Tuba village, that it's after these settlements that you see. It's you see this mount is full of settlements, settlers and violent settlers. After them. There is another village. So they have to pass the settlements every morning and every afternoon to come for the school and to return for their home. So they need the help to be protected because they have to come through the settlements in the middle of the settlements. They have to be protected from the settlers. And because they was attacked many time, they was hospitalized many time from the settlers, um, violent.
MAX: The the children.
SAMIHA: The children, the children of the school, they beat them, they throw them a stone, they with a stick, they follow them with a car to try, try to drive on them. They're still children. They're really small. So we decide to take this responsibility as a young people university student and all these things that we have to deal with our daily life, with our daily family and with our studying and with the with the camp. So the camps start to be our second home that we do everything we do. It's every day like you start to connect it with our life. Somehow.
MUSIC: “Ervira”
MAX: OK. So can you. Tell me what happened to your brother Sami.
SAMIHA: Yes, it's a sad story. As I told you, that we are, uh, restorating the caves for the families. So we decide to build for them a bathroom.
MAX: At Sarura? Same place?
SAMIHA: Yeah. In the same village. So it's a big, uh, like, dangerous decision to build something in C Area. Because you're not allow as a Palestinian to build any things. So we start to build this. We would have to do it because no one would come to live in anywhere in the world without bathroom. So we have to encourage them and to build bathroom to to make their life easy. So we started to build this bathroom. One day. My brother was helping us to to build this bathroom he was. I told you that Sarura is the middle of the two illegal settlements and outposts. So the settlers used to pass through this village to connect this together, to go and return.
SAMIHA: So my brother was in the middle of the road and he was helping in bringing some stone and some stuff for the to build this bathroom. So there was a two settlers in a quad. Four by four that they was driving. So they was going to kill him they keep driving on him. He was really shocked and he don't know what he have to do. He started to run and he just they keep following him because they have this, uh, quad that can drive on the stone and the bumpy road. So he just while he was running, he fell down and his right leg was still in the road. So it's just they drive on his right leg two time. They make for him to crush in his right leg. They like drive on him and they far away and they ran away. So we just.
MAX: They drove over his leg. And then they went in reverse and they drove back.
SAMIHA: Yeah. Yeah. They drive the first time and they go back and drive again. So they make for him to crush on his right legs and then they just drive and they return for the settlements. So we was really shocked from that. And we was running for him. And, uh, when we came, Sami was not awake. And when he wake, he was such shouting from pain and he was really screaming. And we don't know what you have to do because we cannot move him because it's a bones and he was he was really shouting from pain and cannot do anything. We was like we was thinking our hands was cuffed. Like, we don't we don't know what we have to do.
SAMIHA: For sure we call the ambulance just when directly when the when they like the police, the army know that they do a checkpoint. And so the, uh, the ambulance was late one hour to come and to reach the.
MAX: Wait so the ambulance before it even reached you had to go through a checkpoint.
SAMIHA: They stop in the entrance of the village of Tuwani. That's lead for the.
MAX: So they made a flying checkpoint so they couldn't get so that ambulance wouldn't get to you.
SAMIHA: Yeah, they was late. So. So he was really late to come closer. Like one hour. He was on the crowd and shouting. And so they just came and they and they took him for Hebron hospital. And, uh, he have to wait two days until he do his surgery. And he was he's still two weeks in the hospital and he was at home for two months. He cannot walking until he was like. And after two months was not really very well walking.
SAMIHA: When Sami was attacked, I was thinking that now like the other guys will be scared and they will not keep going in the idea they will stop in this point. Just was to make me really proud. That when Sami went to the hospital they back and they keep working in the in the bathroom because they say this is the reason why Sami was in the hospital and why he was attacked. So it's our responsibility to complete what he was doing. And he will he will out. He will found the bathroom, already built. And they really do. What they will say and say. We came back and he found the bathroom was already built.
MAX: And how old was he when this happened?
SAMIHA: Eh, well, last year, uh, he was like around. Now he's like twenty. And how big was twenty. The same age of me now. Yeah.
MUSIC: “Ervira”
MAX: And how about can you tell me about your younger brother.
SAMIHA: Yeah. Hamudi. Yeah. Is, uh, fifteen years old. He have had experience with occupation army because he was arrested for three time. When he was 13. He was arrested 14 the same and fifteen the same. He's trying to be an activist from his children and life like he want to be an activist because my father is an active my grandmom is an active. Everyone in my family is active. So you want to be an activist while he was 15 years old and 14 and 13.
SAMIHA: The first time he was arrested, he was arrested in the camp where we work. In the cave where we work and where we live. So he was arrested without his parents for many of hours and he was interrogated in very bad way that it's make him scared during the night, because he's a child and he cannot understand that you had a policeman interrogate him for no reason. Because he is just sitting in a camp with his family and having his dinner. It's not doesn't make sense. That's what make my father call for him, a special doctor to speak with him and to deal with him.
SAMIHA: And, uh, the second one was fourteen years old, that he was in an action to, uh, to clean the road for the cars, for the people to come reach their own village. He was helping he was arrested for the second time. It was the same. He was interrogated for many hours.
SAMIHA: And fifteen years old. A few months ago, he was arrested with my father, with my uncle in the same time because they told them that you are trying to entering in the settlements. And when they took him, They let my father and my uncle come back and they keep him. They. He slept the night in Ofer jail and he say it was the worst night of my life because they bring him in a room, with a with another two prisoner, Palestinian prisoner. He say that there was a sound of water that is going tick tick it's to make them stressed. And he said there was a light that turn off and turn on, to like, it's just to make you crazy and looking what's going on and scared you. So then. And the next day. Hamudi say they bring for us some food, there was keep the handcuffed. He was stay until the morning with handcuffs. He told them, OK, I want to eat. Can you free my hand? Can you take it over because I want to eat. And they say no for sure. No, it's not my work. You can if you manage to eat, eat. If you don't manage, it's not my business if you eat or not. So he said that I was trying to eat with my hand was cuffed.
SAMIHA: And then they say, OK, now one hour we have to go for court and he say, OK. And then he put they put him in a car that is for especially for the prisoner. And he say it was really hard because everything's iron. I cannot like. When they was driving. And they have just a small window in the top of the car. And he was Hamudi, he really is one of the people that he he cannot still without breathe for a long time. So he was shouting that he want to breathe. So they opened for him a bit of the of these windows. And then they go to close it again and he say they was drive driving really, really slow because they know that him was in really bad situation in that car. He say that this is the most thing that I hated, that the car part when they was driving me for my court. And then I found myself in Qalandiya like checkpoint. They tell him, you have you don't have any court, so go home.
SAMIHA: And after this they raid my home to arrested him. They raid my home like after 3 weeks after they arrested him. And I was asking, what are you doing here, give me the order that you can raid my home and all these things. And he was not answering me any things. He was just looking in the house. And then Hamudi came when he saw all this thing and he stop him, really badly in the wall by his neck with his hand and the give me your ID. And he starts shouting on him and they say, stay calm. And he's still a child he don't have ID because he's under 18. He don't have an ID. He said, where is your father? And my father was around in the village. So he's also start to run and they don't accept that my father can enter. They do my home a closed military zone so no one can enter. And my father say it's my home, it's my family and the they have to be sure that he's my father. I say he's my father. And then we just take him inside. When they was going out, they told him in Hebrew like I hope to don't. It will be better for you to don't see you again. And he say Hamudi say just you are coming for my home. How like. You are coming for me. I'm not coming for you. What are you doing in my home. And he said just you will be lucky if I will not meet you again.
MUSIC: “Drone Birch”
SAMIHA: So this is my brother's story. And I was feeling really sad all this time that I saw that was happening for my family, for my brothers or for my family, my mom, how she feel when her sons or daughters be in like this dangerous situation, just we believe that it's all all this for the land for Palestine and we will succeed. The idea, by the way. Because the idea is idea and it will keep life and no one can kill any idea inside you. No one can stop it. So I believe in that because we believe in that we will keep going and we will never stop. Even that there was a lot of challenge and make us weak every day. Just don't know that all the challenge that they put make us strong because we are we are trying to end the occupation and I hope that it will happen one day.
MAX: I spoke to Samiha Huraini in the village of Tuwani in December 2019, and our conversation was originally released in January 2021. Samiha’s brother Sami -- the one she talked about who had his leg run over by settlers -- that’s the same Sami whose voice you heard at the very beginning of this episode.
Sami bore witness last Saturday, May 22, when settlers from the nearby outpost Havat Ma’on set fire to the fields near Tuwani, and tried to destroy the cave in Sarura that Samiha and the Youth of Sumud have been maintaining all this time. The next morning, Sami posted this video to Facebook.
SAMI More or less one hour ago, the Israeli occupation forces raided my village of Tuwani in the South Hebron Hills. In the campaign of arrests and raids of the home of the Palestinians, searching the homes… Until this moment, three Palestinians from the village got arrested. And we thought that they are leaving but it looks the operation of arrests is still going on in the village.
MAX: Unsettled is produced by Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, Ilana Levinson, and me, Max Freedman. Original music by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music in this episode from Blue Dot Sessions.
Special thanks to Yoshi Fields, who co-produced our original episode, “The Story of Sumud,” back in 2017, and to Oriel Eisner, Emily Hilton, Isaac Kates Rose, and everyone at the Center for Jewish Nonviolence who facilitated my trip to the South Hebron Hills last year.
If you like Unsettled, please take a moment to leave us a rating and especially a review on Apple Podcasts. And don’t forget to subscribe, wherever you get your podcasts, so you never miss an episode of Unsettled.
Amjad Iraqi: Palestinians Rising
Over the last two weeks, even in the face of state and mob violence, Palestinians have been organizing mass demonstrations on both sides of the Green Line: from Jerusalem to Nazareth to Ramallah. After decades of policy designed to keep the Palestinian people fragmented, they have taken to the streets in unison to demand radical change. What does this new Palestinian uprising look like? And where will it go next?
Over the last two weeks, even in the face of state and mob violence, Palestinians have been organizing mass demonstrations on both sides of the Green Line: from Jerusalem to Nazareth to Ramallah. After decades of policy designed to keep the Palestinian people fragmented, they have taken to the streets in unison to demand radical change.
What does this new Palestinian uprising look like? And where will it go next? Producer Ilana Levinson speaks to Amjad Iraqi, a writer and editor for +972 Magazine based in Haifa.
Unsettled is produced by Ilana Levinson, Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, and Max Freedman. Original music by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions.
Amjad Iraqi is an editor and writer at +972 Magazine. He is also a policy analyst at the think tank Al-Shabaka, and was previously an advocacy coordinator at the legal center Adalah. He is a Palestinian citizen of Israel, based in Haifa.
"Against the horror, Palestinians are still rising" (Amjad Iraqi, +972 Magazine, 5/13/21)
The Nation-State Law w/Amjad Iraqi (Unsettled, 7/24/18)
Spotify playlist: Unsettled essentials, May 2021
transcript
MAX FREEDMAN: We have seen horrific death and destruction across Israel-Palestine these last two weeks, especially in Gaza. But there has been another story happening at the same time that should not be overlooked.
Palestinians have been organizing mass demonstrations on both sides of the Green Line, from Jerusalem to Nazareth to Ramallah. After decades of policy designed to keep the Palestinian people fragmented, and in the face of daily state violence and mob violence, Palestinians have taken to the streets in unison to demand radical change.
What does this new Palestinian uprising look like? And where will it go next? My name is Max Freedman, and you’re listening to Unsettled.
Amjad Iraqi wrote about this renewed Palestinian solidarity in a recent piece called “Against the horror, Palestinians are still rising.” It was published in 972 Magazine, where Amjad is also an editor. We’ll link to that story in the show notes.
If you’ve been listening to Unsettled for a while, you might recognize Amjad’s name or his voice. We had him on the show almost three years ago to talk about the passage of Israel’s controversial “Nation State Law.”
Amjad is a Palestinian citizen of Israel, based in Haifa. He spoke to Unsettled producer Ilana Levinson last Thursday, May 20.
ILANA LEVINSON: I was hoping you could start by just describing what you're seeing throughout the West Bank and and what's on your mind in terms of these these uprisings or as you described a bit in your in your article as riots.
AMJAD IRAQI: Yeah, I mean, it's it's quite a complex picture in the end, the way that this kind of, you know, young uprising is emerging looks very different in different cities and different towns and, you know, from everywhere between sort of the Palestinian towns that are across Israel to the quote unquote, mixed cities like Haifa and Jaffa and Lydd and even to those in the occupied territories. But what these different kind of forms of these protests. What we've seen, or let's put it this way, we've seen quite a couple of common threads and common themes that go across all of them. The first is that these protests are really youth led. It's pretty extraordinary that for the most part, these young activists are really trying to almost resist or bypass the traditional leaderships, people like political parties or traditional figures or more prominent figures. They're trying to bypass them in order to assert themselves as the leaders of this movement. And it's not just about a generational thing because it's tied up with a political outlook and the political discourse, which is very present among the Palestinian youth here, which is very assertive of its Palestinian identity, of not trying to fragment itself between, you know, you know, those who are citizens of Israel or those who are under occupation. And you can feel that when you go to these protests, you can feel that vibrant youth, you can feel this desire and hunger for radical analysis of the oppression that they're facing. And the way that they're trying to mobilize these communities is really incredible.
AMJAD: This is the positive side of these protests. But, of course, these demonstrations are largely being faced by the full force of state violence. Inside Israel, for example, this is the first and foremost confrontations with the Israeli police, which are heavily militarized force. And you can see them in this full riot gear, even among even these young people, even in a city like Haifa where I'm living in, where they're even coming with horses and they're coming with stun grenades, even sort of like water cannons. You're really confronting some of the most some of the ugliest and brutal forms of state oppression. And, you know, you also have different degrees to how this is operating. But you're you know, this is like the most visual element of these demonstrations to see that kind of struggle going on in the streets and to see the youth really just go out in full force against the cops almost in a fearless way that hasn't really been seen in a long time. Young kids who've never been to a political protest in their life are showing up and are chanting these slogans, and aren't afraid to even get arrested. And these are very brutal arrests. And it's not to glorify it in any way, but that fearlessness is really showing. You can feel it on the street. You can feel it when you attend these demonstrations. You can feel it when you're talking to the people. You can tell that something's different and people are still trying to navigate it. But inside Israel, what we call like inside 48, it's been a very powerful motivator.
ILANA: Can you describe exactly what these tactics are, what the demonstrations look like? And I'm also I'm interested in your description of them in your piece, because you you. You use the word riot, and you acknowledge the complexity of that word and how politically charged it is, and I wonder why you chose to use that word.
AMJAD: Yeah, I know it's a very controversial it's a very controversial term, but I have to really give credit to some of the conversations that have been happening, especially around the Black Lives movement of last year, which really challenged us to rethink. It's not by any means the first time, of course, nor is it only in the U.S., but it really challenged us to break this sort of narrative that we've been forced into about nonviolence versus violent demonstrations. And it's not an issue about justifying violence in any way. But this dichotomy is often being determined by forces that are outside of the people who are trying to challenge oppression. And the blurred lines and the gray lines get sort of erased by this effort to say that if you want to be a legitimate protester, you cannot even so much as lift a finger on the cop who is brutally beating you and throwing you into the car. And somehow that police brutality has more legitimacy because it's part of the state. And this has been an integral part of especially international perceptions of Palestinian demonstrations, like, oh, look at them, they're throwing stones. Therefore, somehow it's justified to fire rubber bullets or live bullets or skunk water or to arrest them violently in this way. Like there's a very strange comparison that's made that inherently justifies the repression of the state. And so in trying to kind of take this word riot, which, you know, I still debate to this day, but it's it's it's try to continue that conversation that wants to break through that very false dichotomy.
AMJAD: In the end, you know, riots have always been an integral part of any movement. Even the civil rights struggle experienced these things. It wasn't just that people were purely nonviolent and peace loving and all these things that they're out there sometimes had to be some kind of defensive force. And again, it's not about justifying or not, but this is historical fact. And we saw this again with the protests last year where, you know, you had people even like burned the police station, one of the police stations down. I've forgotten which state, but it was a very symbolic image. And there were new questions being raised like, you know, what does it mean to even target an engine of state violence in that way? And it's a very complex question with no real answers but. But this is something that Palestinians are also now re-insisting here.
AMJAD: Because for the past few decades, we've almost been instructed to say, if you want to pursue your struggle, you have to pursue it nonviolently. But the barriers of the boundaries, excuse me, of nonviolence tend to be used against us and tend to almost immobilize us. And this is why these young youth are really kind of coming out. And, yes, you have some people, for example, who are confronting the police, who have some people who are maybe like burning garbage and like a garbage canister and somehow by people is a riot or violence. But and then the focus ends up moving to that rather than what the police are doing. What is the state doing? What are these lynch mobs that are roaming the streets doing? So to kind of try to reclaim that word in a way, to put it in its historical context and to say that you can't be clean cut about it. And in the end, if you're not focusing on the injustice that these people are fighting against and if you're not emphasizing that whatever violence may emanate from them, the violence that they're confronting is far more brutal than anything that they might produce. Again, not about justification or not. And yeah this is a very complex topic, but but serious questions that we need to be asking.
ILANA: Something that's interesting that I'm thinking about in in your comparison to the Black Lives Matter movement, especially over the summer, is the conversation between. People who are witnessing the uprisings over the summer and saying, well, we agree with your cause, but you're burning burning cop cars is not how you do it. And the response was, well, we've been nonviolently protesting for so long. You're just not listening. You're you're now you're paying attention because we're burning cop cars, you know? And so I'm wondering if there is a sort of similar analysis and how the uprisings that we're seeing in in Israel Palestine might reflect similarly.
AMJAD: It's very much so. And it kind of goes two ways. It's like it's only when we cause these, you know, quote unquote disturbances, it's only when we start straying from the line of what you define as nonviolence, that A, people pay attention to the people on the ground who are facing this oppression, and B, they pay attention to the most kind of explicit forms of state violence. Like, yes, you know, the protests and clashes with the police are very visual reminders that this exists. But what about the day to day forms of violence? What about the day to day forms of pressure. And it's sort of a natural kind of dilemma that a lot of activists and struggles face, like how do you keep that momentum and that attention when the violence is so, when it's the constant state of normalcy? And it's a very difficult question and we're certainly not the first ones. And this is, again, one of those things where the where the activists on the ground are saying, OK, if this is exactly how the world is going to respond, that's you know, we don't have anything to lose anymore. We're willing to push those boundaries and we're willing to break the terms which the international community has tried to assert on us. And so and so in this respect, it's it's almost like an experimentation that's going on by the protesters. To almost use this use this against against the watchers and to challenge them to say, like, I dare you to say that, you know, this, you know, quote unquote, riot is somehow more brutal than what the state is doing to us. I dare you to say that somehow the violence ends the moment we get off the streets. It's really these Palestinian youth trying to trying to put that challenge to to the observers. And again, this is really I think a lot of people really paid attention precisely to what was going on last year, because I think the conversation in the U.S., in the public discourse, in the media and the political discourse has changed drastically because people were forced to take this seriously. And it's a sad fact that, you know, it has to be taken to such extreme levels and at such high costs to the people on the streets, to the communities that are experiencing the state's violence. But if that's the way this is being taken seriously, then a lot of people are, you know, for better and worse, willing to put themselves on the line to make that happen. And time will tell if that will work in the grand scheme. But that's really where a lot of people in the Palestinian community are.
ILANA: And of course, we're seeing mob violence perpetrated against against. Palestinian citizens of Israel. Can you talk about that?
AMJAD: Yeah, this has been one of the most alarming features of this past two weeks of escalations. So in primarily in what we regard what are commonly called mixed cities, these are essentially historically Palestinian cities, which through processes of forced expulsion and ongoing gentrification and displacement, that they eventually become turn into like Jewish localities. So Jewish majority neighborhoods and so on, so forth. This is like Haifa, like Jaffa and Akka and Lydd. And what we witnessed, especially after sort of the confrontations in Gaza, in the south between Gaza and Israel, between Hamas and the Israeli forces, was that you essentially had these far right mobs roaming Arab neighborhoods and the Arab areas of these of these so-called mixed cities looking for Palestinian citizens to beat up, looking for Palestinian property like cars and homes to damage and destroy. There are people who were marking the doors of Palestine citizens even here in Haifa, you know, to give people the signal that there's an Arab family here, you can target them. These mobs were chanting racist racist slogans, including death to Arabs. And the police tend to be either joining them essentially in some of these acts of violence by invading people's homes, by firing stun grenades at Palestinian protesters and so on, or simply standing idly by and doing nothing. And this is, you know, doubly alarming for Palestinian citizens to know that not only are these mobs coming at you, but the authorities, which, you know, pose themselves as are to protect you were in fact, doing deliberately doing nothing about it and in fact, were part of the problem. And this was and this has really gripped or the fear that gripped Palestinian citizens in these places was really tremendous. People were almost terrified to come out to the streets. It really was a fear that I couldn't explain. We were having it like my family and I had it here in Haifa that at any moment that could be the potential lynch mob coming to our homes and to our into our areas.
AMJAD: As overwhelming as this fear was. It also produced some tremendous organization on the part of the Palestinian communities. So Neighborhood Committee started emerging to basically create almost like these self-defense groups. So it's like we couldn't you know, we couldn't trust the police to protect us. So we're going to take care of it ourselves. And they helped to kind of fend off sort of the mobs. The communities got together to try to make sure that anyone who was harmed or was vulnerable, like the elderly or with kids, you know, people gathered resources. They're even looking for, for example, therapists to help kids if they witnessed or experienced some forms of violence. Like it was amazing to see how the community tried to step up. And you had some we also had a range of variation of this. You know, some were kind of very, you know, like positive, community oriented. Some got like even sort of a little dangerous with certain, like groups or gangs who maybe took to the streets and were a bit more kind of, you know, like violent in their own ways and asserting their presence. But even within that spectrum, it was this response by the community to say we can't rely on the state. The state is very much targeted against us. And so we're going to look after ourselves. So it's you know, it's one of these, you know, out of a dark moment, something very, you know, enlightening really happened.
ILANA: There is something encouraging, albeit cynical, that I'm seeing within my own community, the American Jewish community. As far as American Jews are horrified to see this mob violence to happen against against Palestinian citizens of Israel because. They have always seen. Palestinians in the West Bank and Palestinians in Gaza as totally distinct from Palestinian citizens of Israel, they are often referred to as as Arab Israelis, sort of making that very deliberate. Distinction between the sort of. Enemy population and the the non Jewish minority, that's sort of seen as proof that that Israel is a liberal democracy. And so I think seeing this mob violence of Jews against Palestinian citizens of Israel is perhaps drawing the connection. For them that. Violence against Palestinians anywhere comes from a sort of rotten place within within the the theory of Zionism, and I'm wondering if you can speak to that and how we can sort of. Use this moment to to draw those connections for folks.
AMJAD: This question really hits the nail on the head, like as you're alluding to, you know, for a long time, the American Jewish community and even Jewish Israelis, you know, for them, the dilemma of Zionism, like you said, was along the green line was along that 1967 occupation. But what most people either did not realize or refused to accept is that the border, the borders of Zionism do not go along that sort of geographic armistice line of 1948 to 1967. The borders of Zionism and insofar as this land is concerned, is between every Jew and every Palestinian. Like there's a reason why the mobs were very confident and assertive to put themselves in Arab neighborhoods in these in these so-called mixed cities because they knew where we were, they knew who we were, and they were there specifically to assert themselves as supremacists. They were there on the streets to remind Palestinians that you are here at our mercy. And if we wanted to, we could crush you and we could remove you. And this was specifically a response to the fact that Palestinian citizens were making themselves heard, were going out into the streets alongside of the Palestinians. And so the state and the mobs and the media and all these authorities were literally telling Palestinian citizens, get back into your cages. That is what Zionism is today. It is the forced expulsions of people like in communities in Sheikh Jarrah. But it is now also the manifestation of the supremacist ideology against people, even with Israeli citizenship, saying, stay in your place, don't think of yourself as a native. You're here as a guest. And this is in the context, of course, in of Israel as frankly, a settler colonial state, which Zionist leaders knew very well. And yet somehow today and many Zionists are somehow allergic to the very word colonization and of settler colonialism, even though that's exactly what the founders envisioned, envisioned explicitly. That's still in continuity today.
AMJAD: And, you know, for American Jewish audiences, this is absolutely fundamental to realize. Yes, Zionism has a wide ideological spectrum. Yes, there are different streams. But at its premise, the way and especially the way it is manifested, it requires Palestinians to be inferior. It requires Palestinians to not allow their native-ness, their indigeneity to be recognized. And as we're seeing today, you know, from state to society to law and to public discourse. That Zionism will never allow equality, it can never allow full liberty, liberty for anyone who's outside the core ethno racial religious group. And Haifa again is the prime example of this, where this so-called, it's prominently known as a sort of coexistence city, which Jewish Israelis are surprised that this you know, that this outbreak has happened. But you can ask most Palestinian citizens and they're not surprised at all. They know the racism they see on the street. They know that their areas are being deliberately and racially gentrified. They know that there are absentee properties belonging to refugees back from 1948. And they know that at any moment's notice, someone come knocking on the door and say, get out. And someone can come knocking on the door, as they did last week, and arrest them. Or that these mobs can come back again and say, you better stay in your place and never say the word Palestinian. This is a Zionism that Palestinian citizens experience. Palestinian citizens of Israel. It's even a more extreme manifestation in the occupied territories. But here it's just as it's very severe. And this needs to be grasped by American Jews. And, you know, I understand the complexities and I understand the long history of this affinity to Zionism and what it means. But that is not what Zionism is today. Zionism is inherently and is being practiced as an oppressive force of racial domination, of apartheid, of colonialism, whether you're on this side of the Green Line or the other.
ILANA: And so how can. How can Palestinians? On every side of the Green Line. Fight this. This segregation from one another in order to be in solidarity right now.
AMJAD: We're discovering this as we speak. Again, what's been amazing about these these popular demonstrations is that. You know, there is much trying to challenge their traditional leaderships as they are challenging the Israeli state. They're trying to reimagine and and channel power differently to the communities that are on the ground. And, you know, with the kind of neighborhood groups that we're seeing, the grassroots activists sort of leading these protests, the discourse that they're articulating, they're trying to create this new path forward. And it's still in the very early stages. So there's still a lot of conversations going on about, you know, how do you channel this into some form of a leadership? How do we sustain this uprising? And these conversations are happening in person. They're happening over social media. The Palestinian speakers are coming out in local international media outlets. They are they are formulating almost like the groundwork for this new vision, for this new ecosystem to guide the path forward. And like I said, it's both to make sure that the Israeli state doesn't kind of go back to normal, but it's also to tell their national leadership that we're not doing things your way anymore. And that includes among Palestinian citizens of Israel, where it's been fascinating to see how grassroots activists are really pushing back against the traditional political parties that are running for the Knesset or the High Follow-Up Committee, which is an umbrella group that represents multiple kinds of groups in the Palestinian community in Israel, but which many see as sort of having a bygone politics, as being mostly like these old men who don't really have connections to the streets or to young people. And seeing this grassroots movement say it's no longer your turn, that now we're taking the mantle of this leadership. And time will tell if that can be channeled positively. Time will tell if that can really be fused into some kind of organizational movement that takes people forward. But already the victories happen just by restoring the consciousness. For the past few years, the fragmentation among Palestinians has been truly severe and it's been imposed by the Israeli state, it's been imposed by geography, and has been imposed even by the national leadership. And just the very fact now that Palestinians in Lydd are re-intertwining themselves with Palestinians in Ramallah, are re-intertwining themselves with Palestinians in Gaza and with the diaspora, it cannot be overstated that that that reawakening and Palestinian national identity across all the green lines across every border is something that I think will have very long lasting effects to come.
ILANA: Do you have a sense of what it is about this moment that's. That's so different, that's that's causing these these mass popular uprisings.
AMJAD: As always, there are many, many different factors. You know, I mean, in the end, this movement really originated in Jerusalem, where you had almost like two parallel and interconnected movements. One was around, of course, the neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah, whose Palestinian families are are being expelled by the state and by settler groups. And who have really been playing up an amazing fight to defend their homes and garner solidarity and attention to their struggle. And at the same time, there were these kind of attacks and infringements upon the upon Jerusalem's Old City at Damascus Gate and particularly the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound. And so, like these two things combined really helped to kind of reconnect Jerusalem's neighborhoods in a way that hasn't been seen for a very long time. And that kind of reinvigorated Jerusalem's centrality as a political force in the Palestinian community. This, I think, was one of the most sort of fundamental shifts that we haven't seen in a very, very long time. And it really mobilized in a way that hasn't been done in arguably like two decades. And so to have Jerusalem at its core and Jerusalem leading that movement, I think was the most powerful aspect that really boosted boosted this movement.
AMJAD: Now, there are obviously in many other interconnected factors. I mean, in the past few years, the Palestinian cause has really kind of gone off the radar for most international actors. Israeli apartheid has essentially been entrenched in such severe ways. There were supposed to be Palestinian elections this summer, which were canceled even ostensibly over Jerusalem, even though it was more like internal political dynamics within the ruling Fatah party. So all these dynamics certainly had a role to play. But I think this restoration of agency on the part of Jerusalem, which has been facing some of the most severe practices of Israeli violence and Israeli fragmentation and an attempt to de-Palestinianize the city. And to see, again, these young people, to see these new neighborhood committees, to see even Muslim worshipers for Al-Aqsa, for Damascus Gate come out in such full force, really powered this in a way that it hasn't been seen in a long time. And again, time will tell if that will continue to persevere, if the sort of grassroots collective institutions can keep people or keep the pulse raised among Jerusalem, Palestinian Jerusalemites to keep moving that movement ahead. But, yeah, I would say that that's the most core factor.
ILANA: I'm hoping I can end on a part of your piece that I. That kind of got me. Maybe I'll read one line of it. You're talking about moments of beauty and you're talking about, there's a video of. This line says, "Another one showed a Palestinian man breaking into a smile when his daughter, oblivious to the fact that her father was being arrested by police in his home, impatiently inquired him about her doll. Even in the midst of this chaos, these moments of beauty and resilience should not be forgotten." So. So maybe you could talk about what why it's so important that we not forget these moments of beauty.
AMJAD: Yeah, I mean, that video really encapsulates almost always that double edged sword of being a Palestinian under Israeli rule. I mean, in the end, you know, that that father was being arrested in his home by the police. And yet even somehow that still create that, you know, that beautiful moment of the daughter, you know, still just casually asking, "Where's my doll? Have you seen it?" It's. And that mixed feeling is very much the defining, it really defines, you know, that concept of like like Palestine suffering and resilience. But that's the way that we just have that we have to keep going through and keep, you know, surviving and maintaining our humanity as best as we can. You know, in the end, the Israeli regime is very intent on removing any sense of humanity among us. It's trying to crush us so much. It's trying to break us from our families like that, like that, father. It's trying to impose this trauma on children deliberately so that they're intimidated to even speak up about their identity or to even demand their rights, they need to fear the state. And this is really what we've been seeing over these over these past few weeks. It's this a full throated attempt by the state and its supporters to to restore terror in the minds of Palestinians? And this is why those you know, as hard as it is to have to crack those smiles, as hard as it is to kind of crack those dark jokes, which is a very Palestinian, very Palestinian feature, it's an absolute must. And, you know, that video, which was just one of many where, you know, like I even mentioned like another of like a kid who, you know, who threw his shoe right at the face of a helmeted officer. And I know that there are a lot of people who will say, like, well, that kid shouldn't have thrown his shoe at a helmeted officer. But for us, it's like, yeah, that kid definitely threw that shoe at that officer. And in many ways, he's absolutely justified to do so. And this is, again, this kind of. There's a new unapologetic ness. It's not a new one, but it's. There is a more assertive, unapologetic ness to say, yeah, if we're doing anything that you think is impolite, we we require that moment. We need that sort of catharsis. And again, it will never be anything compared to what the state, what the cops and what these mobs do to us. And so that beautiful moment is catharsis. That beautiful moment is being able to say that no matter what Israel has done to us, that we can still feel that humanity and we can still have those laughs and we can still have our little, our little jabs at at the state when we can. And it's vital. And you've seen it across the protests. You know, and I want to emphasize, especially for people abroad, because.
AMJAD: So much of Palestinian identity, the way it's perceived by people outside, is of this darkness is of suffering, and that is of this feeling of helplessness. And these really do exist. They're very present. And most of all, in places like Gaza, where the horror of bombardment, the horror of blockade is really a constant that consumes life so much. Even, you know, to fear lynch mobs in the neighborhood, in the neighborhood in Haifa can't begin to explain how how terrifying that is. But they still wake up the next day and say, I'll get back at that state. Like I'm not going to let them get to me. And I will still have a laugh with my friends and I will still love my family. And I will do whatever it takes to get our minds off the state, not to deny it, but to still keep that normality, that humanity. And so I want people abroad to really remember that. There is Palestinian joy, there is Palestinian beauty, and it will always, unfortunately, go hand in hand with that darkness, with that suffering. But that's also a key fundamental element of our Palestinian identity. [68.6s] And we hope that, you know, the movement that we're building now and wherever movements may come in the future, that those sort of tilted more to make sure that Palestinian joy and Palestinian happiness and Palestine fulfillment is the more dominant feeling rather than darkness and suffering.
ILANA: Hm. That reminds me of I don't know if you've seen this picture. There's this photograph of of. These men in Gaza sitting on. On couches in a home where the where the walls have been blasted off the building and they're just sort of sitting and some of them look sad, but some of them are smiling at each other. And it's it reminds me of what you're talking about. There's there's the sort of it's a dark joke like what you're talking about.
AMJAD: It very much is. And just to even give like a personal example in my neighborhood over the past few days, you know, despite the fact there's been the war down in Gaza and despite the fact that, you know, mobs were almost threatening to come to our neighborhood, we still had a wedding, like with loud Palestinian music, you know, a live band that was singing full throated in Arabic and there were cheers and everything. And and a lot of people were you know, we always had these, like, mixed feelings, like on the one that's like, what are you doing? You know, there's just absolutely no violence, there's chaos, there's, no one feels safe. And, you know, are you calling these lynch mobs to our neighborhood? What are you doing? But then there's the other hand where it's like, you know, either bravely or foolishly or whatever you want to say. You know, these families and these people are saying, we're not going to let these people intimidate us, you know, we're not going to let these mobs take away even the most basic essence, you know, of two people getting married, families getting together, because, you know, you can put in many different lenses. But to say that we're not going to let that get in the way of the way we want to live our lives, and we can't let the state and this colonial context rob us of those most basic experiences. So there is always kind of, again, this back that mixed, double edged things exactly like you said, that there's a dark joke that you have to absorb in order to get by. And it's it burdens us, but it's also the way that we thrive and it really toughens up our skin. And it really I think it makes, you know, Palestinians like many other oppressed groups, it really makes us extraordinary in incredible ways. And, you know, I really hope that down the line that, you know, that yin and yang of our identity, that in the yang of our experiences, which will always be part of it in some way, but that, again, we can make that lighter part just a little bit stronger. And that's really what Palestinians are asking for. We don't want the dark side to keep consuming us so much. And if it does, we need the support of people outside to back us up, just to remind everyone that we do have that light side and we are fighting for our lives. In order to bring that joy and happiness, to make that the dominant force.
MAX: Unsettled is produced by Ilana Levinson, Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, and me, Max Freedman. Original music by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions.
We’ve put together a Spotify playlist of Unsettled episodes, including this one, that can help you better understand recent events in Israel-Palestine and their context. You can find a link to that playlist in the show notes. And I hope you’ll share it with friends and family who are looking for information and open to new perspectives.
If there’s anything you wish we would make an episode about, feel free to reach out to us. Write us an email at unsettledpod@gmail.com, or send us a message on Instagram or Twitter.
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Politicized Pain
When violence erupts in Israel-Palestine, talking in public about Palestinian suffering is often met automatically with an assertion of Israeli suffering — as if one somehow cancels out, or even justifies, the other. It feels like compassion has become a scarce commodity. How do we grieve publicly without negating the experience of the “other side"?
This episode is not an expert interview, it's a conversation between two friends: one American, one Israeli. Unsettled producers Ilana Levinson and Asaf Calderon discuss empathy and anger, power, trauma, and responsibility.
When violence erupts in Israel-Palestine, talking in public about Palestinian suffering is often met automatically with an assertion of Israeli suffering — as if one somehow cancels out, or even justifies, the other. It feels like compassion has become a scarce commodity. How do we grieve publicly without negating the experience of the “other side"?
This episode is not an expert interview, it's a conversation between two friends: one American, one Israeli. Unsettled producers Ilana Levinson and Asaf Calderon discuss empathy and anger, power, trauma, and responsibility.
Unsettled is produced by Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, Max Freedman, and Ilana Levinson. Original music by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions.
“Want to help Israelis? Become an anti-Zionist” (Asaf Calderon, +972 Magazine, 5/19/21)
“What it’s like to have a Jewish terrorist in the family” (Asaf Calderon, Haaretz, 5/3/17)
Spotify playlist: Unsettled essentials, May 2021
TRANSCRIPT
ILANA LEVINSON: Watching the violence unfold in Israel-Palestine from afar brings up a lot of emotions. And we all respond differently to them. For me, I make this podcast you’re listening to. But I also argue with people in Facebook comments. Might not be healthy, but it’s what I do.
As I go back and forth with people who feel differently than I do, I’ve noticed a common thread in these debates. Bringing up Palestinian suffering, or fears, or pain is automatically met with an assertion of Israeli pain. As though what Israelis are going through right now somehow cancels out, or maybe even justifies what’s happening to Palestinians.
It’s almost like compassion has become a commodity, and a scarce one at that. How do we grieve publicly without negating the experience of the “other side.”
I’m Ilana Levinson and you’re listening to Unsettled.
I've been talking about what's been happening over the past week a lot with my fellow Unsettled producer Asaf Calderon. And in these conversations, we've also started reflecting on how Asaf relates to his upbringing in Israel. For those who don't know us, I'm an American Jew, raised outside of Philadelphia. Asaf is an Israeli Jewish activist and social worker, who moved to the United States in 2016. What you're about to hear isn't an expert interview, it's a conversation between two friends.
ILANA: Asaf, what's it like to be an Israeli person in America right now?
ASAF CALDERON: It's it's it's a. it's really weird, it's really strange and I am, I mean, you know, it's been it's been almost a week of this already, I think right. And at the beginning when it just started, I was sort of going, I was going crazy. I was surprised by how crazy I was feeling. I used to live in Tel Aviv and I have been through two of these like missile attacks on Tel Aviv. And it was like 2012, 2014 and when I was there, it just sort of like I mean, you don't accept it. I didn't accept it. I protested against it. But I also the just the sheer volume of the absurd, of the insanity didn't get to me emotionally as much as it is now like. it sheds it sheds a whole new light on my entire life before.
ASAF: I'm discovering new things about myself and about my relationship to to Israel, because when when you're there you just like you have to disassociate and now I don't have to do that. So I get to feel the entire range of my emotions. And, I’ve never lived outside of Israel before I came here in 2016, and so it was the only home that I knew was Israel and more specifically, it was Tel Aviv. And I sort of felt like it was my safe zone. And now I look back at it and I'm like, it was so crazy that I thought that. I was talking about it with my therapist and the thing that without even thinking about it came out of my mouth. Was that like I feel like I have escaped hell. That I am now only starting to realize just how much it was hell.
ILANA: So can you talk about what a typical day looks like when Israel and Hamas are in the midst of this kind of fighting.
ASAF: So, I mean, first of all, I would say that my experience was so mild, like compared to obviously compared to people in Gaza, but also compared to Israelis that are living like close by to Gaza. You sort of go about your day and then there is these alarms that go off and can get you at work, can get you at home. And you go to the stairwell because that's that's just like the instructions that you have to get as far away from external walls and windows, because that's the thing about these Hamas missiles. But they're basically all they're such weak missiles that if they hit your wall, they most likely they're going to like, you know, they might break your wall, they might go through that wall, but probably not much further than that. They are definitely not going to take down your your building. So if you're in the stairwell. You're likely going to be safe or at least safer. And like newer buildings in Israel, all new buildings, the apartments have a bomb shelter, basically like one of your rooms in the apartment. Usually it’s like a storage room or it can even be like a bigger room, like one of the children's rooms or something like that, is a bomb shelter. So it's got these like the walls are like fortified with steel or whatever. And the the window is this, like, hatch thing. I used to live in a bomb shelter for a while. I wanted to pay less rent and I lived with other people and it was like, I'm just going to live in a bomb shelter and and you don't think about it. It's just life. The buildings have bomb shelters. And the word that we use for basement, like there's a Hebrew word for basement, the Hebrew word for basement is martef, but many people will just say miklat which means shelter because it's obvious that you use your basement as a bomb shelter. And. The odds of anything hitting you are extremely, extremely low, so you it's it's almost ritualized you sort of like go to the stairwell, and you meet your neighbors there, and it just is sort of like this like surreal experience, and then you hear a boom. And then you just go back to whatever it is you were doing and. And that's just this like sort of like a surreal ceremony of it. Then. All the all the while, you know the IDF is heavily bombing Gaza and people are dying and and also in other parts of Israel so like by Gaza, like Sderot. These other towns that are close to Gaza, the danger is much more real. They have just so many missiles that they have to be into the bomb shelters all day long and. Um. And Israelis die, usually Israelis die, but people dying and the news sort of talks about them each as a person and they tell you something about them. Not just how old they were and what their name is. Sometimes the news say how many Palestinians were killed. It's not unusual to sort of Google it. It's just it's like endless sort of list of names of children and women and men and. They have no faces, you don't know until you don't know anything about them, just know that they are dying. Um, and. And then it ends and you’re like. Why does it end now? Like, why didn't we end it yesterday? Yeah, it’s. That's what it is.
ILANA: So you and I have been talking a lot and struggling together with this concept of politicized pain. Yeah. Which is a concept that I can't stop thinking about. Yeah. And I and I can't stop thinking about it because. I grew up with this conversation and this narrative about how how difficult it is to be an Israeli because of the reality that you're you're describing and the response. The conclusion of of. These stories about how horrifying it is to have to have your basement be a bomb shelter. The conclusion is always aren't Palestinian people awful? And it's terrible that we have to kill them, but we have to kill them and and and they have to die for us to be safe. And so now what I'm noticing is that whenever. People talk about Israeli pain, my association is unfortunately with demonizing Palestinians and with justifying Palestinian pain, and I I don't I don't want that to be my association with Israeli pain. I want my association with Israeli pain to only be compassion. And I I want to know how to maintain my humanity through all of this.
ASAF: Right. I mean, yeah, I mean. The pain is very real. Like the pain is so real. And I'm even sometimes struggling with, like, sort of comparing the pain, because I sort of go back and forth honestly, like I'm like, well, the Palestinians like they suffer so much more, which is definitely true, it's true. Right like. We sit in bomb shelters and we send our kids to the army and we, you know, like like we fucking we suffer. And it's it's no way to live. And it's insane. But we don't face the same existential horror that Palestinians are experiencing, especially in Gaza, but not only. We don't face the same, like helplessness that Palestinians are experiencing when they just like they don't have control over their own lives in a way that is unfathomable to us. And, you know, and like the endless humiliations of the occupation, like we don't we don't we don't even know like we don't go through that at all. But but we suffer. And. And the thing about pain, the thing about suffering is that it's unquantifiable, like you can't quantify it, you can't count it. t's incomparable, it's incomparable like Palestinian pain and Israeli pain are incomparable because the the power difference is just so great. So. You know, all of that is to say, like, it makes it really hard to talk about Israeli pain because it's sort of incomparable to Palestinian pain, and you want to center Palestinian pain because it's so important. I mean, it's it's so important, I think, to center Palestinian pain because, like. It's just it's ignored, it's ignored in Israel and it's ignored in the United States, like nobody's talking about it. And like you just sometimes you get these, like, numbers, but you don't get the stories and you don't get the faces and you don't get to actually experience and empathize with people's actual pain. And that's what it means to be colonized, to be, to be, to be occupied is you’re dehumanized. And so your pain is also dehumanized. It’s so important to talk about Palestinian pain. Then how do we talk about Israeli pain? how do we talk about Israeli pain without taking space from Palestinian pain? That's that's that's one difficulty. And the other difficulty is how do we talk about Israeli pain without playing into the the hasbara of the Israeli regime? How do we talk about the Israeli pain without it serving the regime?
ILANA: Right. Because, you know, you and I are people with extensive experience with therapy. And to me, when I hear people talk about comparing pain, my first instinct is like, that's not useful. It's not useful to talk about, it's not useful to talk about comparing two people's experiences of pain. The only way to address pain is compassion and to give space to it. And yet. The pain of both Palestinians and Israelis is used as a tool, and it's and it's it's very public, this pain is extremely public in a way that if you if you. If you show compassion publicly. Then you're speaking politically.
ASAF: Right, and I mean. I mean, I don't know about you, but like for me at least, like it's so hard to even access these these feelings of compassion, or at least it was hard for for a very long time. I think part of why it's so hard for me to to access these feelings of compassion is that it's just like being in Israel, during these escalations, during these like bombings of Gaza is is terrible for another reason, which is that. So many people are so full of hate. I mean, I just don't have another way to put it. It's like they're so full of hate and so many people support these these bombings out of just like pure like revenge and sometimes even just like pure like genocidal, like ideology. Some people want to make them suffer because they deserve it. Some people just want to kill all of them. Some people would say that, like, that's the only way that they understand. There's just so much of this violence. It's not just in the regime, it's in people's hearts. And I'm not saying everyone is like that, but it's so prominent.
ILANA: Yeah, and I think, you know. Those kinds of people who are who are. The people you're talking about who are genocidal are also talking about pain. You know, they're they're only talking about Israeli pain, but they're no less correct. That that's bad and.
ASAF: Their pain is also real, the pain is also real, but it's but it's so hard for me to feel empathy for them. And and I'm not even saying that like all Israelis are like that. I'm not trying to demonize Israelis, but it's like even the Israelis who are not genocidal, generally support these bombings. So I think, the bottom line is like Israelis as a people, we don't just support the regime, we are. We are we are holding the regime. We are the regime. I mean, I think that, like one thing that I've been really struggling in order to in order to feel this empathy this past week, I have done this sort of like the sort of like logical step of separating us Israelis from the regime being like there is Israel. And then there are the Israelis. And Israel is screwing us over like the Israeli regime, the the Israeli state is like fucking over the Israeli people, and that is true. I still think that's true. But I think one thing that I have moved from is trying to say that is trying to to see these things as separate as in like. We are not the regime's pawns. I mean, that would be easier. It would be easier to imagine us as the regime’s pawns.
ASAF: When I'm saying that the regime is screwing us over, what I'm actually saying is that we are screwing ourselves over, It's it's it's sort of hard for me to, I guess, put into words like I think how much like being Israeli is associated with the state of Israel. Like, I think one thing that is so central to to being Israeli above all else. Is serving in the military and. When I was growing up and I was a teenager then, I was sort of considering if I should go serve in the military or not, there was this campaign that was saying a true Israeli doesn't dodge the draft. And so I. I internalized that and I sort of like came to the conclusion that, like, I'm not really a true Israeli if I'm not serving in the military and I didn't serve in the military, I actually chose not to serve in the military. And I really sort of internalized that. And. In a way, I don't think that I don't think it's wrong, like I think being Israeli the way that Israel is now, it means being a soldier, even if you're not literally a soldier like you have this like duty to defend Israel, even if it's like if it means like defending it, like on Twitter.
ILANA: But I mean, the way that we got to this place, we're talking about what a true Israeli means is, is, is because we're talking about how to sort of separate. Defending an Israeli person's right to live and to live without having to have your basement be a bomb shelter without having to run from rockets. Separating that from defending Israel's right to do whatever it wants. And so what does what does that say? What is your analysis about about who is a true Israeli say about about that system.
ASAF: I think all of that is to say that, like, it's really hard for me to feel that compassion when I know that, like Israelis are choosing to sort of like uphold this regime, but I think we need to let ourselves feel that compassion, feel that pain. Knowing that. Like. Knowing that. Knowing that. It's. I don't know, like…
ILANA: Well, it seems to me that it's the dichotomy that allows for the public conversation about pain to be such that if you show compassion or one quote unquote side, Israelis or Palestinians, then you are defending the the choices of of that side’s military.
ASAF: Right, absolutely, I mean, I think that, like, we we really need to stop doing that and we need to stop buying that. I think it's not only important that we let ourselves feel this compassion because it's real, I think it's also important to politicize it. I do think that it makes sense to politicize pain. I think it's important to politicize pain because it's political. It's the pain is a result of political choices made by the Israeli regime and. But and so by extension, by the Israeli people, it's choices that we make that are the that causes this pain. And that doesn't mean to I'm not saying that in order to sort of like because it kind of sounds like, you know, like I have no compassion because it's like, well, you know, it's it's sort of like blaming us for like.
ILANA: This is this is where I'm most challenged because because it honestly does remind me a little bit of the of the argument that people will make that, oh, it's so sad that that Palestinians are dying, but they're dying at the hands of their own government.
ASAF: Right. But, yeah, I mean, you know, it's it is kind of actually very similar. But I think, like, the way that I approach it is not to blame us. It’s like. We are making shitty choices. And we're making shitty choices because we’re hurt. Because we've been hurt, because we've been hurt even before we got there like we are. The. Like, we we carry pain form from the pogroms and we carry pain from the Holocaust and. And so we make shitty choices like we we make choices based on like knee jerk reactions to to trauma and we are retraumatizing and retraumatizing ourselves constantly. And it's this like cycle. And I'm not saying that to take away our responsibility for these choices because they are choices. Of course we're responsible but the fact that we're responsible. It doesn't mean that, like I, I have no compassion for us. And I think part of why I'm really trying to speak in the ‘us’ here, by the way, and not in the them, like I'm the grandson of Holocaust survivors and I am like, I don't know, like I have also been through this like like missile attacks and like, I'm fucking traumatized and and like. It's not I'm not still probably making shitty choices because of that, you know, and. So it's not like it's not so much being like. You made bad choices, and so you deserve it, it's you made bad choices, you don't deserve it because no one deserves this. And how are we helping you stop making bad choices or how are we making ourselves stop making bad choices?
ILANA: Right, and this is I mean, it's interesting to to hear you navigate who you're speaking to.
ASAF: Yeah.
ILANA: Because I feel like I'm navigating that all the time, I and and the truth is that you and I have different orientations.
ASAF: Yeah
ILANA: I mean, you have a different orientation then than an Israeli person who was in the army even. I mean, we all have have different different affiliations and and experiences. But the truth is that I'm not Israeli at all. Right. I'm I'm, I'm just not. And I honestly, when people say to me, you have no idea what it's like, you don't live here.
ASAF: Yeah, I mean, like, thank God you don't. But I mean, I think something that's really important is like always has to be said, is that you don't need to know what it's like in order to know what's right. There is it's another it's another related manipulation to be like you don't experience this and therefore you don't know what's going on. But I mean, you know what's going on. You see the bombs falling. You know what's going on. In many ways, because I’m Israeli, I think it's harder for me to feel this empathy than it is to some of my American Jewish friends. Because you guys you have been raised to. I mean, it's so weird because you've been raised to love us. You were raised to to adore us, you were raised to care about us and like. And so and so I think it comes it's probably comes so so natural to so many American Jews to feel compassion towards Israelis. And and what I'm feeling is I'm feeling like I'm I'm looking at these people that I feel like have rejected me because I didn't serve in the army and because, like, I I don't know, like I hold, like, beliefs that like they, you know, like most people don't accept. And there was a long time in my life like, you know, years, I think when when I was like, well fuck all these people. And that's not I mean, I'm not proud of that. Like it was. It was immature and it was it was bad and it was without any empathy, but that’s, I mean, I was like that. And I don't want to be like this anymore, and I'm trying to, like, fight it.
ILANA: So, I mean, I don't think we're here to fix this problem, but, just in case we might. I mean, what what what what does it look like? I mean, I. So I have this friend who I look up to and I admire and he recently said to me. Listen it. It just feels like there's a lack of compassion for Israeli people who are going through what we're going through.
ASAF: Yeah
ILANA: And. That's. I don't. I don't want to have that impact on people, so what how how how do I get my humanity back? Like, how do I how do I stop? How do I how do I get out of the cycle? Where. My. My experience of. Distributing compassion is associated with a political affiliation.
ASAF: I think it starts. I think, at least for me, I think it starts with like understanding that you can have compassion towards someone that is doing something really bad. Like you can, you can. You can have compassion to someone and criticize them. You can have compassion to someone and be mad at them also at the same time.
ILANA: But publicly? I mean, that's.
ASAF: Yeah.
ILANA: This conversation is happening in the public sphere.
ASAF: Yeah. We need to find a way. To to be public about it. We need to find a way to really put it out there that Every drop of Israeli blood that spilled is preventable and that it is the responsibility of, that it's our responsibility as Israelis to prevent it. And it doesn't mean that it's not painful, on the contrary. Like, it's sort of like the more I think about it, like the more I feel that just it being so preventable, making it even more painful, but it just so mixed with, like anger that it's really hard to get to. But I think we must like I think we must like we must get to the point where we can. We can be angry at someone and still feel compassionate about them, and one thing that I think is that like I mean, I'm just thinking about like how how so many people care about Israelis. And I think. I think it's a problem for you if you care so much about Israelis and you don't care about Palestinians, I think you should start caring about Palestinians. But I don't think you should stop caring about Israelis. I think I think it's great that you care about Israelis. If you care about us so much, help us understand that we are harming ourselves.
ASAF: We're killing ourselves. We're just killing ourselves. Grieve that, like grieve that with me, you know, like like grieve with me the. The pain of knowing that we are our own worst enemy. And and how tragic it is. And then fight it. That's it.
ILANA: Asaf recently published a piece in +972 Magazine about Israel’s exploitation of Jewish pain to justify violence toward Palestinians. It’s called “Want to help Israelis? Become an anti-Zionist.” You can read it at 972mag.com
Unsettled is produced by Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, and me, Max Freedman and me, Ilana Levinson. Our theme music is by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music in this episode from Blue Dot Sessions.
If you’re looking for more context for what’s happening in Israel-Palestine, check out our new Spotify playlist to help make sense of this moment. We’ve taken a few episodes from our back catalog that directly speak to some of what’s happening right now. You can find a link to that playlist in the show notes, and I hope you’ll share with friends and family members who are looking for more information and context and storytelling as the violence continues to escalate.
If you liked this episode of Unsettled, leave us a rating or review on Apple podcasts. And be sure to subscribe, wherever you get your podcasts.
Shaul Magid: The Life and Afterlife of Meir Kahane
Meir Kahane is one of the most polarizing figures in modern Jewish history. His Jewish Defense League was labeled a terrorist group by the FBI. His KACH party was banned from the Knesset for racism. Kahane was assassinated in 1990, but his name and ideas live on.
Kahanist mobs have recently marched through the streets of Israeli cities chanting “Death to Arabs” and attacking random Palestinians. A Kahanist politician was blamed by Israel's Police Commissioner for inciting a new intifada. What is Kahanism, who was Meir Kahane, and how did the ideas of such an extremist figure become, in many ways, mainstream?
Meir Kahane is one of the most polarizing figures in modern Jewish history. His Jewish Defense League was labeled a terrorist group by the FBI. His KACH party was banned from the Knesset for racism. Kahane was assassinated in 1990, but his name and ideas live on.
Kahanist mobs have recently marched through the streets of Israeli cities chanting “Death to Arabs” and attacking random Palestinians. A Kahanist politician was blamed by Israel's police chief for inciting a new intifada. What is Kahanism, who was Meir Kahane, and how did the ideas of such an extremist figure become, in many ways, mainstream?
In this episode, producer Max Freedman speaks to Shaul Magid, professor of Jewish Studies at Dartmouth College and author of the forthcoming book, Meir Kahane: The Public Life and Political Thought of an American Jewish Radical.
Unsettled is produced by Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, Max Freedman, and Ilana Levinson. Original music by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions.
Shaul Magid is Professor of Jewish Studies at Dartmouth College and Kogod Senior Research Fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute of North America. Author of many books and essays, his two latest books are The Bible, the Talmud and the New Testament: Elijah Zvi Soloveitchik’s Commentary to the Gospel, and Piety and Rebellion: Essay in Hasidism, both published in 2019. His new book Meir Kahane: The Public Life and Political Thought of an American Jewish Radical will be published with Princeton University Press in October, 2021. He is presently working on a project understanding contemporary Jewish scholarship on antisemitism through the lens of critical race theory.
Shaul Magid, Meir Kahane: The Public Life and Political Thought of an American Jewish Radical (Princeton University Press, 2021)
Josef Federman and Joseph Krauss, “Radical rabbi’s followers rise in Israel amid new violence” (Associated Press, 5/14/2021)
“Police chief said to blame far-right lawmaker Ben Gvir for ‘internal intifada’” (Times of Israel, 5/14/2021)
Spotify playlist: Unsettled essentials, May 2021
TRANSCRIPT
MEIR KAHANE: And I'm here to, first of all, to point out to American Jews that the problem of the West Bank is an insoluble one. If we keep on thinking in terms of coexistence, the Arabs believe it is their country. I understand the Arabs. I respect the Arabs. There's no coexistence possible with them. They have to leave. [00:02:32][21.1]
MUSIC: “The Telling”
MAX FREEDMAN: That’s the voice of Meir Kahane, one of the most polarizing figures in modern Jewish history.
Kahane first became infamous in the United States in the late 1960s for starting a paramilitary organization called the Jewish Defense League. The JDL was later classified by the FBI as a terrorist group.
In the early 1970s, Kahane moved to Israel, where he started a political party called KACH. KACH was eventually banned from the Knesset, the Israeli Parliament, for being too racist, and Kahane himself was expelled.
In 1990, Kahane was assassinated in a Manhattan hotel. But his name lived on.
In 1994, a follower of Kahane, Baruch Goldstein, massacred 29 Muslim worshippers in the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron.
Earlier this year, Itamar Ben-Gvir, who once had a framed photograph of Baruch Goldstein hanging in his home, was elected to the Knesset.
And earlier this month, Itamar Ben-Gvir opened an office in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah, as a clear provocation to Palestinians demonstrating against the displacement of several families from their homes.
Since then, Kahanist mobs have marched through the streets of Israeli cities chanting “Death to Arabs,” and attacking random Palestinians and journalists. The Times of Israel reported that Israel’s Police Commissioner blamed Itamar Ben-Gvir for inciting a new intifada.
What is Kahanism, and who was Meir Kahane? What did he believe, and why? How did the ideas of such an extremist figure become, in many ways, mainstream?
This is Max Freedman, and you’re listening to Unsettled.
MUSIC: Unsettled theme
MAX: For this episode, I spoke to Shaul Magid, a professor of Jewish Studies at Dartmouth College and the author of a forthcoming book, Meir Kahane: The Public Life and Political Thought of an American Jewish Radical.
The book is not a conventional biography. As a scholar of Jewish thought, Shaul is most interested in how Kahane’s ideas evolved and informed Jewish culture, politics, and religion in the United States and Israel in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s.
But I wanted to start our conversation in the present.
MAX: We're talking on Tuesday, May 18th, and we are in the middle of what is arguably the worst escalation of violence in Israel Palestine that we've seen certainly the most widespread since 2014, maybe longer. And for the last couple of years leading up to the moment that we're at now, you've certainly seen a lot of liberal American Jews raising the alarm about the mainstreaming of what are referred to as the Kahanists in Israeli politics and. I'd like to start by asking you who who are the Kahanists, who are we talking about when we talk about the Kahanists in Israel? And what kind of a role do you see them as playing in getting us to this moment and also in what's actually playing out in the streets?
SHAUL MAGID: A good question. Well, officially, when people refer to the Kahanists, they're speaking about a small group of people that have coalesced around a new political party called Religious Zionism, which is a kind of a break off from some of the other right wing parties. And there are a number of people, one in particular, Itamar Ben-Gvir, who is now a a Knesset member who espouses the kind of ideology of Meir Kahane. But then there are other people that are kind of kind of around him, Bezalel Smotrich and a bunch of others who who don't necessarily identify with being disciples of Meir Kahane, but in many ways espouse very similar, a similar kind of ideology in regard to the relationship between the state and the Arab population. But but I think it's important to note that I mean, I personally find Kahanist ideas really throughout what is the center-right and right of the Israeli political spectrum, even with people who would never identify as being Kahanists because of his reputation and because of of of the very particular kinds of solutions that he was suggesting. But I think that his basic worldview and his understanding of the relationship between the Jewish state of the Arab population, I think that Kahanism, I should say, is much more widespread than the Kahanists per say.
MAX: So how would you define Kahanism, what is that ideology?
SHAUL: Well, it's difficult, it's difficult to pinpoint. I think there are two things. I think one is the ideology of Kahane and the other one are the solutions that Kahanists suggested. And the third thing would be that the tactics Kahane wanted to use in order to achieve his goals. So in terms of the the solutions that Kahane suggested and the tactics, that's something that's limited to a fairly small group of people. Meaning that the relationship between the Jews and the Arabs in Israel is a zero sum game, that Arabs either have to recognize the superiority of the Jews and the special nature of the Jews in the land of Israel or and they could continue to live as second class citizens or they have to leave. So he was one of the people that was espousing this thing that was called the long time ago, this idea of transfer of basically transferring Palestinians out. And, of course, the tactics was very different forms of militarism in order to make it uncomfortable for the Arabs to be there. You see that among the price tag movement, which is a small movement of radical right wing settlers who are bent on destroying Arab property and houses and causing physical damage and so on and so forth and other and other groups as well, like Lehava, which is a group that's not specifically focused on the political reality of the Arabs, but the cultural reality, trying to separate the Arabs from Jews, trying. You know, one of the first things that Kahane did when he came to Israel in nineteen seventy one when his one of his first political acts was trying to trying to promote legislation prohibiting Jewish and Arab dating. Right. So it's not just a political project. That's a much larger cultural project. And Lehava is an organization that is really focused on the separation of Jews and the Arab population. But then you have something different, which is a kind of worldview, which is for Kahane, that Zionism is about power and it's about the power of the Jews and it's about the Jews' right, historical right and theological right, to dwell in all of the land of Israel and that the Arabs really have no right to be there. They live there, but they have no rights to be there. So they only can stay there if they're willing to acknowledge that kind of second class status. And that particular idea, I think expressed in all kinds of different ways is much more widespread than the kind of the solutions or the tactics of Kahanism.
MAX: So how many of the people that you've discussed would actually call themselves disciples of Kahane or have a picture of Kahane?
SHAUL: Well, I think there are some. I mean, Itamar Ben-Gvir is one, right? Another guy named Gopstein is another. And there are groups of people I don't know which really would consider himself a disciple of God. I mean, I think Ben-Gvir has a picture of Kahane in his office. So there are a small group of people within the religious Zionism party that are openly Kahanists. But again, I think I think the I think it's it's it's a mistake to really limit Kahane's influence in terms of worldview just to those small group of people.
MAX: So let's back up a little bit, who was Meir Kahane? How did he become? I mean, I think it's I don't I don't know if you. Is it fair to say that for a few years, in the late 60s and early 70s, he was really maybe the most famous American rabbi, for better or worse? How did that happen?
SHAUL: Well, yeah. I mean, most famous. Most infamous. I'm not really sure. Certainly, he was he was incredibly well known, I think, from probably 1968 when he founded the Jewish Defense League in response to the anti-Semitism that emerged from the Ocean Hill-Brownsville Brooklyn school strike, which was really a tremendous school. I mean, it brought the entire New York City school system to a halt.
MUSIC: “Clay Pawn Shop”
MAX: Ocean Hill-Brownsville and the teachers’ strike is a huge story. We don’t have time to get into it here, but if you want to learn more, I happen to have produced another podcast called School Colors. And in the first season of School Colors, we spent two episodes on Ocean Hill-Brownsville. (The JDL makes a guest appearance.) You can find a link to School Colors in the show notes.
SHAUL: So from that point, from around May or June 68 until probably late seventy one seventy two. He was a very popular among a certain group of people, infamous, among others, because of his his basic advocacy of militancy and violence to protect Jews. In a certain sense, he was an interesting case of somebody who used the tactics of the radical left at that point. I'm talking about black nationalism, Black Panthers, the SDS, the Weather Underground. But he was using them for the purposes of what we could call the reactionary right. And in particular to foster Jewish pride. So in a certain way, the JDL was a an organization that was in some way, in some way mirrored the Black Panthers, I mean Kahane basically calls the JDL Jewish Panthers. I mean, he wasn't afraid to use that terminology. I mean, he was basically advocating the use of violence to protect Jews. He wasn't promoting violence as something, you know, something independent. But he said that, you know, if Jews are threatened, then Jews should use violence in order to be able to deter that threat. Now, this is all built on the assumption that anti-Semitism is endemic to the American experience and that there's no way for Jews to erase anti-Semitism. The only thing they can do was manage it. And I think this is an interesting case where what Kahane was talking about in terms of anti-Semitism in the 1960s and 1970s, which a lot of American Jews were pushing very strongly against. I mean, American American Jews in the 1960s were still engaged in the kind of accommodationalist assimilationist project of Americanization. And they believe that Americans, liberal, American, liberal society, could, if not erase anti-Semitism completely, certainly diminish it and Kahane's basic attitude was that's not the case. Because for him, anti-Semitism is just endemic to the to the non Jew. I think, interestingly, in 2020, a lot of American Jews basically are espousing those ideas that Kahane was talking about in the 1960s and 1970s. So on the anti-Semitism question and all the discussion about anti-Semitism, I mean, if you go back and read Kahane from the late 60s and the 1970s, he's basically saying the same thing.
MAX: So when did Kahane move to Israel and why did Kahane move to Israel?
SHAUL: The when is easier than the why. He moves to Israel in September 1971. He had just been actually. He was convicted and he was given a parole from a series of arms smuggling charges and he moves to Israel immediately after that. His. The ostensible reason for moving to Israel was to make aliya and that he had finally come to the conclusion that that there was no future for American Jews. That eventually the Vietnam War was going to end. American Jews are going to be blamed. There was there was going to be a spike in anti-Semitism and the Jews were going to be physically endangered. And if they weren't physically endangered, they would be spiritually endangered through tolerance and assimilation and so on and so forth. So he gives up on the American Jewish project, which is kind of interesting, because in the late 60s, he envisioned the Jewish Defense League as a way what he calls to save the American Jewish dream. So he wasn't he was he although he always was a Zionist, he his initial kind of cultural project was really a diasporic one.
MAX: So what became his political and cultural project in Israel?
SHAUL: Well, you know, he comes to Israel and you would think, OK, so he won. He claims to be a Zionist. He's can move to Israel with his family. He's going to spend the first couple of years, you know, in what Israelis called klitat. Right. Absorption to come, become absorbed in the country, to learn the language, to to do all the to all the things that are necessary and that all new immigrants do to become part of the country. But in fact, he moves to Israel in September 71. By October seventy two. He has already spent time in Israeli prisons. He's already been arrested like 60 times. So it's a kind of an interesting case where in a certain sense he goes he goes to Israel in some way to intervene in in its political life in an attempt to kind of overthrow the secular Zionist regime. And that becomes his political program. He writes a book called Am Segulah or it's called in English The Challenge, which is a kind of program of a political future. And then he kind of continues to go on his way writing a lot, but eventually gets elected to the Knesset in nineteen eighty four after two failed tries.
MAX: What does it mean to overthrow the secular Zionist regime and what was the regime he wanted to replace it with?
SHAUL: Well, he wanted to replace replace it with a regime of Torah observance. He doesn't call it a monarchy, but he's certainly one of the interesting things about Kahane is that he gives no legitimacy whatsoever to secular Zionism. He basically thinks that secular Zionism is a form of racism and that the only reason that the Jews have to be in the land of Israel is that God gave them the land. If you don't believe that God gave them the land and if you don't believe in God, then you don't believe that God gave them the land, then from Kahanists perspective, there's absolutely no right for secular. There's actually no right for Jews to be there. So when he gets removed from the Knesset because of a racism law that's established in 1986 and then and then that's upheld by the Israeli Supreme Court in 1987, his basic attitude, his response to being called a racist and being removed from the Knesset is that he says, no, it's secular Zionism. That's racism. It's not me that's racism. I'm only here because I believe God gave the land to the Jews. If you don't believe that God gave the land to the Jews and then your then your being here is just racist. So in a certain sense, he's trying to overthrow the secular Zionist project.
SHAUL: He's trying to establish a separatist society, a separatist Jewish society that's built on power, that's against normalization. Remember, the whole Zionist project is about becoming normal. It's about becoming a nation state in the in the family of nations. It's becoming you know, it's trying to shed the abnormality that many people had about the Jews as a people without a land, whereas Kahane's saying, no, Zionism is an abnormal project. It's not about normalization. It's about the opposite. We don't have to abide by the basic principles of other nations. We can live in our society. And and and here it's very important that he was not in favor of Israel being a democratic society. He didn't think being a Jewish and democratic society was possible, which is interesting because when Jewish and Democratic became a part of the Israeli narrative, it wasn't in forty eight. But it became later on the people that were arguing that Jewish and Democratic was impossible were actually the people on the left. Kahane was one of the few people on the right that was saying no Jewish and Democratic was just schizophrenic, can be a Jewish state or it can be a democratic state, but it can't be both.
MAX: So as you already mentioned, what two years after he was elected, the Knesset, the Knesset passed a law against racism specifically to get Kahane and his party out of Knesset.
SHAUL: Correct.
MAX: I don't think I'm overstating it to say that there's a lot of there's a lot of open racism in Israeli politics. So this is sort of hard for me to wrap my head around. How did that happen? Why was he such a threat to the powers that be at the time? And also how did it happen that his ideas went from being essentially excommunicated to coming back into the fold?
SHAUL: Well, it's an interesting back story to that. So he's elected to the Knesset in nineteen eighty four with one mandate, meaning that he's the only one in his party that's a parliamentarian. And that was that that really sent shockwaves around Israel, not only not only around the Israeli left, but also around the Israeli right. I mean, this Kahane was always seen to be an outlier because, as I said, he's basically undermining the entire Zionist project and in a sense is trying to ideologically overthrow the secular Zionist regime. So it was a very it was a big shock moment. But was really more shocking was that in 1985, the year after he was elected, the Knesset, there was a poll taken in Israel by a very reputable polling organization that said that if elections were held today in nineteen eighty five, Kahane's party would get 11 seats. So they recognized something was happening. There was a shift in the society and going from one seat to 11 seats is a pretty big jump. And that seems to be what got the Knesset moving to say. We have to do something to stop this. We have to do something to get him out of the Knesset, because there seems to be this wave of support for Kahane’s ideas for transferring the Arabs out, for separating Jews and Arabs and so on and so forth. And and that seems to be what catapulted the Knesset to basically do this as a way of getting rid of him. I think you're totally right. I think that that law could have been used in numerous times after that, but it never was. And it was very specifically legislated for him and for him alone.
MAX: And who were who were his followers? Where did he find a following?
SHAUL: Well, that's an interesting question. So his followers originally broke down into a couple of different groups in Israel. First of all, of course, many JDL people from America who had moved to Israel. So and that's a small group of people. He really built his base in the early years with the Mizrahim, with the Jews who had come from Arab lands, who already held a certain kind of animus toward the Arab population from their experiences living in Algeria and Morocco or Iraq or other places. And what he did was he basically portrayed the Labor Party, which was the party in power at that time, from nineteen forty eight until 1977. The Labor Party was always the party in power. He basically portrayed the Labor Party as the kind of Ashkenazi elite who were discriminating against the the Mizrahim. And the truth is that he had a lot to go on there because there was a lot of marginalization of the Mizrahim at that time. In a certain sense, the the Ashkenazi elite, the Ashkenazi liberal elite, which were the ruling party of the government became one of the kind of Israeli version of the liberal American Jewish establishment. In a certain sense and here the question of race is very important. He he tried to use the whiteness of the Ashkenazi elite against the Mizrahi Jews. And to some extent he was successful. To some extent he wasn't successful. For example, in the early 1970s, there was a movement that came out of the Mizrahi world called the Israeli Black Panthers. And the Israeli Black Panthers were in a certain sense modeling themselves after the American Black Panthers on the racism of Israeli society. Kahane thought that he could use the Black Panthers as as part of his base, because in a certain sense, you know, the enemy of the enemy is my friend. But in a certain way, it blew up in its face because many of the Israeli Black Panthers also saw themselves in solidarity with Israeli Arabs. Because they were also being discriminated against because of their color. Right. So you had cases in the early 1970s where Israeli Black Panthers and JDL people were literally like, you know, having street fights in Zion Square in Jerusalem until they kind of called the truce. So I think this was a good example where Kahane's racist view of the world didn't really quite translate into the Israeli scene, which was much more complicated.
MAX: Yeah, I mean, I was struck by the I think the phrase that you used in the introduction to your book, as you called him, a dismal failure in Israel.
SHAUL: Yeah. Yeah.
MAX: How so?
SHAUL: Well, because I think the reason why Kahane was a failure in Israel is that what he tried to do was he tried to transport American cultural racial categories into the Israeli situation, which was very different. And he was never really successful. So he was never taken seriously by by many Israelis because he was really speaking in cultural categories that they really couldn't relate to. What actually is successful in Israel is something that I call in the book, a kind of Neo-Kahanism. And that's where you have Itamar Ben-Gvir and those people. And Neo-Kahanism is really a bringing together of Kahane's ideas of power and militancy with Rav Kook's notion of kind of religious Zionist romanticism. I mean, one of the interesting elements.
MAX: Let me stop you. For a second.
SHAUL: Yeah.
MAX: So who was Rav Kook?
SHAUL: OK, so Rav Kook, Rav Abraham Isaac Kook was the first chief rabbi of Palestine, Mandate Palestine, and he he was an outlier in his ultra-Orthodox world of becoming a Zionist. And he basically developed this kind of romantic ideology, quasi mystical ideology that we're living on the cusp of redemption and that the secular Zionists, unbeknownst to them, are being swept up in this cosmic process. And therefore they should be supported because in a sense, they are creating that which will eventually result in the unfolding of the messianic era. Now, more interesting than Abraham Isaac Kook is his son, Zvi Yehuda Kook, who really became the kind of figurehead of the settler Zionist movement after 1967. The thing about the two of them is that they're both basing their ideas on a certain kind of romantic view of living on the cusp of redemption. Kahane has no interest in them whatsoever. He barely talks about them. He barely mentions them because Kahane was not a romantic in that way. Kahane was really, in a certain sense, a really a materialist. What mattered was in front of him. It was really about power. And all of this kind of romantic messianism, this kind of apocalyptic messianism didn't really speak to him. So the Neo-Kahanists in a way, because the Kookian ideology became so popular, they've kind of brought together Kahane's tactics and Kook's romantic vision of, you know, living on the land of Israel as a necessary prerequisite for the kind of the coming redemption.
SHAUL: And I think one of the interesting things about it is that the Neo-Kahanists do not, by definition, reject the secular Zionist project because they're influenced by that romantic Kookism. Kahane did you know for Kahane someone like Yossi Sarid, who was a secular leftist Zionist, one of the one of the most well known at the time, and people like Geulah Cohen, who was a secular Right-Wing Zionists in a certain sense, he speaks about them in divisive, intrusive ways, as if they're the same, whether you're a right wing secularist or a left wing secularist, if you're a secular Zionist, then you're basically from Kahane's perspective, you're basically a racist.
MAX: And just finish that thought, so that's different from the. So then how do the Neo-Kahanists…
SHAUL: So the Neo-Kahanists have been educated in the in the religious Zionist system, which is very influenced by Kook, which gives legitimacy to the secular Zionist project as being part of this larger religious Zionist project that is kind of dialectically interwoven between the secular and the religious. Right. So in a certain sense, the religious Zionists narrative is not a rejection, an outright rejection of the secular Zionist project. The secular Zionist project simply becomes instrumental to the religious Zionist ideas. I think I think that's where you see the Neo-Kahanists as different from Kahane himself.
MUSIC: “Slow Dial”
MAX: I want to end by bringing it back home, I suppose. You argue pretty powerfully that Kahane's greater impact in some ways is in the United States. And. I'm going to quote you for a second.
SHAUL: OK.
MAX: You know, Kahane is is is basically a bad word in American Jewish life. And what you write is "I argue that by marginalizing or ignoring Kahane, we have not seen the way he has in some way hypnotized us. That is, we have absorbed more of his world view than we think." How so?
SHAUL: Well for a number of reasons. Remember, Kahane leaves America in the 70s and he's really not a part of what becomes neo conservatism later on in the 1980s. But in some way, he was espousing a particular kind of kind of ideas from a Jewish perspective that later become very, very neo conservative ideas. So I'll give you an example again. Neo conservatism is a complicated political position that has many different facets to it and moving parts. But the idea of perennial anti-Semitism. That is so pervasive in the American Jewish conversation today from groups on the right side of the spectrum to groups that claim to be nonpartisan like the ADL, who speak about the anti-Semitism and specifically the anti-Semitism on the left. Now, interestingly, in the 1960s. Most Jews were worried about the anti-Semitism on the right, whether it was the Ku Klux Klan or whether it was other kinds of politicians on the right. There was, of course, worry about anti-Semitism on the left with the black nationalist movement and so on. But most Jews, Jewish attention was really focused on the anti-Semitism of the right. Kahanists said that the anti-Semitism of the left is worse. And it's it's deeper and it's more dangerous. And I think that if you take some of the reactions that American Jews have had to Black Lives Matter, for example, you see that in a way they're espousing that that particular idea of anti-Semitism on the left is really worse than antisemitism on the right for all kinds of reasons. So I think that in a way, the precarious way in which American Jews see themselves within American society today, the quest, the issue of marginalization, the ideas that emerge out of a feeling of anti-Semitism is something that Kahane thought was endemic to American democracy. And that as as much as Kahane writes in his book, Time to Go Home, that America was better to the Jews than any other. Society in history, in the history of the West, and that in America is the bet is is by far the best democracy that has ever been created, even that will not prevent anti-Semitism. And and that's the reason he feels like the American project will be a failure for American Jews. And I think American Jews, you know, more and more I wouldn't say obviously not a majority, but they're they're they're beginning to entertain those ideas.
SHAUL: And I also think that the question of what Kahane called Jewish survival, right. So nowadays we don't really use that language of survival, although more people are beginning to revive the language of survival. But for a long time, we called it Jewish continuity. But Jewish continuity is really Jewish survival by another name and in 1974, when not many American Jews were really that concerned with intermarriage. I mean, intermarriage rates were still pretty low, but they were rising. Kahane writes a book called Why Be Jewish, which is a book about intermarriage. In 1974. When nobody was writing about intermarriage. And he's saying that this is going to be the big problem in the coming decades. And we see now that, you know, with the Pew poll 2013, another Pew poll, twenty twenty one, that intermarriage has become one of the primary issues for American Jews to grapple with.
SHAUL: As I said in the book, I think we ignore Kahane to our own peril. It's very easy to create, to create kind of figures that we can dump everything that we don't like on. I mean, I think I mean, my view is that's that's that's my critique of the left vis a vis Netanyahu. It's like, oh, it's all Netanyahu's fault that we got rid of Netanyahu. Everything would be better. And I think that we see that with Kahane, like everything that's bad becomes Kahanist. But of course, we're not that. And I think we really need to see how his influence has really has really, in a certain sense, become much more a part of the consciousness and the conscience of of American Jewry and Israeli Jewry than we think. Even those who would never. Who who would who would be who would be aghast to be identified with him.
MUSIC: “Slow Dial”
MAX: So I guess I do actually have one more question, which is that to really bring it back to where we started. I wanted to talk to you this week specifically because I thought that. In order to understand what's happening right now in Israel Palestine, it was important to talk about Kahane. Do you agree? And I mean, and as somebody who's been studying Kahane for the better part of a decade, how how have you been watching what's been happening?
SHAUL: Yeah, I mean, yes and no. I mean, I think the situation is is very, very complicated for. As as everybody says right. And then and then everybody critiques people that say that it's complicated. Right. I understand that. And a lot of it doesn't have anything to do with Kahane. But I'll tell you what I think does have to do with Kahane. And that is what I see is the new element in all this, because, OK, Israel does something provocative. Hamas fires rockets for a couple of weeks. Then they stop. Then there's another provocation. I mean, we've seen that so many times, right? I mean, this is just what we're watching the same we're watching the same thing again and again. The only thing that's different is the year. But the dif the new element here are the are the Arab riots in Israel itself. And I think that actually. Speaks to Kahane because Kahane was basically. Kahane was very, very concerned that the Arab Israelis will come back to haunt Israel. And that they they are not an integrated community, they shouldn't be an integrated community, they can't be an integrated community and they can't be an integrated community because this is a Jewish country. And and that eventually this project of integrating the Arabs into Israel proper was going to fail. And Kahane said that in the 70s, and I think that he's on that point, he's actually proven to be correct. So when Ahmad Tibi, who is an Arab Arab-Israeli parliamentarian, says, well, how can how can our community become integrated into a society whose national anthem not only ignores us, but arguably denies our existence? And Kahane would say, yes, that's correct. Right? That is correct, because it's a Jewish country. And you have to either recognize that or leave. And I think the inability of Israel to. Seriously confront the you know what was called back in the early Zionists days, the Arab question, that is, who are the Arabs in a Jewish state? I think that we're seeing the fruits of the inability to really confront that. And I think that's actually very frightening because, OK, you know, the Palestinians in the West Bank, that's one thing. Hamas in Gaza, that's another thing. But when you're when your citizens start to rebel. What are you supposed to do? You're supposed to send the army in against your own citizens?
MAX: But it's not you know, it's not just the Palestinians in Israel who are rebelling, it's also Jews who are I mean, I've seen videos of Jews marching around to Palestinian homes in different cities and trying to. You know, basically invade homes and attacking people in the streets, I mean, the riots, so to speak, go both ways.
SHAUL: Right, of course. So what's what gets set up is that so you'll have a riot in Lod and then you have know settlers from Yitzhar getting bused in to to go. And then you have this kind of very, very weird kind of Israeli West Side story scenario. But in a certain sense, the settlers, this is fine for them. This is what they want. Right. They want that confrontation because they see it. And I think this is Kahane's view, too. They see it as a zero sum game. Right? It's it's one side is going to win and one side is going to lose. And coexistence is not only impossible. For for many of these people, coexistence is not at all what is even aspirational. So in a way, you're absolutely right. So the Arabs will riot and then the settlers will riot and then, you know, but but then you then you really have a kind of complicated civil war scenario.
MUSIC: “The Telling”
SHAUL: We have no answer to that. And and I think that this is a question that has to be seriously addressed. And Kahane saw that. He saw that even in the 70s.
MAX: Unsettled is produced by Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, Ilana Levinson, and me, Max Freedman. Original music by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions.
With everything that’s happening right now in Israel-Palestine, a lot of new people are finding the show. If you’re listening to Unsettled for the first time, welcome: we’ve been producing interviews and documentaries since 2017. We put together a Spotify playlist of past episodes that can help you better understand this moment. You can find a link to that playlist in the show notes. And I hope you’ll share it with anyone else in your life who’s looking for information.
To support Unsettled, you can leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, follow us on Twitter and Instagram, and make sure you subscribe, wherever you get your podcasts, so you never miss an episode of Unsettled.
Leena Dallasheh: "East Jerusalem is under attack"
The imminent displacement of several Palestinian families in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah set off a chain of events that led to the violence we’re now seeing all over Israel-Palestine. But what’s happening in Sheikh Jarrah isn't new. Ever since Israel gained control of East Jerusalem in 1967, the state has been making life difficult for Palestinians -- and trying to get them out.
In this episode, producer Ilana Levinson speaks to historian Leena Dallasheh about the many forms of exclusion faced by Palestinians in Jerusalem.
The imminent displacement of several Palestinian families in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah set off a chain of events that led to the violence we’re now seeing all over Israel-Palestine. But what’s happening in Sheikh Jarrah isn't new. Ever since Israel gained control of East Jerusalem in 1967, the state has been making life difficult for Palestinians — and trying to get them out.
In this episode, producer Ilana Levinson speaks to historian Leena Dallasheh about the many forms of exclusion faced by Palestinians in Jerusalem.
Unsettled is produced by Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, Max Freedman, and Ilana Levinson. Original music by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions.
Leena Dallasheh is an Associate Professor of History at Humboldt State University. Her research focuses on modern Palestinian and Israeli history, and her training covered the broad social and political history of the modern Middle East, with a particular interest in understanding identity and citizenship in colonial transition. She received her PhD in the joint History and Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies program at NYU. Her work focuses on the social and political history of Nazareth from 1940 to 1966, tracing how Palestinians who remained in Israel in 1948 negotiated their incorporation in the state, affirming their rights as citizens and their identity as Palestinian. Before coming to NYU, she received a law degree from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.
Spotify playlist: Unsettled essentials, May 2021
Rasha Budeiri: Sheikh Jarrah (Unsettled, 5/14/21)
Refugees: Gaza, ep. 2 (Unsettled, 2/4/19)
Jerusalem: Leena Dallasheh (Unsettled, 12/22/17)
Tareq Baconi: Hamas, Explained
Since last week, nearly two hundred Palestinians have been killed by Israeli airstrikes in Gaza. Israel's defenders say the state is simply defending itself against rocket fire from Hamas; loss of life is tragic, but Hamas is to blame. But many of us know very little about Hamas itself.
In this episode, originally published in 2019, producer Max Freedman speaks with Tareq Baconi, author of the book Hamas Contained: The Rise and Pacification of Palestinian Resistance. They discuss the origins of Hamas, how Hamas governs the Gaza Strip, and its complicated relationship with the state of Israel.
Since last week, nearly two hundred Palestinians have been killed by Israeli airstrikes in Gaza. Israel's defenders say the state is simply defending itself against rocket fire from Hamas; loss of life is tragic, but Hamas is to blame. But many of us know very little about Hamas itself.
In this episode, originally published in 2019, producer Max Freedman speaks with Tareq Baconi, author of the book Hamas Contained: The Rise and Pacification of Palestinian Resistance. They discuss the origins of Hamas, how Hamas governs the Gaza Strip, and its complicated relationship with the state of Israel.
Unsettled is produced by Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, Max Freedman, and Ilana Levinson. Original music by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions.
Tareq Baconi is the International Crisis Group’s Analyst for Israel/Palestine and Economics of Conflict. His book, Hamas Contained: The Rise and Pacification of Palestinian Resistance, was published by Stanford University Press in 2018. His writing has appeared in Arabic in Al-Ghad and Al-Quds al-Arabi, and in English in The New York Review Daily, The Washington Post, Foreign Affairs, The Guardian, The Nation, The Daily Star (Lebanon), and al-Jazeera. He has provided analysis for print and broadcast media, including The New York Times, The New Yorker, BBC, National Public Radio, and Democracy Now!
Spotify playlist: Unsettled essentials, May 2021
Fares Akram and Ravi Nessram, "Israel stages new round of heavy airstrikes on Gaza City" (Associated Press, May 16, 2021)
Tareq Baconi, Hamas Contained: The Rise and Pacification of Palestinian Resistance (Stanford University Press, 2018)
Tareq Baconi interviewed by Rami Younis (+972 Magazine, January 11, 2019)
Tareq Baconi, "Sheikh Jarrah and After" (London Review of Books, May 14, 2021)
Hamas’s original charter (August 18, 1988)
Hamas’s new political document (May 1, 2017)
transcript
UPDATED INTRODUCTION (2021)
MAX FREEDMAN: I’m recording this on Sunday night, May 16th.
I just checked for the latest numbers, and according to the Associated Press, at least 188 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli airstrikes in Gaza this week. That includes 55 children. More than 1,200 people have been wounded, and around 34,000 people have been displaced.
In the same period, eight people in Israel have been killed by rocket fire launched from Gaza.
These are not just numbers. As I was taught, the Talmud says that “whoever saves one life has saved the whole world.” If that’s true, the reverse must also be true: every single life lost is a whole world that’s lost.
But unfortunately, that is not how a lot of people respond to the loss of Palestinian life. We’ve been here before, and every time the bombs rain down on Gaza you can hear variations of the same thing: “Oh, it’s tragic, it’s terrible, but… you know. Hamas. They’ve got rockets. They hate Jews. What are you gonna do?”
To me, this sounds like a recipe for sitting on your hands and doing nothing.
So, two years ago as part of a series on Gaza, we released an episode of Unsettled all about Hamas: an interview with the author and policy analyst Tareq Baconi. We’re re-publishing that episode today.
In addition, we’ve created a Spotify playlist with past episodes of Unsettled that speak most directly to everything that’s happening right now in Israel-Palestine. You can find a link to that playlist in the show notes.
ORIGINAL EPISODE (2019)
MAX FREEDMAN: When we started planning our series about Gaza, we knew we’d have to talk about Hamas. And pretty quickly I realized I didn’t know anything about Hamas.
So when I found out that there was a new book out about the history of the group, I ordered a copy and started reading it.
So one day I’m on my way to work, I pull out this book to read on the train and suddenly I get nervous that people are going to see me reading it. A book about Hamas, in public.
Which is ridiculous, right? It’s a book. Written by an academic. I was just trying to learn more. So why did I feel that way?
TAREQ BACONI: There is an aversion to try to understand Hamas and to try to contend with the complexities that Hamas presents.
MAX: This is Tareq Baconi, who wrote that book.
TAREQ: The movement is seen as inherently toxic and one that people don't really want to understand or engage with or are too frightened of engaging with it.
MAX: To be fair, all that most Americans ever hear about Hamas from commentators and politicians is stuff like this:
RON DERMER: Hamas intends to harm Palestinian civilians and to harm Israeli civilians the more civilians they kill the better for them.
ALAN DERSHOWITZ: It's called the dead baby strategy. You use children and women you deliberately put them on the front lines. You make it impossible for Israel to defend itself without occasionally killing a woman or a child or an elderly person. And every time Israel accidentally kills somebody like that, Hamas cheers and celebrates because that's exactly what they want.
BEN SHAPIRO: The Gaza Strip is filled with people who want Israel destroyed and want to kill Jews. And those people have elected people in the Hamas government in order to do just that.
BENJAMIN NETANYAHU: Hamas is like ISIS. Hamas is like al-Qaeda. / Hamas is like Boko Haram.
[MUSIC: “The Telling”]
MAX: This knee-jerk fear I had — that somehow this organization is so uniquely toxic that by allowing strangers to read the word Hamas over my shoulder I might as well be writing TERRORIST SYMPATHIZER across my forehead — it’s not uncommon.
But the fear of engaging with Hamas even as a subject of study means that the scary things people say on TV aren’t contested in the public sphere, and — as Tareq Baconi points out — that has consequences.
TAREQ: I think the misrepresentation that is prevalent on Hamas has become quite disturbing and has allowed a lot of realities to unfold particularly in the Gaza Strip in a way that is unchecked.
And so I think it's really important for anyone who's interested in Israel-Palestine to understand what this organization is and to understand what it stands for to understand the implications of the fact that it's in power governing two million Palestinians and to try to dig a bit deeper beyond the the the surface understanding of Hamas as simply a terrorist organization that merits marginalization and isolation. I think it's it’s much more complex than that.
MAX: So in today’s episode, with Tareq’s help, we’re going to get into some of that complexity.
Because the surface understanding of Hamas that he’s talking about can go hand in hand with a surface understanding of Gaza. So if we want to take a nuanced look at Gaza, we need to make a nuanced assessment of Hamas.
How has Hamas changed over the last thirty years? What is Hamas’s relationship with the people of Gaza? And if Hamas isn’t going anywhere, what does that mean for Israel?
My name is Max Freedman, and this is “Gaza,” a series from Unsettled.
[MUSIC: Unsettled theme]
MAX: Tareq Baconi is an Israel-Palestine analyst at the International Crisis Group. His new book is called “Hamas Contained: The Rise and Pacification of Palestinian Resistance.”
TAREQ: So I decided to study Israel-Palestine as a way of learning more about an issue that's important to me on a personal level and that informed a lot of my life growing up.
MAX: Tareq was born and raised in Jordan, but he’s the grandson of Palestinian refugees. His book was published last spring, and it’s the end product of more than a decade of research. “Hamas Contained” is billed as “the first history of the group on its own terms.”
TAREQ: So I pretty much read every single document Hamas has ever issued over a 30 year period.
MAX: And before we go any further:
Tareq told me that he rejects without question the use of armed violence against civilians. In his work, he tries to understand the context, and to understand how Hamas justifies its violence against civilians, but he does not excuse it. He also rejects the use of violence against Palestinian civilians by the Israeli state.
When we started working on this episode, I really knew almost nothing about Hamas beyond the headlines. So when I had the opportunity to speak with Tareq in September, I asked him to start at the very beginning.
MAX: Where did Hamas come from. Why was Hamas started where it was and when it was. What was going on at that moment.
TAREQ: Hamas started in 1987.
MAX: 1987 was a key turning point in Palestinian history.
[MUSIC: CBS News Nightwatch]
CHARLIE ROSE: Simmering tensions erupted in violence this week along the Israeli-occupied Gaza Strip. Some 650,000 Palestinians…
MAX: This was the start of the First Intifada: a spontaneous mass uprising on an unprecedented scale — mostly nonviolent, despite the tenor of news coverage at the time.
BOB SIMON: Senior Israeli officers say it can no longer be defined as a wave of disturbances. They’re calling it insurrection. U.N. officials are calling it the worst violence since Israel conquered the Gaza Strip in 1967. Palestinians are calling it the children’s revolt.
MAX: So in order to fully understand the significance of this uprising — and the origins of Hamas — we need to spend a minute talking about the broader Palestinian political landscape.
For twenty years leading up to this moment, the Palestinian cause had been led from abroad, by the Palestinian Liberation Organization, or the PLO. The PLO is an umbrella group made up of different Palestinian factions, but historically dominated by one faction, Fatah.
TAREQ: And the PLO's message the PLO's ideology was the full liberation of historic Palestine through armed struggle. And over the course of the 60s and 70s, a great deal of violence was shed by the PLO all over the world against Israel and Israeli targets.
MAX: But by 1987, the PLO had been weakened by years of violent in-fighting. And from its exile in Tunisia, the PLO was relatively disconnected from the Palestinians who were living under occupation and facing the brunt of Israel’s military rule.
So part of what made the First Intifada such a watershed moment was that for the first time since 1948, Palestinians living in Palestine were at the vanguard of the resistance. And suddenly, the eyes of the world were on Gaza.
BOB SIMON: Gaza’s not only forgotten it’s unwanted. The Arabs all insist that the Israelis should pull out. But no one wants to take their place. Even the PLO has offered very little in the way of money or support. Which is one reason why the rallying cry in Gaza these days is Islam. The force is fundamentalism, the mosques are overflowing. Yasser Arafat is being replaced as spiritual leader of the strip by 51 year old Sheikh Ahmed Yassin.
MAX: Sheikh Ahmed Yassin was the head of the Mujama Islami: basically a chapter of the Muslim Brotherhood in Palestine. Up to this point, the Mujama Islami had adopted a very different theory of Palestinian liberation from the PLO.
TAREQ: They believed that if the Palestinians living in the occupied territories were more connected to their Islamic doctrine and Islamic belief that that would allow the Islamic nation the Ummah to prosper and ultimately within the Palestinian context to end the occupation.
When the intifada erupted, that belief, that independence would happen organically through living a more virtuous life, came into tension with reality on the ground.
MAX: Leaders of the intifada were calling for a complete boycott of all forms of engagement with Israel.
But Israel had actually supported the growth of Islamic organizations like the Mujama Islami — hoping they would provide an alternative to Palestinian nationalism and draw support away from militant groups like the PLO.
So the Mujama Islami was widely criticized within the Gaza Strip — not only for avoiding active resistance but for working with the occupation forces in order to get permission to expand their social, religious and educational services.
This criticism threatened to leave the Mujama Islami marginalized at what was clearly a historic moment in the national struggle.
TAREQ: And so in 1987, the founders of the of the Mujama Islami within the Gaza Strip got together in the house of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin and decided that actually it was time to break off into a splinter group that would prioritize resistance.
MAX: That splinter group was called the Islamic Resistance Movement - better known by its acronym, in Arabic: HAMAS.
[MUSIC: “Envira”]
MAX: So at the time that Hamas is founded there is a charter. And you know a lot of the time when you try to talk to people American Jews let's say about about Gaza you can't get past the question of Hamas and if you want to talk about Hamas you can't get past the question of the charter. So can you talk a little bit about the charter what's in the charter and why it's such a flashpoint for these discussions.
TAREQ: Absolutely. And it should be. I think that charter should be interrogated and the charter is problematic on so many levels that it absolutely must be something that is brought to people's attention and discussed. Fundamentally it lays out what Hamas’s mission is. So it talks about Hamas being dedicated to the notion of jihad and it defines jihad not as a tactic but as a way of being, as a holistic way of life. The charter talks about how the movement derives its ideology and its beliefs from the Koran. And it talks about creating an Islamic state over the land of historic Palestine.
Now the problem with the charter. There are several problems but I think the problem you're alluding to is the rampant anti-Semitism in it. So it conflates Judaism with Zionism. There is no real sophisticated understanding of the difference between the two in in the charter. And it plays on all the anti-Semitic tropes that are well known. You know the Jews controlling global politics and controlling the U.N. and mass media and amassing wealth and it derives a lot the charter derives a lot of its interpretation of the Jewish people from the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. So it's in many ways the charter is a despicable piece of writing.
MAX: Well we're having a very kind of measured conversation about this. But I mean when I hear that those things are in the charter as a Jewish person should I not feel threatened by that.
TAREQ: Absolutely you should. Absolutely. And that's exactly what I'm saying. So this is a document that needs to be interrogated it needs to be challenged. I very much sympathize and understand with the worries that Jews or non-Jews have about the the charter frankly you don't need to be Jewish to be disturbed by this. I wouldn't ever say that Hamas has no anti-Semitism. But I do think that the charter isn't representative of Hamas’s political thinking today and isn't representative of the degree of sophistication they have in engaging with Israel.
MAX: Tareq interviewed many leaders of Hamas while writing his book: across different levels of seniority, in the occupied territories and in the Palestinian diaspora. And he explained to me that many of them do understand the difference between Judaism and Zionism.
TAREQ: Hamas's leaders at least the leaders that I interviewed and certainly many of the people that I spoke to have tried to distance themselves from the charter.
MAX: In fact, in May 2017, Hamas issued what they called a new “political document.”
MAX: Is it a new charter?
TAREQ: So in my mind and in the mind of many it is seen as a new charter but Hamas never officially renounced the old charter. And more than not renouncing it attached the old charter as an appendix to this new political document.
MAX: Okay.
TAREQ: But so the question about why Hamas wouldn't renounce the charter is one that is quite perplexing. I think many people have openly within Hamas as well have openly called on Hamas to renounce the charter. I think Hamas is still very much a populist movement and it is still very much connected to what they like to call maintaining the fiery roots. So maintaining a certain level of passion and a certain level of ground mobilization and I think that renouncing the charter would appear to be a concession or at least present Hamas in a way that might distance the political leadership from its rank and file.
MAX: When you say that they haven't renounced the old charter because they are a populist movement it seems to me what you're implying is that what is in the old charter is popular.
TAREQ: That's I don't think that's what I'm implying. I think that it’s it’s seen as a way of maintaining your ideological commitments. So I don't think I'm suggesting that Hamas's followers are believing in the anti-Semitism that Hamas’s charter portrays but I think they believe in Hamas's ideological purity and Hamas's refusal to bow to pressure.
MAX: This ideological purity and refusal to bow to pressure became so central to Hamas’s identity in part because of what was happening within the PLO at the same time that Hamas emerged.
[MUSIC: “Clay Pawn Shop”]
TAREQ: By the 1970s the PLO under the leadership of Yasser Arafat was starting to understand the limits of armed violence. Particularly when you're dealing with a state that had a very clear territorial level of control and institutions and an army that was developed and supported by the world's nations. So throughout the 70s and the 80s there was a process of transformation that was starting to take place within the PLO which was to contend with the need to enter the diplomatic fold to start engaging with Israel as a reality. That transformation obviously was one that took a significant period of time to come through. But it led to ultimately by 1988 for the PLO to make the decision to recognize the state of Israel.
MAX: Wait I'm sorry. The PLO recognized the state of Israel in 1988.
TAREQ: Yes. So in 1988 —
MAX: The reason I ask is because that's definitely not that's definitely not what I was raised to believe.
TAREQ: Yes. I know.
MAX: Tareq explained that in November 1988, Yasser Arafat gave a speech in Algiers declaring the creation of the state of Palestine.
[SOUND: Yasser Arafat in Algiers, November 15, 1988]
MAX: In this speech, Arafat agreed that the PLO would accept a state on 22% of the land of historic Palestine — effectively conceding the fact that 78% of the land of historic Palestine had indeed become the state of Israel.
I was surprised to find out about this.
MAX: So when I hear even today that a precondition for negotiations or what we call the peace process is that the Palestinians must recognize the state of Israel. What does that mean. If that happened 30 years ago.
TAREQ: Yes that's a good question. And if you look at the way that that demand is put forward so now for example it's not recognizing Israel it's recognizing Israel's right to exist which is very subtle but very different. Recognizing Israel's right to exist many legal scholars have scratched their heads to try to understand what that means because there is no nation state that has a right to exist. Nation states exist and come into being and falter and what is this right of a nation state to exist.
And then the demand changes in different guises. So for example Prime Minister Netanyahu today would condition any kind of engagement with the Palestinians on the Palestinians recognizing Israel as a Jewish state. So there are constant demands that Palestinians need to rise up to and that they need to fulfill before they are seen as legitimate partners. And the irony of course is that there hasn't been a recognition of Palestinian statehood yet in an official capacity by most Israeli political parties including the party of the current prime minister, the Likud.
So you're right to be bewildered. But the constant call on Palestinians to recognize Israel. To my mind is nothing but an exercise in ensuring that there can be no equity between Israel and the Palestinians and to keep demanding of Palestinians what they've already given.
[MUSIC: “Envira”]
MAX: So going back to 1988.
TAREQ: Yes.
MAX: How did this evolution of the PLO shape the kind of organization that Hamas became and its mission.
TAREQ: This is seen as a huge betrayal by Hamas. Hamas believes that the PLO had conceded central tenets of Palestinian nationalism and Hamas in a way rose to protect those to safeguard those tenets and to remain committed to what it views as the purity of Palestinian nationalism.
[MUSIC: “Envira”]
MAX: The end of the First Intifada led to the Oslo Accords, signed between Israel and the PLO between 1993 and 1995. Oslo created the Palestinian Authority, which was supposed to be temporary: the embryo of a future Palestinian state.
Meanwhile, Hamas had become a powerful player in the occupied territories, not just in the Gaza Strip. And Hamas rejected Oslo. Hamas refused to concede 78% of historic Palestine, refused to renounce armed struggle, and spent the 90s trying to undermine negotiations with terrorist attacks — often suicide bombings, which Hamas referred to as its “signature” operations.
TAREQ: Of course there are people and scholars now who would say that even in a peaceful reality the negotiations wouldn't have produced a Palestinian state. But at the time there was for the Palestinians and I think for the majority of Israelis as well a very strong hope and belief that the peace negotiations would produce a two state solution. And Hamas played a significant role in spoiling that.
[MUSIC: “Emmit Sprak”]
MAX: A decade of negotiations and hope, at least for some, gave way to devastating violence with the outbreak of the Second Intifada in the fall of 2000.
NEWS ANCHOR: Clashes erupted at several flashpoints in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The death toll mostly Palestinians now stands at 236 people. Yasser Arafat made a rare public call today to restrain Palestinian gunmen. But Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak dismissed Arafat's words as inadequate and told Israelis they are in for a long struggle.
TAREQ: With the eruption of the second intifada and of course with the failure of that decade of negotiations Hamas remained committed to the idea that violence could work.
MAX: Suicide is considered sinful in Islam, but Hamas essentially rebranded suicide attacks as “martyrdom operations.”
And though Hamas was not the only faction which carried out suicide bombings during the second intifada, its attacks were the most destructive.
In August and September 2005, under the direction of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, Israel “disengaged” from the Gaza Strip. Jewish settlements were dismantled and Israeli security forces were withdrawn.
TAREQ: My reading of the situation is that the movement believed that the more pain it could inflict on the Israeli public the more likely the Israeli public would pressure their government to let go of the territories.
MAX: Well and in 2005 2006 they did let go of the territories. So were they right?
TAREQ: Hamas absolutely claims that Israel let go of the territories because of its armed attacks and for Hamas it has made the argument consistently that only force works. And when Ariel Sharon made that decision in 2005 he reinforced that message.
But until that withdrawal happened, the way that Israel dealt with Hamas's attacks was to carry out hugely destructive operations throughout the Palestinian territories to reoccupy Palestinian villages invade refugee camps and the numbers of Palestinians killed over the course of the intifada in terms of the violence of the occupation forces dwarfs the number of Israelis killed by the resistance of the Palestinian factions.
MAX: Most of Hamas’s senior leaders were killed during the Second Intifada — including its founder, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin.
TAREQ: Hamas’s response to that level of reaction from Israel — the fact that the disengagement from Gaza happened within the context of a blockade that would then isolate the Gaza Strip — I think there was a moment of transformation within Hamas where there was an understanding that armed struggle wouldn't actually achieve liberation. It was an awakening that was very similar to the one that the PLO had gone through.
MAX: In January 2006, just a few months after the Israeli disengagement from Gaza, Hamas decided to run as a political party in Palestinian national legislative elections for the very first time. And much to everyone’s surprise, they won.
[MUSIC: “Noe Noe”]
MAX: For Tareq and many other Palestinians, this development raised a lot of questions.
TAREQ: How could a movement such as Hamas to be elected through democratic elections. How could a movement such as Hamas run in democratic elections. What did this mean for the Palestinian struggle.
MAX: After the surprise election results, most of the international community refused to recognize the new government led by Hamas. Israel began its blockade of the Gaza Strip — which we’ll explore in more detail in the next episode. And Fatah - the secular political party which had dominated the PLO and the Palestinian Authority — would not cede power to Hamas easily.
By the end of 2006, there was open violence between the factions, and in June 2007, the split became official: Hamas took control in Gaza, and Fatah created its own government in the West Bank.
For nearly two decades, Hamas had been defined by its rejection of mainstream Palestinian politics. Now, Hamas made the decision to embrace the democratic process and join the Palestinian political establishment. Hamas went from doing everything they could to undermine Oslo to taking responsibility for what Oslo had created: the municipal infrastructure of the Palestinian Authority.
MAX: It's hard to say that they have abandoned armed struggle.
TAREQ: Well I mean —
MAX: You know the line is, “Israel disengaged and they got rocket fire.”
TAREQ: Right. So Hamas didn't abandon armed struggle. Hamas still believes in armed struggle as a means of liberation and hence the rocket fire. But the kind of resistance that Hamas engages with today is very different than the resistance of the Second Intifada.
So through the Second Intifada Hamas was on the offensive in terms of invading Israeli cities and towns and settlements and carrying out suicide bombings and carrying out stabbings and carrying out various forms of armed struggle. Now for structural reasons including the fact that the wall is there and the the disengagement happened but also for strategic reasons that's not the kind of armed struggle that Hamas engages with today.
So you mentioned rocket fire. That's strategic and deliberate. That's done in a way to force Israel to renegotiate access into the Gaza Strip to pressure Israel into lifting the blockade or it's used in order to maintain deterrence. After Israel carries out their military incursion into the Gaza Strip Hamas would respond with rocket fire.
MAX: And aside from this strategic use of rocket fire, Tareq says:
TAREQ: Hamas today has become extremely effective at policing resistance.
MAX: I know what you’re thinking. Hamas is policing resistance? This is what Tareq's book is all about: how the leaders of Hamas have, in recent years, been willing and able both to keep their own members in line, and to stop other armed groups from attacking Israel when it doesn’t serve Hamas’s interests.
TAREQ: If Hamas wasn't in power whatever other faction or organization would come to power could be infinitely more hostile. Hamas has actually been a very effective party in terms of committing to ceasefires controlling rocket fire stabilizing the Gaza Strip.
[MUSIC: “Envira”]
MAX: What was it like for you personally to spend time there and to spend time with leaders of Hamas and do the research that you had to do for this book.
TAREQ: There's really no place that I'd ever visited that's like the Gaza Strip. I might disagree with Hamas's ideology and I might find a lot of what it stands for problematic but I also understand their thinking and their desperation and their their belief that they are engaged in a moral struggle that Israel is the invader and that Zionism is a form of colonialism that disenfranchised people of their land. I understand those things so I'm able to see Hamas and to see its leaders beyond the surface beyond this bloodthirsty terrorist organization and to try to understand this deeper reality that animates them and animates their following.
And beyond Hamas I think going to the Gaza Strip for me was a very difficult experience. But also what I felt was an enormous responsibility and an enormous privilege. To go into the Gaza Strip and and see the way that people are made to live in this age for political reasons and for demographic reasons for to to leave two million Palestinians penned on a side of a state because they're not Jewish.
For me the most difficult the most difficult thing for me about the Gaza Strip is that I could leave. And that carries with it a huge amount of guilt. Because you have two million Palestinians who can’t. And that's incredible to feel incredible in a very dark way.
[MUSIC: “Emmit Sprak”]
MAX: All four of Tareq’s grandparents were expelled from their homes in Haifa in 1948. They fled to Lebanon, and then because they were Christians, they were naturalized and given Lebanese citizenship. They lived in Lebanon until the civil war, when they fled to Jordan, where Tareq was born.
TAREQ: Just because by sheer coincidence when my grandparents were made refugees in 1948 because of their religion I can have a passport now that allows me to leave when I could have easily been one of the people there. That is a type of guilt that a still on a personal level I'm trying to address.
MAX: So as you said two million people are living in these conditions because they are not Jewish. I think some people would say they are living in these conditions because they are not Jewish and because they chose this group of people who hate Jews to represent them. So my question is why did so many people support Hamas in those elections in 2006.
TAREQ: So the first thing I would say is Gazawis didn't choose Hamas.
MAX: “Gazawis” is the Arabic word for Gazans — using a letter we don’t have in English.
TAREQ: Gazawis didn't choose Hamas. The legislative elections that Hamas ran in ran in the West Bank and East Jerusalem as well. So it's certainly not just Gazawis and there were many people within Gaza as there were within the West Bank who voted against Hamas and who voted for Fatah.
So there are many reasons why Palestinians chose Hamas in 2006. There was a huge amount of dissatisfaction with the Palestinian Authority under Fatah's leadership.
MAX: Again, the Palestinian Authority is essentially a municipal government that runs the West Bank under Israeli occupation. The PA is distinct from the PLO, but they are both dominated by Fatah.
TAREQ: Fatah was seen to be a corrupt and elitist movement that was no longer connected to the needs of the people. What I think is that it's much bigger than that. Hamas isn't just its ideology and its charter. Hamas is a movement that is rooted in principles of Palestinian nationalism that go back to 1948.
So for example Hamas calls for the right of return. Hamas calls for the atrocities of 1948 to be recognized. In negotiations and in the two state solution that the Oslo Accords put forward the Palestinian Authority was dealing with 1967. It was dealing with the beginning of the occupation. It was calling for an end to occupation. Hamas in many ways goes further back than that to address the injustices of 1948.
So if you shed Hamas of everything that you or I or many Palestinians would disagree with there are still principles and values that animate Hamas that many Palestinians would identify with and openly support.
And you see that you see that. So for example in 2014 when Israel was carrying out its major operation in the summer of 2014 —
BRIAN WILLIAMS: After this 10 day back and forth air war Israel launched a ground invasion of the Gaza Strip tonight. This is a major escalation. Flames and flares and outgoing fire were visible in the night sky over Gaza.
TAREQ: Support for Hamas was low. I think it was about 35 percent within the Gaza Strip. But support for resistance and for armed struggle against Israel was 95 percent. So how do you explain that discrepancy. These are Palestinians who are saying, “Okay we might disagree with the fact that Hamas is in power or that Hamas is an Islamist movement or that Hamas has authoritarian tendencies but we believe in Hamas's right to use armed struggle. Because you know what? The blockade is an act of war and the blockade is violent and we cannot sit back and put up a white flag and allow to be starved to death. We believe that we have a right to defend ourselves.”
That's not Hamas. That's Palestinians living under occupation seeking dignity and a better life. And Hamas understands that and Hamas speaks to that. And so when Hamas comes out and says, “You know what? The Palestinian Authority has a police force that's committed to Israel's security and that will crack down on Palestinians in the West Bank when they protest the occupation. I protest the occupation and I will come out and support you and give you tools and give you weapons to protest the occupation.” Many Palestinians would choose Hamas over Fatah because of that. You're choosing between what has essentially become a subcontractor to the occupation and a movement that says, “You know what? There is a nationalist struggle here that's rooted in 1948 that hasn't been resolved.”
What I tried to do in my book is to understand that and to understand Hamas in many ways not as this sort of exceptional Islamist movement that if it didn't appear and if it wasn't there that somehow we would have justice and Palestinian self-determination. No in my mind Hamas is a continuation of Palestinian nationalism. And if Hamas gets quashed you know what you're going to get another political party that calls for the same thing.
MAX: How can Hamas continue to claim to the people of the Gaza Strip that violence, that violence works when the result of the violence from Hamas has been these incredibly destructive incursions from the Israeli army in which thousands of Palestinians have died and many many many more been injured and had their lives completely changed.
TAREQ: Did violence not work? I mean that is a question mark. Israel disengaged in 2005 and disengaged from south Lebanon in 2000. Israel has consistently reacted to and negotiated with Hamas in a way that undermined and undercut the Palestinian parties that were committed to negotiations and that were committed to achieving statehood through diplomacy. So I don't think Hamas has a very difficult task ahead of it in claiming that actually violence works certainly more than negotiations. I think Israel has been very good at rewarding some of Hamas’s policies and at least dealing with Hamas as the more powerful of the two parties.
MAX: Can you can go into more — I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around that. That Israel rewards Hamas.
TAREQ: I mean look at some of the things that have happened over the course of the past decade. You have a Palestinian Authority that's sitting in the West Bank that is committed to negotiations. And what it gets out of that commitment is settlement expansion and signposts that are constantly moving out of reach. On the other hand you have in the Gaza Strip some of the most successful prisoner release negotiations happened between Israel and Hamas where a thousand Palestinian prisoners were released for Gilad Shalit. More than a thousand a thousand twenty seven.
MAX: Gilad Shalit, an Israeli soldier, was kidnapped in June 2006 and held in a Hamas prison for more than five years before being released as part of a prisoner exchange.
TAREQ: This dwarfs any successful negotiation that the Palestinian Authority have had with Israel around prisoner exchange. And so it might not be seen as a reward by Israeli government officials but what's happening is a tacit agreement between Israel and Hamas where the two use violence cynically and openly to negotiate the relationship between them with the understanding that there are no ideological concessions so Hamas still hasn't recognized Israel and Israel still refuses to let go of the blockade. But the two parties use violence in a way that allows an equilibrium to be produced between them. Whereas if you look at the Palestinian Authority you have a complete subjugation. Instead of supporting the Palestinian Authority to lead and build a Palestinian state, Israel has used the openness of the PLO to enter into negotiations in order to entrench its occupation.
And so yes I do think that the manner in which the relationship has unfolded between those two Palestinian factions and Israel could very easily be read and portrayed and often is read and portrayed by Hamas’s leaders and Hamas’s followers as, “Israel only understands force. And Israel will only respect a Palestinian party that is able to inflict pain on it and that certain concessions will come.”
Now I personally would disagree with that reading and I would say that Palestinians in Gaza haven’t actually gained anything. Their life is as miserable as it can be and they're living under horrendous conditions and under an unforgiving blockade and in are suffering under a collective punishment.
There is a very high level of disenchantment and anger within the Gaza Strip at Hamas for dragging the Gaza Strip into or I should say opening the Gaza Strip to Israeli military assaults in the way that Hamas does. But for Hamas I think it can easily claim that Israel has rewarded its its refusal to engage with with Israel.
[MUSIC: “Drone Pine”]
MAX: How does Hamas govern.
TAREQ: Hamas governs in what is often called soft authoritarianism. So what that means is it doesn't allow for political mobilization by other parties. So Fatah for example is repressed within the Gaza Strip. Freedom of expression is often quite fragile. So they would allow certain forms of freedom of expression but not forms that are openly critical of the movement. There isn't always due process in terms of dealing with prisoners or in terms of dealing with Palestinians in Gaza that Hamas would see as opponents or criminals or whatever the case might be so there is definite authoritarian tendencies within the Gaza Strip.
I personally don't think that it is far worse or even not comparable to the authoritarianism we have in the West Bank. I think the Palestinian Authority has been increasingly repressive over the course of the past decades. I think that they have used their security forces against Palestinians in the West Bank in a very cynical way. I think freedom of expression within the West Bank is policed as well and not tolerated. Hamas and any kind of political opposition to Fatah and specifically to Mahmoud Abbas's power within the Palestinian Authority is not tolerated at all.
So the point I'm trying to make is that there is authoritarianism in the Gaza Strip and Hamas is in no way a model government. But the movement has a very active social and charitable infrastructure that ensures that the movement has open communication channels and is connected to the people it’s serving. And so I think that by default makes Hamas more sensitive to criticism.
So for example when I was there I interviewed a lot of human rights organizations and journalists that were active in the Gaza Strip and they talk about how Hamas invites them in to hear about their criticisms and their reports and to try to understand the grievances that Palestinians in Gaza might have towards it. I don't think the Palestinian Authority does that in a similar way.
MAX: In particular isn't it dangerous for Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip to try to engage in any kind of relationship with Israelis.
TAREQ: Yes. So in the same way that Israelis cannot engage with anyone in Gaza. I mean it's illegal for Israelis to go into the Gaza Strip and in the same way it's absolutely the issue of collaborators is taken very seriously by Hamas.
MAX: Well, maybe not exactly in the same way.
TAREQ: There’s no system of law here that would provide suspected collaborators with a legal approach that would safeguard their rights. I think Hamas often takes the suspicion of collaboration as sufficient to result in someone's execution.
[MUSIC: “Drone Pine”]
MAX: Hamas’s surprise victory in Palestinian national elections took place in 2006. Since then, there have been no new elections in Gaza. Since there hasn’t been an election since 2006, and since the majority of Palestinians in Gaza are under 18 and therefore would have had no opportunity to vote for Hamas — would it be fair to say that Hamas can’t accurately claim to represent the majority?
Tareq explained that Palestinians have a leadership crisis that goes beyond Hamas and Fatah, beyond the Palestinian Authority, to the PLO, the one organization that is supposed to represent Palestinians all over the world. Neither Hamas nor the PA nor the PLO really represent the Palestinian people — and that’s precisely why there is increasing authoritarianism in both the West Bank and Gaza.
MAX: One of the claims of your book is that really the status quo which seems to any reasonable observer untenable for the two million people living in the Gaza Strip but that the status quo actually works for Hamas and works for Israel.
TAREQ: Absolutely it works for both. I think the status quo. I think Israel benefits a great deal from having Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The dynamic that has emerged between Israel and the Gaza Strip what Israeli security officials call mowing the lawn which is that you carry out a hugely destructive attack on the Gaza Strip every few years to remove or destroy Hamas's military tactics or Hamas's military infrastructure excuse me is a way of actually ensuring stability. It doesn't destroy Hamas. It doesn't completely collapse Hamas.
MAX: And they don't want to.
TAREQ: Well they would then they would have to deal with having two million Palestinians with no government think about it. Hamas now addresses the needs and governs two million Palestinians that Israel wants nothing to do with. If Hamas wasn't there or if the Gaza Strip collapsed what would that mean for Israel.
MAX: You're asking me.
TAREQ: Yes. As in the status quo is one where two million Palestinians can continue to live governed by a Palestinian entity without Israel claiming any responsibility for them. And while maintaining the Gaza Strip as a separate entity from the West Bank which is the area that Israel is or the current Israeli government is ideologically committed to maintaining. Without a functioning government in the Gaza Strip there would be much more difficult reality for Israel to contend with.
So I think both Hamas and Fatah are engaged in a very short term game where they both try to have small victories without making any actual ideological long term concessions. So they're both involved in short term management of the conflict. And the external dynamic is that Israel benefits from the absence of reconciliation. So you see the Israeli prime minister claiming that there can be no peace because there isn't a single partner. Palestinians are divided. But when when in the past the Palestinians did reconcile the prime minister would then say, “Well, the Palestinians have chosen terror. There can't be discussions with them.” So there has been a constant effort by Israel to ensure that the division isn't healed and that's because this divide and rule framework has actually served Israel's purpose.
MAX: So if if this miserable status quo works for Israel and works for Hamas and works for Fatah how do what do we do. How do we get out of the, what you call this “equilibrium of belligerence.”
TAREQ: I don't think we do. I think that the current situation is what we will continue to see for a while until a major unexpected tipping point happens. And I think for me you know to answer your question about how was it for me on a personal level to deal with this research. That was the most difficult realization to accept. I don't think the situation on the ground can change in any fundamental way.
I think if we look at if you look at the way that in the way that discussions around the Gaza Strip has evolved particularly over the course of the past year. You see the Trump administration obviously working very closely with the prime minister's office in Israel talking about humanitarian assistance to the Gaza Strip. Talking about major infrastructure projects like desalination plants and sewage treatment plants and electricity generators. No one is talking about lifting the blockade. Which is the reason Palestinians in Gaza are suffering. And so you have a reality where the major world powers are accepting the structures of occupation. There is there's not only no cost for the blockade now there is also an EU power footing the bill of the blockade paying for the humanitarian suffering that the blockade is inflicting.
So in many ways the reality is sustainable. Israel has managed to — it's effectively outsourced its occupation. And I don't see why things would change. If I were sitting in the prime minister's office in Israel. It's a very comfortable seat. The economy is booming. The Palestinian Authority in the West Bank is completely subservient. And the Gaza Strip isn't their problem. There is no cost to Israel's occupation at all.
And I think until there is a major tipping point something that's unexpected which there will be of course because there are in those conflicts you know the Berlin Wall or or apartheid South Africa until there is a tipping point. I think the current reality is one that is likely to persist.
[MUSIC: “Slow Dial”]
MAX: What do you more than anything want to contribute to the public discourse and the academic discourse about Hamas.
TAREQ: I think the main intervention that I tried to do in the book is that saying that Hamas is a terrorist organization doesn't absolve us of the responsibility of understanding what is happening on the ground today. It doesn't absolve us of the responsibility of holding Israel accountable to the illegal ways it deals with the Palestinian people. I think that Hamas has become a very effective fig leaf that allows Israel to legitimate policies that are morally corrupt. And I think that we need to understand Hamas as a party despite a lot of the issues that are very troubling about the organization that has very legitimate political grievances ones that cannot be dismissed if we actually want a just outcome for Palestinians and for Israelis for that matter.
TAREQ: You know people who live in Gaza and who come from Gaza even if you speak to Gazawis abroad there is a pride and rootedness in their right to resist and their belief that they are on the right side of history that even with all the difficulty that they're going through now this long arc of justice will bend towards them. There is pride in the fact that they’re not the Palestinian Authority that it is quote unquote liberated territory that's free of the occupation within. Of course there is an occupation that is controlling it from the outside but on the inside that it has somehow purged Zionism. There is there is pride in Gaza that makes it a very special place.
MAX: Last spring, during the first few weeks of the Great March of Return, I was involved in a protest here in New York where we said the Mourners’ Kaddish for those Palestinians who had been killed by Israeli sniper fire. We got a lot of angry comments online in response, but one really stood out to me. “We don’t say Kaddish for terrorists.”
I can’t tell you exactly when or where I learned that Hamas was the Boogeyman. I grew up during the Second Intifada; I’m sure that had something to do with it. But I think the effect is that it gave me permission not to see the people of Gaza as fully human. And not seeing the people of Gaza as fully human makes it easier to brush aside what happens to them. Especially when it’s supposedly for the sake of the safety of Jews.
You know, I’ve never lived in southern Israel, but I can vividly imagine having to run to a bomb shelter when rockets begin to fall. And I can compartmentalize - even if I don’t like the current Israeli government and I think Ariel Sharon was a war criminal, I can still usually see Israelis as humans.
I’m not asking for a medal, I’m saying that I think for many Jews in the diaspora, it is more difficult to do this for Palestinians. There are a lot of reasons for this, but the portrayal of Hamas as nothing more than bloodthirsty fanatics plays an important role in circumscribing our empathy.
So of course, I acknowledge and condemn their use of terror. And I think it’s important to try to understand Hamas as a rational political actor. It might feel scary and complicated to do that — even just to read a book or listen to a podcast — but what’s the alternative?
UPDATED EPILOGUE (2021)
MAX: On Friday, May 14th, 2021, Tareq Baconi published a new piece in the London Review of Books. You should read the whole thing — I’ll put a link in the show notes — but here’s part of what he wrote:
Palestinians are divided over Hamas’s rockets. Some see them as a sign of a Palestinian military force rallying to their protection, unlike the leadership in the West Bank, which was not only conspicuously silent as events in Jerusalem unfolded, but suppressed solidarity protests in Hebron and elsewhere. Others view the barrages as a cynical effort by Hamas to co-opt the success of grassroots movements in Jerusalem and elsewhere. And many worry that Gaza is once again paying the price. For their part, Hamas and other armed factions in Gaza do not believe that popular protest can change the balance of power on the ground unless backed by force. Politically, Hamas has little to lose and much to gain from the escalation.
More than Hamas’s rockets, though, the real story of this conflict may turn out to be the mobilisation of Palestinian citizens of Israel in Akka, Lydd, Ramle and Haifa. They are calling for Gaza to be protected from Israeli retribution and Jerusalem from further colonisation. They are also protesting against the dispossession, systematic racism and colonial violence that they experience, like Palestinians elsewhere.
Regardless of whether a broader movement emerges out of the current moment, the collective eruption across historical Palestine shows that the Palestinians remain a people, despite the false hope of partition, the all-too-real separation of their territories, and the deep fragmentation of their political and social life. They may argue about Hamas’s armed resistance or peaceful protest in Sheikh Jarrah. But tactical disagreements ought not to obscure their clear understanding that they are fighting for their freedom against a single regime of domination.
[MUSIC: Unsettled theme]
MAX: Unsettled is produced by Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, Ilana Levinson, and me, Max Freedman. This episode was produced and edited by me. Fact-checking by Asaf Calderon.
Our theme music is by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music in this episode from Blue Dot Sessions.
Don’t forget to follow Unsettled on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. If you like the show, you can rate and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts, and of course subscribe, wherever you get your podcasts, so you never miss an episode of Unsettled.
Rasha Budeiri: Sheikh Jarrah
The current round of violence in Israel-Palestine began in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah: where a number of Palestinian families are facing imminent eviction from their homes — to be replaced by Jewish settlers — and where Palestinian demonstrators were met with overwhelming force from Israeli police. In this episode, Max Freedman speaks to Rasha Budeiri, whose parents are right in the middle of all this: they live in Sheikh Jarrah, in one of the homes threatened with displacement.
There’s a lot going on right now in Israel-Palestine. Right-wing Jewish Israeli mobs are attacking Palestinians in cities like Lod and Haifa. Israel is bombing Gaza. Hamas is firing rockets into Israel. Just last week, Israeli police were attacking worshippers inside Al Aqsa mosque. This round of violence began in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah.
A number of Palestinian families in Sheikh Jarrah are facing imminent eviction from their homes, to be replaced by Jewish settlers. Palestinian demonstrators in Sheikh Jarrah were met with overwhelming force from Israeli police. In this episode, Max Freedman speaks to Rasha Budeiri, whose parents are right in the middle of all this: they live in Sheikh Jarrah, in one of the homes threatened with displacement.
Unsettled is produced by Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, Max Freedman, and Ilana Levinson. Original music by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions.
Spotify playlist: Unsettled essentials: May 2021
“Palestinians fear loss of family homes as evictions loom” (Joseph Krauss, Associated Press, 5/9/21)
“Tax-exempt U.S. nonprofits fuel Israeli settler push to evict Palestinians” (Alex Kane, The Intercept, 5/14/21)
Born and raised in Jerusalem, Palestine, Rasha Budeiri is a mother of two girls; ages 14 and 12. Rasha holds a Bachelor’s degree in Mass Communications and Sociology from Birzeit University in the West Bank. She worked with Palestinian communities through her employment at the United Nations for the Relief and Welfare of Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) in Jerusalem. After several years of working in the media and NGO fields in Jerusalem, she moved to Kuwait and continued to build on the knowledge and expertise in the communications and research fields. Rasha now resides in Ottawa, Canada.
In 1948, Rasha’s grandparents (Fouad and Badria Al-Dajani) were forcibly displaced from their house in Al-Baq'aa, south of Jerusalem by the occupying Israeli forces. As was the case for many Palestinian refugees, they moved to Jordan, then Syria, and back to Jerusalem where they lived in rental homes until 1956.
Through an agreement between the Jordanian Government and UNRWA in 1956, Rasha’s grandparents, along with 27 other Palestinian refugee families, were offered housing units in Karm Al-Jaouni, Sheikh Jarrah. In return, these families’ refugee status and benefits were revoked.
Raising their six kids at that house, Rasha’s grandfather passed away in 1977 and her grandmother in 1992. Their legacy and love to the place was passed down to her aunts, uncles, and grandchildren. Israeli forces are now in the process of confiscating Rasha’s grandparents' house and evicting her parents, who currently live in it.
TRANSCRIPT
MAX FREEDMAN: There’s a lot going on right now in Israel-Palestine.
MUSIC: “Emmit Sprak”
MAX: Right-wing Jewish Israeli mobs are attacking Palestinians in cities like Lod and Haifa. Israel is bombing Gaza. Hamas is firing rockets into Israel. Just last week, Israeli police were attacking worshippers inside Al Aqsa mosque.
Yousef Munayyer, former director of the U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights, tweeted this on Wednesday night. He said: “I'm trying to think of a moment when this broad a range of Palestinians have been exposed to this great a level of Israeli violence all at once since 1948 and I don't think I can.”
This round of violence — it started in Sheikh Jarrah.
A number of Palestinian families in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah are facing imminent eviction from their homes, to be replaced by Jewish settlers. Israeli police chose to respond to Palestinian demonstrations in Sheikh Jarrah with violence… and here we are.
For this episode, I spoke to a woman whose parents are right in the middle of all this: they live in Sheikh Jarrah, in one of the homes threatened with displacement.
My name is Max Freedman, and you’re listening to Unsettled.
MUSIC: Unsettled theme
MAX: Rasha Budeiri was born and raised in Jerusalem. After working for the UN’s Palestinian welfare agency, UNRWA, and other NGOs, she now lives in Ottawa, Canada. Her maternal grandparents’ home, where Rasha’s parents now live, is one of the houses currently facing displacement by Jewish Israeli settlers, backed by the state. I spoke to Rasha over Zoom on Wednesday morning, May 12.
MAX: Can you tell me about the house, how your family came to live in that house and what it was like to grow up there?
RASHA BUDEIRI: Of course. So just like hundreds of thousands of Palestinian families who were living in Palestine in 1948 when the Israeli occupying forces just took over the western side of Jerusalem in the 1948 territories, my grandparents were living in a neighborhood in the western side of Jerusalem. They had a house where my grandparents from my mother's side, my grandparents lived in a house. And in 1948, just like other Palestinian families, they had to flee. They lived in Damascus for a year, in Jordan for a year, and then came back to East Jerusalem, to the eastern side of Jerusalem, lived in their homes. And until 1956 and 1956, the Jordanian government and UNRWA gave twenty eight families, including my grandparents, the house which offered them to start again and build roots in Jerusalem. So these are refugee families. Some come from Jaffa, from Yaffa, from Haifa, from other locations.
RASHA: And fast forward the Jordanian side and under the war promised these families that within three years, in 1959, they would give them the title to and ownership of these homes. Unfortunately, with all the events that led up to the 1967 war and the Israeli occupation of the eastern side of Jerusalem and the West Bank, that it never came to fruition. And in 1972, there were two settler communities that basically falsified documents and said that the lands on which these homes are built belonged to Jews pre-1948. But according to to our due diligence and the research that we've done and our lawyer and researchers and historians who went to the Ottoman Empire archives and looked up these documents never found what would be traced back to a Jewish ownership. And although we really try to present these documents and these that are proof to the Israeli courts, they were dismissed. So you're talking about it's a multifaceted case, but at the end, it's a reflection of what occupation is all about.
RASHA: What I what I also want to mention is that what's happening to the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood is is not unique, it's not unique in the sense of the larger picture of occupation and then attempt to basically change the demographics in Jerusalem for the benefit of Jewish settlers. And a very important thing for your listeners. The case is brought forward by the U.S. based company. I don't know if you were aware. I don't know if your listeners are aware, but these settler committees sold their rights to a U.S. based Delaware based company, and that's the company, Nahalat Shimon is the one that is bringing these cases against us.
MAX: Can you describe the house physically, just like how many bedrooms. Yeah, what does it look like?
RASHA: Of course. The garden is actually bigger, larger than the house itself? As soon as you walk into their gates, you're you're welcomed by a long driveway. To the left. There's some olive trees, very Palestinian, and there's a swing to the left, flowers wherever you look. Then on the left side, there's a stone house like a brick, a brick house. That's my grandparents house. And it's small of the size. It has two bedrooms, a bathroom, a living space, the dining table, dining room. And yeah, it's, it's not that big of a house but it's our home.
MAX: I'm so just so I'm clear, did you did you live in that house as a child or it was your grandparents house still then and then.
RASHA: It was my grandparents house. My mom and dad currently live there. But just like I don't know if we're Arab communities, you spend more time in your grandparents house than you spend in yours because we have a big family. And that's where we would gather. My mom always made sure that she's visiting her mom. And like my grandma, I can still remember her face, her calm manner, always making sure that we all around her playing and goofing around. Yes. Just like any other family we would fight and we would shout and scream and but this is a house that was full of memories. My uncles made sure to cook for the family. My I remember all the fruits like until this day we have lemon trees, oranges. There's also grapes, blueberries.
RASHA: It was the place where we grew up, just being ourselves and being carefree and being kids, doing what kids do, run and chase and cry and fall down and then stand up and and have long nights where we were like, I remember my sister telling horror stories. And like, these are memories that will never go away, whether they take the house or not. These are the kind of memories. These are the kind of roots that we have to the place and I. I hope I hope that we will still be able to cherish these memories. And build more.
MAX: How is your mom doing? How did it how yeah, how is your mom doing, how she's holding up in the middle of all of this?
RASHA: She's being the mom I knew all all this time she's. She's strong. Of course, her heart aches. But every time we talk to her, every time we bring this up, she's she's holding up just like an olive tree, I would say. I don't know how to explain it. She's she gives us strength, to be honest. Her resilience.
RASHA: It was it was such an emotional Ramadan this year where my mom hosted a few iftars at our house. But in my head, I could not stop thinking, is this the last Ramadan where my mom can host these kind of meals? And I was like, I would shake that off and say, no, don't think about that. We keep doing what we're doing.
RASHA: My mom also makes sure to host people in this house, sits in the garden, she spends her time now teaching Arabic to foreigners, including diplomats and and people who know what this house means to my mom, to her family. To now us as her grandchildren. So. I honestly take my strength from her. She keeps sending us photos and videos from the place, but she also keeps telling us, don't lose hope.
MAX: Now, you you mentioned that Sheikh Jarrah is not unique. So I guess why do you think that clearly what's happening in Sheikh Jarrah has triggered a whole lot of other events, which is a nice way of putting it. Why? Why now? Why there?
RASHA: Why, of course, the case against the Sheikh Jarrah homes It did bring attention because the decision to displaced people, the owners of those homes was very imminent. When I say it's not unique to Sheikh Jarrah because there are similar demolition orders against houses in the Silwan neighborhood also another neighborhood in the eastern side of Jerusalem. So you look at these places, these are strategic locations. Because once you take these important neighborhoods, you're changing the face of Jerusalem. You're changing the facts on the ground. You are emptying Jerusalem out of its indigenous Palestinian members and people and bringing in settlers. Why it's also important in the larger context? Because we keep saying a two state solution, a future viable Palestinian capital, that's not going to happen. If you take Sheikh Jarrah, you take Jerusalem and you take that away as a potential like. Sheikh Jarrah, it is a ten minute walk from the Old City, from the Al-Aqsa Mosque, from the Dome of the Rock, from the Holy Sepulchre. It is it's our strategic neighborhood. And once that's gone. I don't think a possibility for a future Palestinian state will be in the horizon.
MUSIC: “Emmit Sprak”
RASHA: It is very important for the American audiences to understand that a lot of their money, the hard earned tax money, is being used, unfortunately, to empower the Israeli occupation of Palestine. Crimes are being committed in their name when the bullet is being used and the arms and the weapons and everything that we're seeing, all the atrocities that we're seeing from the Israeli occupying forces. Unfortunately, three point eight billion US dollars every year is being handed to the Israeli government and empower their occupation of Palestine. So it is very important for people to know that. It's very important for people to refuse that. If you want to stand with justice, if you want to do something about the situation, there is something that you can do. Do not accept this to go on and on and on and in your name. I know what the American people, how hardworking they are and how how how how uneasy it is to to live from paycheck to paycheck. And then just imagine a chunk of that just to take it away from your paycheck goes to militarize the Israeli government and the Israeli state and crimes are being committed in your name. I don't want to be that. If I was in your shoes, I don't want my money to be a part of all of the atrocities that are taking place on a daily basis. And that's why I am telling you, if you want to stop it, you can't stop it because that money should be spent on medical care, on your schools, on your infrastructure and on fighting poverty. I want that money to stay in the U.S. for U.S. people. We don't want to see it being used in bullets against my own people.
RASHA: So I do hope that people keep trying to be educated about the situation. Read. There are a lot of resources out there. Follow the Save Sheikh Jarrah hashtag on social media to learn more. Speak up. Speak out. Do let your members of Congress and your representatives let them be aware that you're not happy with the situation and that you don't want your money to be used to kill Palestinians. These are important steps. And we're very fortunate to have, I think social media now despite all the attempts to put us down and put our posts down. But we keep trying and there are people who are committed to making sure that our voices are heard. So thank you Max for the opportunity. And I hope that the next time we speak things will will be will be different.
MAX: Yeah. Inshallah.
RASHA: Inshallah.
MUSIC: “Emmit Sprak”
MAX: Rasha’s mom, Samira Dajani, was recently interviewed by the Associated Press about their family home. You can find a link to that article in the show notes.
Unsettled is produced by Emily Bell, Asaf Calderon, Ilana Levinson, and me, Max Freedman. Our theme music is by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music in this episode from Blue Dot Sessions.
We’ve been producing interviews and documentaries about Israel-Palestine for almost four years — so we’ve taken a few episodes from our back catalog that directly speak to some of what’s happening right now and put them in a Spotify playlist. You can find a link to that playlist in the show notes, and I hope you’ll share with friends and family members who are looking for more information and context and storytelling as the violence continues to escalate.
Sam Bahour: Confederation
When it comes to peace in Israel-Palestine, the two-state solution has been the party line for much of the international community for a long time. But lately, many experts and activists have been saying the two-state solution is dead. If that's true, what’s the best path forward?
According to Palestinian entrepreneur Sam Bahour, it’s time to try confederation. In this episode, Ilana Levinson talks to Sam about why he believes a confederal model is best for Israelis and Palestinians.
When it comes to peace in Israel-Palestine, the two-state solution has been the party line for much of the international community for a long time. But lately, many experts and activists have been saying the two-state solution is dead. If that's true, what’s the best path forward?
According to Palestinian entrepreneur Sam Bahour, it’s time to try confederation. In this episode, Ilana Levinson talks to Sam about why he believes a confederal model is best for Israelis and Palestinians.
Unsettled is produced by Ilana Levinson, Emily Bell, and Max Freedman. Original music by Nat Rosenzweig. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions.
Sam Bahour is a Palestinian-American business consultant from Ramallah/Al-Bireh in Occupied Palestine. He is a frequent independent political commentator and is co-editor of “Homeland: Oral Histories of Palestine and Palestinians” (1994). He blogs at ePalestine.ps. @SamBahour
"Want Israeli-Palestinian Peace? Try Confederation" (Sam Bahour and Bernard Avishai, The New York Times, 2/12/21)
"J Street finally wants the US to think beyond the two-state solution" (Arianna Skibell, +972 Magazine, 4/16/21)
Will this Palestinian matriarch get to keep her Jerusalem home?
Amal Sumarin lives with her family just outside Jerusalem’s Old City in the Palestinian village of Silwan. The Jewish National Fund and the Elad organization have long been promoting Jewish settlement in the area — often at the expense of Palestinian residents like the Sumarins.
In April, after a decades-long legal battle, an Israeli court will finally decide whether the Sumarin family will be forcibly evicted from their home. On this episode, we teamed up with the +972 Podcast to tell the story of the Sumarin family and their struggle to remain in the house they’ve lived in for generations.
Amal Sumarin lives with her family just outside Jerusalem’s Old City in the Palestinian village of Silwan. The Jewish National Fund and the Elad organization have long been promoting Jewish settlement in the area — often at the expense of Palestinian residents like the Sumarins.
In April, after a decades-long legal battle, an Israeli court will finally decide whether the Sumarin family will be forcibly evicted from their home. On this episode, we teamed up with the +972 Podcast to tell the story of the Sumarin family and their struggle to remain in the house they’ve lived in for generations.
This episode was produced by Ilana Levinson, Max Freedman, and Emily Bell. Music from Blue Dot Sessions. Special thanks to Henriette Chacar and Edo Konrad at +972; Asaf Calderon, Uri Blau, Ayat Yaghmour, Hagit Ofran, and Leena Dallasheh.
RESOURCES
Emek Shaveh website
Timeline of the Sumarin eviction case (Peace Now, 9/23/19)
Common Ground: The politics of archaeology in Jerusalem (Rachel Poser, Harper’s Magazine, September 2019)
In Search of King David’s Lost Empire (Ruth Margalit, The New Yorker, 6/29/20)
Palestinian family faces latest setback to save Jerusalem home (Aseel Jundi, Middle East Eye, 7/2/20)
Documents reveal decades of close cooperation between JNF and Elad (Uri Blau, +972 Magazine, 10/19/20)
JNF Plan to Expand Settlements Could 'Endanger Its Existence,' Jewish Groups Warn (Allison Kaplan Sommer, Haaretz, 2/15/21)
Update on the Sumarin case before the Supreme Court (Peace Now, 4/6/21)