Episode 002: All Our Liberation is Linked

Mar 17

In this episode, Lara and Michael cover the latest assertions of the Israeli ambassador to the U.S. and the UN Gilad Erdan who, following a trip to the "American south," said he was touched by learning about segregation and the Jim Crow era calling it an "incredibly moving trip." The Times of Israel reports that the ambassador compared slave plantations in the US to concentration camps but said there was "no comparison" between Israel's treatment of Palestinians and struggles for racial justice in the US. Lara and Michael play a quick round of “Sounds like Jim Crow or Not” to test the ambassador’s unsupported assertions on the reality of Israel’s treatment of Palestinians which according to Michael “fold like a house of cards after Kevin Spacey got accused.” Lara and Michael reject the ambassador’s attempts to exploit the Black struggle in the US and erase a deep history of Black-Palestinian solidarity going back to the 1960s and existing until today. Citing the book Black Power and Palestine, Lara and Michael cover the positions of leading Black activists throughout the ages including Malcolm X, Kwame Ture, and Angela Davis, and describe the anti-imperial, anti-colonial, and anti-racist connections that undeniably form the foundation of the solidarity between Black liberation and Palestinian liberation activists. Lara and Michael coin the term “crocodile sympathy” to refer attempts by Pro-Israel apologists to posture themselves as compassionate supporters of equality in situations not involving Palestinian rights, meanwhile hypocritically participating in the system that deprives Palestinians of the very rights they purport to support elsewhere. Lara and Michael offer other examples of crocodile sympathy, including (i) IDF soldiers’ social media posts about donating their hair to cancer patients as they participate in the very institution that denies Palestinians access to health care by bombing hospitals in Gaza, denying permits to seek health care elsewhere, restricting importation of medicine and medical equipment, preventing pregnant Palestinian women from reaching hospitals at checkpoints, and (ii) Israel’s provision of COVID-19 vaccines to Honduras and the Czech Republic while blocking the entrance of COVID-19 vaccines to Gaza, denying 5 million Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza vaccines in violation of its international obligations as an international power, and the demolition of a COVID-19 testing site in the occupied West Bank earlier this year.

To consult the sources used in the preparation of this episode, please see:

Books

Quotes

Stokely Carmichael (later known as Kwame Ture), another major SNCC organizer and most well-known for having popularized the term “Black Power” said in 1970 that "Israel is a settler colony. European Jews leave Europe, go to Palestine, change the name to Israel, expel the original inhabitants, the Palestinian Arabs and dominate the land." (Black Power and Palestine)
Stokely Carmichael (later known as Kwame Ture) also said “I have two dreams in my life. My dreams are rooted in reality, not imagery. I dream, number one, of having coffee with my [South African wife] in South Africa, and number two, of having mint tea in Palestine." (Black Power and Palestine)
Steven Salaita wrote “There’s a certain way to show that Israelis are outsiders to the land, but unfortunately it doesn’t much resonate in the United States, in no small part because Americans are fundamentally outsiders to the land they occupy, as well. I speak of olive trees, which exemplify the phrase ‘labor of love.’ The trees take years to bear fruit. Once they do, though, they can provide for centuries. The curved, cragged trees, blending into the tawny environs of surrounding earth, are ubiquitous throughout the West Bank and the Galilee, often arranged in captivating symmetry. Nearly every Palestinian I know owns some type of olivewood icon. Since 1967, Israel has bulldozed more than 800,000 olive trees. [Jewish] settlers routinely destroy orchards, having uprooted more than 11,000 olive trees [in 2014]. [Israeli] officials cite practical reasons for the destruction, all of them involving the apocryphal word ‘security.’ Much of the time, however, they are simply being punitive. A Palestinian would never destroy a healthy olive tree. This reality clarifies the so-called complexities of the Israel-Palestine conflict. Who is the indigenous, Jews or Palestinians? A Palestinian would never destroy a healthy olive tree. Who is the aggressor? A Palestinian would never destroy a healthy olive tree. Who has a deep history on the land? A Palestinian would never destroy a healthy olive tree. Who wrecks the environment with irresponsible human settlement? A Palestinian would never destroy a healthy olive tree. Even if it is incomprehensible to capitalists, politicians and much of the American public, it is the correct answer to any inquiry about instigations of violence: A Palestinian would never destroy a healthy olive tree.” (Uncivil Rites)

Articles

Palestine Pod

Episode 002: All Our Liberation is Linked

Episode 003: Akhaduha Mafroosheh (They took it furnished) with Amer Zahr

Episode 001: Welcome to the Palestine Pod