May 15 marks the 77th anniversary of the Nakba — the destruction of historic Palestine, the catastrophe of dispossession, and the mass ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian population in 1948, which continues to this day.
The Arabic word ‘Nakba’ means ‘catastrophe’, with this day designated as Nakba Day.
The Balfour Declaration, a pledge by British Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour in November 1917, is regarded as one of the main catalysts for the Nakba.
The pledge came in the form of a letter written on behalf of the British government by the then Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour to Lord Walter Rothschild, “a figurehead of the British Jewish community, for circulation among the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland,” according to the Geneva International Center for Justice.
The U.N.’s humanitarian affairs chief held nothing in reserve on Tuesday at the U.N. Security Council as he unloaded on the State of Israel for deliberately starving the civilian population of Gaza.
“The ICJ is considering whether a genocide is taking place in Gaza,” Tom Fletcher said, “It will weigh the testimony that we have shared. But it will be too late.” With the Israel and U.S. representatives sitting opposite him, he demanded:
“What more evidence do you need now? Will you act – decisively – to prevent genocide and to ensure respect for international humanitarian law? Or will you say instead that ‘we did all we could?’”
Video: 20min, 12sec. Below is the full transcript of Fletcher’s remarks
In the aftermath of a broken ceasefire, Palestinians in Gaza speak out about the trauma, loss, and fear they live with daily. Families recount the horrors of bombings, life in tents, and the silence of a world that watches but does not act. Through raw testimony and haunting imagery, this short film captures the reality of survival under siege—and the enduring dignity of a people who refuse to be erased.
Producers: Belal Awad, Leo Erhardt Videographers: Ruwaida Amer, Mahmoud Al Mashharawi Video Editor: Leo Erhardt
Transcript
MAMDOUH AHMED MORTAJA:
More than 500 days have passed and this unjust world has watched our bodies being burned alive.
SUHAILA HAMED SA’AD:
A girl asleep. In a tent, also. An air strike hit, her brain spilled out—she died on her mattress. What did this girl do? What crime did she commit?
MUKARAM SA’AD MUSTAFA HLIWA:
Two billion Muslims. Two billion Muslims are watching us. They could do something, but they do nothing. Where is the Arab world? Where is the Islamic world? Where is the Western world? While we are being killed daily.
MOHAMED DARWISH MUSTAFA SA’AD:
Destruction, terror, fear, humiliation. Faith only in God. As for faith in the end of the war—sadly, we’re not hopeful.
SUHAILA HAMED SA’AD:
We were in the refugee camp, when we heard gunfire, bombs and the chaos that followed. We didn’t need anyone to tell us, at night, we woke up to gunfire and bombs. There were assassinations, and the whole world turned upside down. My feelings when the ceasefire happened: we were truly pleased, we thought it was over and thought we were going to go back to normal life, like everyone else. Or do we not have the right to live? After that, war returned, worse than before. Now our feelings are different from before. At first, when the ceasefire happened, we were happy and thought we could go back to our lives. But for the war to stop and then return? That’s terrifying and fills us with anxiety. We didn’t expect the war to start again, at all. We couldn’t even believe it when it ended. We were waiting for relief, supplies and aid. We heard the promises on the news, about trucks entering—we didn’t expect the war to return.
MOHAMED DARWISH MUSTAFA SA’AD:
For me? Yes, I expected it. I expected it. Because they are treacherous, they don’t want peace. We had almost finished the first stage, but at the beginning of the second phase, they turned everything around. They don’t want it to succeed. They don’t want it to succeed. It’s not possible for the war to end. It’s not possible.
MAMDOUH AHMED MORTAJA:
Rings of fire, flying body parts, surprise attacks, abductions—the stuff of nightmares is happening in this war, and now, the resumption of war has renewed our feelings of intense fear. Everyone’s only demand is an end to this war and this curse, so we can have safety,
and tranquility, so we can rest our heads on our pillows and know that we will wake up the next day without drones, bullets, or artillery strikes.
Interviewer:
– This is not normal, it’s really loud.
MOHAMED DARWISH MUSTAFA SA’AD:
– It’s like this 24/7.
SUHAILA HAMED SA’AD:
Of course, Gaza is used to wars, but not like this. It’s not a war; it’s genocide: the child, the young, the girl, the wealthy, the poor—everyone. I’ll tell you a story: Yesterday, a ten-year-old girl was sleeping in her bed when an airstrike hit and killed her. What did this girl do? She was only ten years old. A girl sleeping. Also, in a tent. An air strike hits, her brains spill out. She dies on her mattress. What did she do? What crime did she commit? It’s a scary thing. The person sitting in his tent is scared, the person in his house is scared. We feel complete exhaustion, there is no stability, and we are mentally drained. When we sleep, we don’t expect to wake up. With the jets and the strikes, no one expects to wake up. We are living day to day, when we sleep, we don’t think about waking up. Death has become normal. What can we do?
MUKARAM SA’AD MUSTAFA HLIWA:
To me, the war hasn’t stopped. We have been living in destruction since October 7, 2023. I was injured on October 11, 2023, and until now, there’s been complete ongoing destruction in the Gaza Strip. Martyrs, orphans—destruction, destruction, destruction, more than you can imagine.
MOHAMED DARWISH MUSTAFA SA’AD:
Unfortunately, we expected the war to end, but it didn’t. They don’t want to end it—they want to end us: completely. We don’t want wars, it’s enough. We’re exhasted. Displacement, displacement, displacement. I lost three homes, and I have lost family as martyrs. We’ve been humiliated as you can see, living in a refugee camp and the situation is miserable. A worn out tent, frankly the situation is not good.
SUHAILA HAMED SA’AD:
The children here, when they hear explosions, develop psychological problems. They wet themselves. If a glass falls, they panic—they’re psychologically broken. They’re still children. What do they know? Anything that moves, they think it’s an airstrike or tank fire. They’re living in fear.
MUKARAM SA’AD MUSTAFA HLIWA:
One of my grandsons has a heart condition, we worry his heart will stop from terror. He screams and cries when he hears a rocket or an airstrike, or the quadcopter fire. The children can’t sleep because of what’s happening here in Gaza.
MOHAMED DARWISH MUSTAFA SA’AD:
The kids wet themselves. That’s one thing. The second? The fear and terror—like this child next to you. They are terrified and have no reassurance. The children roam the streets. There are no schools, no education. The Jews demolished the schools, they demolished kindergartens, the hospitals, the dispensaries, and the infrastructure. Buildings, houses: there is nothing left. The children are broken. The children? Childhood is over here.
SUHAILA HAMED SA’AD:
The future? It’s black and bleak. We have no future—our future is with God. What future? We live in tents, and they have followed us even here! The tent is everything—the living room, the kitchen, the bathroom, everything. At the same time, the tent is an oven—not a tent. Even here, they won’t let us stay. They won’t leave us alone. The tents, the fear, the airstrikes—everything is crushing us.
MAMDOUH AHMED MORTAJA:
More than 500 days have passed, and this unjust world has watched our bodies being burned alive. Today, more than 50,000 human beings killed, burned alive in front of the world, and no one lifts a finger. So it’s normal that we in Gaza feel we face a deaf, blind, unjust world that supports the executioner standing over us, the victims.
MUKARAM SA’AD MUSTAFA HLIWA:
After losing my son, after what’s happened to Gaza? No. There is no hope, none at all. Only God stands with us. Hope in any country? There is none. I don’t trust the international community. They haven’t helped us. On the contrary. They sit and discuss as they destroy us. They haven’t found a solution for Gaza. They are destroying us here and in the West Bank. No one has stopped the war. Why? Only God knows. The blame is on them. There is a conspiracy against the people of Gaza.
MOHAMED DARWISH MUSTAFA SA’AD:
Doesn’t the international community see the victims every day? Thirty, forty victims a day, while they watch. No. Only God is our hope. No one else. God will deliver us from this war. He who is capable of anything. As for the international community, the Arab world, the Muslim world? There are 56 Arab and Muslim nations, yet they do nothing. Two billion Muslims. Two billion Muslims are watching us. They could act, but they do nothing. Where is the Arab world? Where is the Islamic world? Where is the Western world? We are being killed daily. They could act, but they are complicit—their hearts side with Israel. In the end, we’re battling the U.S. We are not equals. And the entire world supports Israel. We’re
exhausted. We are seeing horrors, tragedies, and no one stands with us. The International Court of Justice ruled for us, but where’s the action? We’re alone.
Interviewer
– Do you think you will survive this war?
SUHAILA HAMED SA’AD:
– No. Zero chance. I told you: I sleep feeling like I won’t wake up. It’s normal. Thanks be to God. If He wills us to be martyrs, it’s better than this torture. Because, I’m telling you, we are not living—we are dead. These tents are graves above the earth. What’s the difference if we’re buried under it? Nothing. We’re being tortured, watching the explosions, the despair—it’s destroying us mentally and physically.
MOHAMED DARWISH MUSTAFA SA’AD:
Honestly, it’s difficult. We’ve faced death repeatedly. May God save us. I don’t expect to survive. I’m not optimistic. Destruction, terror, fear, humiliation. Only faith in God. As for faith in the war ending? Sadly, we’re not hopeful.
SUHAILA HAMED SA’AD:
Who can we have faith in? In whom? There’s no one. We’ve lost everything. Everything. Only our breath remains. And we wait, minute by minute, for it to leave us.
MOHAMED DARWISH MUSTAFA SA’AD:
Frankly, we are beyond exhausted. We lost our children, homes, livelihoods, work—Gaza has no life left. Life is over. I mean it. I’m 73. I’ve seen many wars, but never like this. This is genocide.
MUKARAM SA’AD MUSTAFA HLIWA:
I hope to walk again after my injury. I have a broken hip, I need a replacement. They approved my transfer, but I’m afraid if I leave, I’ll be exiled. They’re saying that those who leave can’t return. But why? I’m leaving for treatment—why exile me? I am from this land. I am Palestinian. I want my country. I want treatment, but I must return. I’m not leaving to emigrate. I don’t want to abandon my country. That’s what I fear.
When Palestinian resistance forces broke free from their open-air prison in Gaza on October 7th, 2023, many did not realize the events that would unfold–that we were all about to bear witness to the world’s first live-streamed genocide. Israel thought this would be business as usual, that they could continue their brutalization of the Palestinian people, and the world would go about its business—as it has for decades. Not only did they have to contend with the resistance on the ground in occupied Palestine, but the groundswell of support around the world, and specifically from within the imperial core that is the U.S.
Since the last installment of this newsletter, two students detained by the Trump administration have been released on bail.
Mohsen Mahdawi, the Columbia University student who was kidnapped by agents during a citizenship interview, was released from a Vermont correctional facility on April 30.
“The two weeks of detention so far demonstrate great harm to a person who has been charged with no crime,” said U.S. District Judge Geoffrey Crawford.
Mahdawi addressed a crowd of supporters and reporters upon his release.
“For anybody who is doubting justice, this is a light of hope and faith in the justice system in America,” Mahdawi told a crowd outside the courthouse after his release.
Pewaukee, WI – On the afternoon of May 13, dozens of anti-war and pro-Palestine activists held a rally outside the Wisconsin Defense Industry Council (WDIC)’s inaugural conference at the Ingleside Hotel in Pewaukee, a suburb of Milwaukee. The rally spoke out against the WDIC’s stated mission, to increase the influence of defense manufacturing in Wisconsin.
The Wisconsin Defense Industry Council was founded in December 2023, mere months after the genocide ramped up in Palestine – and just in time to capitalize and profit off the mass deaths of the Palestinian people. This timing has not gone unnoticed in Wisconsin.
In the early hours of Wednesday 14th May, activists from Palestine Action targeted Edwards Accountants in Birmingham and JP Morgan at Victoria Embankment in London. Both firms were covered in red paint, and the front glass doors of JP Morgan were completely shattered.
Both firms directly enable the operations of Israel’s biggest weapons producer, Elbit Systems. Edwards Accountants are the listed accountants for Elbit Systems UK and its subsidiaries, whilst JP Morgan hold Elbit shares worth over $22million in the Israeli weapons maker. On 12th May, financial reports showed JP Morgan had reduced their investment in Elbit Systems by over 53%.
Fourteen pro-Paelstinian student protestors were arrested at Brooklyn College following a brutal police raid where students were beaten up, dragged, and tased. Those students, who were entirely peaceful , were viciously attacked by police at the command of the CUNY administration and now seven face charges of disorderly conduct and trespassing and risk punishment from Brooklyn College.
The Brooklyn College administration recklessly endangered all of their students, staff, and faculty, protesters and non-protesters alike, by bringing cops on campus to protect a genocide and attack the right to protest. The cops, in the name of genocide and as enemies of democratic rights, punched, kicked, and tased students for practicing their right to speak out.
When the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) was established in 1949, it started its operations in Jerusalem. Nobody expected that it would be forced to shut down its activities in the face of Palestinian refugees in the city who still needed its services. Even more perversely, Palestinians could never have imagined that the only institution that bore witness to their forced…
Police have banned a regular protest by the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network (IJAN) from gathering near genocide–supporting Israeli ambassador Tzipi Hotovely’s residence in London. A letter from the group and a comment from a holocaust survivor have responded to the ban and the misinformation surrounding it.
IJAN: peaceful anti-genocide protests vs aggressive agitation from genocide-supporters
IJAN insisted that:
In almost 20 months of peaceful protesting, the International Jewish Antizionist Network has never “intimidated” anyone, Jewish or not, attending prayer services. As a Jewish organisation we would never do that. But the police have caved in to pressure from the Board of Deputies of British Jews who are well connected with Parliament and the Prime Minister. Any “hate speech” came from them.
It explained that:
As our outspoken, well-informed Jewish-led opposition to genocide grew in numbers, the Zionist establishment orchestrated provocative and threatening counter-demonstrations to shut us down. The Board of Deputies [BoD] called on Zionists to turn up and they did, shouting and dancing to loud music with banners claiming “There is no genocide in Gaza”! Holocaust denial would likely be prosecuted, but denying today’s genocide against Palestinians seems to be entirely acceptable. They are responsible for the police having to close the Finchley Road to move them away.
It accused the police of consulting with local people who objected to the protest while ignoring those who supported it. And it added:
The claim that Swiss Cottage is a Jewish area is also false. The most recent census shows: 27.7% Christian, 28.6% no religion, 16.4% Muslim and 8.5% Jewish.
‘Criminalising pro-Palestinian protest on behalf of the Zionist establishment’
Criticising prime minister Keir Starmer’s regime for its genocide apologism, IJAN stressed that:
This government, like the previous Tories, refuses to recognise the genocide in Gaza despite international pressure and court rulings so it can continue its lucrative arms sales and other support for Israel. They are determined to criminalise pro-Palestinian protest on behalf of the Zionist establishment. The BoD is even “investigating” dissent within its own ranks – 36 members objected to Israel’s slaughter of Palestinian children (after 18 months!) Financial Times (LINK).
And it insisted:
As Jews who remember the genocide against us, and like millions around the world, we will never be silenced about the genocide of Palestinians. Never.
Holocaust survivor says BoD agitation “made me anti-Zionist”
Jewish holocaust survivor Dr Agnes Kory, meanwhile, released a statement saying:
Prior to the Friday 2nd May 2025 protest, the Board of Deputies [of British Jews] issued a call to their members, allegedly asserting that these IJAN protests were anti-semitic. As a result of the Board of Deputies call, the twenty or so IJAN protesters were confronted by about sixty or more BOD protesters who shouted abuse at the small IJAN gathering, blocked Finchley Road and played amplified loud music to drown out IJAN speeches.
She argued that:
The undue influence of the Board of Deputies over the British police is likely to increase antisemitism.
And she said:
As a Jewish Holocaust survivor, by default I have been a life-long Zionist although critical of some of Israel’s policies. The abusive behaviour of the 2nd May 2025 BOD counter-protesters tipped the balance and made me anti-Zionist.
Israel has imposed a complete block on humanitarian aid into Gaza since March 2, with hundreds of trucks with lifesaving aid waiting at the border. Now many of Gaza’s kitchens have closed, and Palestinians face mass starvation as rations run low. We speak with Alex de Waal, executive director of the World Peace Foundation at Tufts University, author of Mass Starvation: The History and Future of…
Ben and Jerry’s co-founder Ben Cohen has been arrested after disrupting a senate hearing alongside fellow protesters. The group disrupted proceedings at the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee hearing. Speaking at the time was Donald Trump’s health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr (RKF Jr).
Cohen himself posted footage of the incident:
I told Congress they're killing poor kids in Gaza by buying bombs, and they're paying for it by kicking poor kids off Medicaid in the US. This was the authorities' response. pic.twitter.com/uOf7xrzzWM
RFK Jr. jumps in fear as protesters jump and begin to shout. Outside the hearing, Cohen is shown handcuffed as he says:
Congress kills poor kids in Gaza by buying bombs and pays for it by kicking kids off Medicaid in the US…Congress and the senators need to ease the siege. They need to let food into Gaza. They need to get food to starving kids.
Ben and Jerry’s push back
The two founders of the ice cream company, Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, have previously advocated for various social justice issues. In November 2024, Ben and Jerry’s began legal action against their parent company, Unilever. As the Guardian reported, the lawsuit involves a claim that Unilever has not respected Ben and Jerry’s social mission:
Ben & Jerry’s said in the lawsuit that it has tried to call for a ceasefire, support the safe passage of Palestinian refugees to Britain, back students protesting at US colleges against civilian deaths in Gaza and advocate a halt to US military aid to Israel.
The ice cream makers said:
Unilever has silenced each of these efforts.
For their part, Unilever have said they will “defend their case.”
Cohen’s latest actions demonstrate individual agency in stark contrast to his company’s ongoing battle to maintain their attention to social justice. Earlier this month, Cohen appeared on a US show and said:
Right now, what it means to be American is that we are the world’s largest arms exporter, we have the largest military in the world, we support the slaughter of people in Gaza.
If somebody protests the slaughter of people in Gaza, we arrest them. What does our country stand for?
Starvation looms
Several organisations, including the United Nations (UN) have issued grave warnings this week over a serious risk of starvation in Gaza. On 12 May 2025, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC Global Initiative), who are responsible for measuring the risk of famine, published a report which said:
Over 60 days have passed since all humanitarian aid and commercial supplies were blocked from entering the territory. Goods indispensable for people’s survival are either depleted or expected to run out in the coming weeks. The entire population is facing high levels of acute food insecurity, with half a million people (one in five) facing starvation.
The report laid out in stark detail that if Israel continues to block the entry of food into Gaza:
there would be a critical lack of access to supplies and services that are essential to survival.
The initiative predicted further mass displacement, the collapse of any health services that may have been able to address malnutrition, and further severe deterioration of other services essential to survival. They explained that:
Only an immediate and sustained cessation of hostilities and the resumption of humanitarian aid delivery can prevent a descent into Famine.
But:
Food assistance alone will not prevent Famine.
Instead, they explain that “unhindered” humanitarian access” must be put in place. In other words, Israel must stop attacking aid workers who are attempting to save lives.
The World Food Programme’s head Cindy McCain, said:
It’s imperative that the international community acts urgently to get aid flowing into Gaza again. If we wait until after a famine is confirmed, it will already be too late for many people.
Ben and Jerry’s: optics
If anyone should be advocating to stop Israel from starving people to death, it should be the US health secretary. However, because US government is little more than official sanctioning for Israel’s genocide, it’s down to the co-founder of Ben and Jerry’s to make sure famine in Palestine is on the news agenda.
It should be an absolute disgrace that someone protesting against the starvation of children is arrested for doing so. But, it should also be a disgrace that Israel is purposefully putting Palestinians on the brink of famine and killing anyone who attempts to help.
We conclude that Israel’s treatment of Palestinians, including mass killing, arbitrary detention and torture, meets the legal threshold for the term
We are university professors and human rights advocates who teach and write about Palestine and Israel. We have collectively taught thousands of classes on human rights law, international law and government repression. We have defended death row prisoners in Malawi, documented forced labor in Brazil, helped women seeking gender equality in Burma, chronicled the struggle of the Sahrawi people for self-determination in Western Sahara, and advocated on behalf of families of disappeared immigrants in the United States. As human rights defenders, our job is to expose government abuses of power where we find them. And that includes Israel.
It has never been easy for scholars in the United States to publicly criticize Israel. Now, anyone who does so risks professional suicide. The Trump administration deliberately conflates criticism of the government of Israel with antisemitism and has pressured universities to discipline students and fire faculty who express concern over the slaughter of Palestinians. This has chilled speech on our campuses and is a direct assault on academic freedom. It is also an attempt to stamp out all opposition to US foreign policy with respect to Israel.
Sandra L Babcock is a clinical professor and director of the International Human Rights Clinic at Cornell Law School. Susan M Akram is clinical professor and director of the International Human Rights Clinic at Boston University School of Law. Thomas Becker is the legal and policy director at the University Network for Human Rights and teaches human rights at Columbia Law School. James Cavallaro is the executive director of the University Network for Human Rights and a visiting professor at the Yale Jackson School of Global Affairs
Global solar geoengineering funding reached a record high in past two years (2023-4). And who’s happens to be funding it? That would be the Global North governments and wealthy philanthropists who are driving the climate crisis.
This is according to new analysis by a solar geoengineering research non-profit.
Significantly, Anglosphere countries provided three-quarters of global funding. At the same time, funders funneled more than 50 times more funding to the Global North than to Global South countries.
Solar geoengineering: now we who’s funding the controversial technology
Sunlight reflection methods (SRM) are a set of theoretical ideas to reflect a small fraction of incoming sunlight to reduce global temperatures. They would not be a solution to the climate crisis, but governments and researchers see it as one that could help to reduce some of its impacts. Purportedly, this would be while governments accelerate efforts on the essential work of decarbonisation. They would, however, introduce novel risks and are highly controversial.
International funding for research into SRM has surged in recent years. This marks intensifying international interest in this controversial set of potential ideas to cool the planet.
The research found that global funding for SRM has risen sharply in recent years. Notably, funding allocated to SRM was around three times greater in the five years from 2020-2024 ($112.1m) compared to ten years earlier in 2010-2014 ($34.9m). With $164.7m of funding already committed for 2025–2029, it seems likely this upward trend will continue.
The findings emerged from the first global analysis of funding flows in the field by SRM360.org, a new knowledge broker that informs people about the latest developments and trends in SRM research and governance. It launched the findings at the Degrees Global Forum in Cape Town, the world’s largest gathering of SRM experts.
SRM360’s new funding tracker provides the best available information to track SRM funders and recipients by country, sector, and activity. SRM360 will continue to update the tracker as more information emerges.
Global North gets the bulk of the funding
Funders have funneled the vast majority of SRM funding to date to the Global North. SRM researchers and organisations in the Global North have received more than 50 times more funding than those in the Global South. Global North researchers took $188.2m through 2024, compared to $3.5m in Global South countries. The leading recipients of SRM funding through 2024 were in the US ($102.8m), Australia ($22.6m), the UK ($17.5m), Israel ($16.1m), and Canada ($12.0m). Recent announcements put the UK into second place going into the future.
Anglosphere countries have contributed three quarters of all SRM funding, and this is set to grow to 85%. The US has been the world’s largest source of SRM-related funding through to 2024, giving around $102.2m from public and private sources. Australia is close behind ($22.6m), with the UK ($17.5m), Israel ($16.1m) and the European Union (EU, $6.7m) following.
Some EU member countries have provided an additional $12.9m. For funds committed through 2030, the anglosphere is projected to move further into the lead, accounting for 85% of all funding. This is in large part due to recent UK commitments that will push the UK’s total from $17.5m to $121.1m, making it the world’s second largest funding source. This takes into account both governmental and philanthropic contributions.
Philanthropic sources and governments driving SRM
Philanthropic sources contribute half of all SRM funding for solar geoengineering. Up to 2024, these provided has come around $92.6m (48%).
Governmental funding takes a close second place with $80.2m (42%). Commercial investment – with for-profit motives – account for considerably less at $17.7m (9%). However, these only became a significant contribution in 2023. Major philanthropies outspend most nations on solar geoengineering.
There is no evidence of private fossil fuel funding for SRM. Nonetheless, anonymous sources and incomplete data raise questions.
SRM360’s research did not find evidence that private fossil fuel interests are funding or promoting SRM. Moreover, many recipients of SRM funding explicitly state that they will not accept funding from fossil fuel sources. However, several organisations did not respond to requests for details about their funding sources, and it identified at least $1.1m of anonymous donations in the field.
Commenting on the findings, SRM360 editorial director Peter Irvine said:
There has been growing interest in solar geoengineering from some governments and philanthropies, but it’s been very difficult to get an overall picture. Our new analysis presents a comprehensive overview of the funding for the field, and it makes it clear that most funding comes from only a handful of countries and philanthropies.
SRM360 external relations director Mark Turner added:
As solar geoengineering research funding increases around the world, it is more critical than ever for people to have a clear accessible source of information about latest developments. Critical and difficult decisions await, and people across society should have the information they need to understand what is at stake.
The Palestine Solidarity Campaign has called on people to:
Take action in advance of the upcoming FIFA Congress on 15 May by e-mailing the UK’s Football Associations represented at the Congress, along with the FIFA President and Secretary General, to ask that they ensure genocidal Israel is banned.
And it insists that FIFA should stop giving Israel:
a platform to cynically present itself as a normal country, obscuring the truth that it is carrying out a genocide, and imposing a regime of settler-colonialism, military occupation and apartheid.
In has created a form that “only takes 2 minutes to complete” and allows people opposing Israel’s ongoing participation in FIFA events to write to the heads of the English, Scottish, and Welsh football associations, along with FIFA president Gianni Infantino and secretary general Mattias Grafström.
Take action ahead of the FIFA Congress on 15 May by e-mailing the UK’s Football Associations represented at the Congress, along with the FIFA President and Secretary General, to demand they act to ban genocidal Israel. (1/8)https://t.co/G4YhX4rNDupic.twitter.com/VHuZIz27CW
— Palestine Solidarity Campaign (@PSCupdates) May 13, 2025
Israel has murdered “many hundreds of Palestinian footballers” and “annihilated Gaza’s footballing infrastructure”
In the suggested email, the group writes that a ban would be:
in line with FIFA’s obligations not to be complicit in Israel’s genocide, military occupation and apartheid against Palestinians.
And it points out that:
Israel’s genocide in Gaza has killed many tens, if not hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, including many hundreds of Palestinian footballers. It has annihilated Gaza’s footballing infrastructure such as stadiums, training facilities and pitches.
At the same time, it laments that FIFA has so far
ignored and sidelined the voices of Palestinian organisations, including the Palestinian Football Association, who are clear that the Israel Football Association must be banned.
FIFA’s double standards are clear, because it banned Russia “within days of invading Ukraine”. But as activist Coll McCail pointed out in a recent video:
the world’s terraces wave the Palestinian flag
Indeed, from football to Eurovision events, people have been consistently showing solidarity with Palestine. And that must extend to demanding all institutions hold Israel to account for its crimes by ending its attempts to use culture to whitewash its crimes. So if you have two minutes for a quick message to FIFA decision-makers, you know what to do.
Just last week, 70 former Eurovision contestants called for Israel and its national broadcaster to be excluded.
Yesterday we began our hunger strike. In every slowed minute we remember the children of Gaza, now surviving on boiled weeds and muddy water. It is now day 584 of the genocide in Gaza, and more than 60,000 Palestinians have been murdered by the Zionist entity. Just last week, at least four separate massacres have occurred in Gaza, leaving hundreds murdered and wounded. Two months have passed since Israel’s total siege of the strip on March 2nd, completely blocking all food and aid from entering Gaza. Israel has completely weaponized food; aid convoys remain blocked, grain silos stand empty and parents barter wedding rings for flour that never arrives.
A Massachusetts court ruled that the detention of a former student who expressed pro-Palestine views was unconstitutional and that it was a punitive measure triggered almost solely by a complaint from the Zionist militant group Betar.
Late last week, a judge ruled that a former student at the University of Massachusetts (UMass), detained unlawfully by ICE, be released, providing the first court admission that Zionist extremist groups are working with U.S. authorities to violate free speech rights.
The former student in question is Efe Ercelik, a Turkish national who entered the U.S. on an F-1 student visa. After a physical altercation with a Jewish student during a protest in late 2023, the American corporate media and pro-Israel groups pointed to his case as evidence of rampant attacks against Jewish students on campus.
On October 13, 2023, a group of well-marked journalists transmitting a live feed of an Israeli military outpost from Lebanon came under fire. An Israeli tank shell struck their location, severely injuring AFP photojournalist Christina Assi. In this same attack, Al Jazeera correspondent Carmen Jokhader was severely injured and Reuters journalist Issam Abdallah was killed. Issam Abdallah’s death marked the first of a series of Lebanese journalists killed by Israel. TRNN reports from Lebanon, speaking with journalists who continue to report on Israel’s war crimes even after they have been targeted and injured and their colleagues have been killed.
Producer: Belal Awad, Leo Erhardt Videographer: Kamal Kanso Video Editor: Leo Erhardt Fixer: Bachir Abou Zeid
Transcript
Narrator: On October 13, 2023, a group of well marked journalists transmitting a live feed of an Israeli military outpost from Lebanon came under fire. An Israeli tank shell struck their location, severely injuring AFP photojournalist Christina Assi.
Her AFP colleague, Dylan Collins, was also present alongside teams from Reuters and Al Jazeera.
Christina Assi:
We didn’t understand at first what happened, it’s when I looked at my legs that I knew that they were gone. I started screaming for Dylan. Because I couldn’t find him because of the smoke and the chaos, you don’t understand anything at first. Suddenly you can’t stand, even though you were just standing just now. And you’re thinking about your team too: “Where are they?” So, Dylan runs up to me, and says: “OK, OK, I want to tie a tourniquet.” I’m just screaming, after seeing my legs. So he’s trying to help me and Ilia from Al Jazeera comes too. He says “now you have the tourniquet, stay near the wall.” He wasn’t able to finish his sentence before they hit us the second time. And it hit the Al Jazeera car directly, and here Elie gets injured too, and Dylan disappears and the car next to us starts burning. And I don’t understand that I’m going to burn. It’s all right next to me. I say to myself: “OK, just move away from the fire.” I couldn’t stand so I started shuffling with my body. My vest was a size too big and it was very heavy, the camera was strangling me, and the helmet. I couldn’t get anything off, I just needed to get away. The last thing I remember, we got to the hospital, they opened the door and asked “What’s your name?” I told them my name, and that’s it, nothing after that. Blank.
Narrator: In this same attack, Al Jazeera correspondent Carmen Jokhader was severely injured and Reuters journalist Issam Abdallah was killed. Issam Abdallah’s death marked the first of a series of Lebanese journalists killed by Israel.
Christina Assi:
Issam was one of the first people to support me after I decided I want to be a photojournalist because in Lebanon it’s mostly men in this domain. Issam was one of the first people to support me in this. He used to love to joke, and he loved life. He loved to go out and to eat. He loved to go out and about on his moped and wander and do stuff.
Narrator: Nour Kilzi is a Legal Researcher from the Lebanese non-profit Legal Agenda. She has been documenting attacks on civilians and journalists in Lebanon since the start of this latest war.
Nour Kilzi:
The Israeli aggression on Lebanon was targeting in a clear way, a huge number of civilians, among them journalists who were doing their jobs documenting the crimes that are taking place. The worst attacks, we can say, was the attack that resulted in the martyrdom of Issam Abdallah, the attack on the Al Mayadeen team where Farah Omar and Rabih Me’mari were martyred and the attack in Aalma El Chaeb on a centre of journalists in Hasbaya.
Mohamed Farhat:
Sadly, there are martyrs among our colleagues who have fallen as a result of this targeting. It’s clear the Israeli enemy is terrified of the word. It is terrified of the voice of the Lebanese people that is exposing its crimes. This is a new view of its crimes. We were sleeping in the journalists house, as you can see. This is the bedroom that I was in when it was targeted.
Narrator: Mohamed Farhat, is a senior reporter at the independent Lebanese TV channel Al Jadeed.
Mohamed Farhat:
You look up and you don’t see the roof, you see the sky. Around you everything is black, dust and everything is smashed. Outside we found the car smashed, the SNG truck was completely overturned, closing off the road. We understood there was an attack. The first thing we thought to do was to shout out to the guys to check who was alive. We didn’t get response from three people. As I told you, we were staying in 8 buildings. We looked and found that one of the buildings had completely disappeared. We know that three guys were staying in this building, the three that were killed. We looked for them and found them dead. The strength of the explosion meant they were thrown far from the house, so it took a long time to find them. That’s how it happened: Israel hit us while we slept. Frankly. Everyone present in that residential area was a journalist. From local channels, Arab channels and international channels too.
Christina Assi:
It wasn’t a mistake. It’s possible for one missile to hit you by mistake, but not two missiles. And bullets: a machine gun opening fire, on top. So… it was an intentional targeting and they didn’t stop there. We have seen this is being repeated with many journalist colleagues, here or in Gaza. Yesterday they killed five in Gaza, they targeted them. And the colleagues who they killed in Hasbaya who were asleep: they were asleep! They weren’t even “on the ground”: they were asleep. There’s something unnatural happening, we can expect anything to happen—the crimes—and no one cares. It’s become that if you wear a press vest that’s it, you’ve become a target. Because you have worn this thing that’s supposed to protect you, it’s become the thing that actually puts you in danger.
Either they [Israel] say yes it was a mistake, because of the fog of war. Or they accuse the journalist of belonging to a political party. They just bring any old reason to excuse their crimes. They can say what they want, but nothing excuses what’s happening. For them this kind of thing is allowed—so: why not?
Nour Kilzi:
The number of journalists that have been killed in Gaza is more than the number of journalists killed in any conflict on the planet in the last 30 years. So of course, it’s not by mistake that they’re killing journalists. There is a targeted killing. Of course the goal is the silencing of journalists, the narrative is shifting, disallowing the transmission of pictures of the
crimes that are happening. Especially because the narrative is shifting and people are becoming more aware of what Israel really is, its crimes and its brutality.
Narrator:
Ali Shouaib has been covering news in South Lebanon for 32 years. For many people here, he has become a familiar face. His news channel, Al Manar, is widely seen as sympathetic to Hezbollah.
Ali Shouaib:
The cameraman with me was sleeping in a different room with journalists from Al Mayadeen. I was sleeping in a room next door. The rocket hit the room they were sleeping in directly. All three of them were killed. The whole compound was damaged. A large number of journalists were injured. The Cairo channel was also present with the cameramen, they also suffered serious injuries. MTV was present, Al Jadeed was present, Al Jazeera was present. Many different journalists were present.
Narrator:
Working at Al Manar, makes Ali Shouaib even more of a target, and not only for the Israeli military.
Ali Shouaib:
I have covered every war that south Lebanon witnessed. Every single war. Direct threats have been constant via the spokesperson of the Israeli Army and also there were multiple statements quoted in Yedioth Ahronoth and Haaretz. It got to the point that they were saying “the eyes and tongue of Al Manar,” and they mean by that, Hezbollah. As you can see, I don’t own anything other than a camera, a phone and a mic. These are the weapons that I use. I am a citizen, a civilian and even if I was speaking in the name of the resistance, no one can say that I own any weapons apart from the weapon of the word. The weapon of principle.
Nour Kilzi:
There were direct threats from the spokesperson of the Israeli Occupation Army towards media and political personalities, close to or affiliated with Hezbollah. In an attempt to create a narrative in people’s minds that these people, because of their political beliefs or because they have opinions or positions that intersect with Hezbollah, that they are legitimate targets. This is completely contradicted by international law. Civilians—and journalists—do not lose the protection afforded them by international law because they have a political opinion or even if they support one side of the warring parties.
Ali Shouaib:
Israel is afraid of the truth. It’s afraid of reality. It’s true it’s a channel that opposes [Israel], we speak in the name of the nation. We are an occupied nation, it’s our right to defend ourselves with the word, against what we are being subjected to.
Narrator:
Fatima Ftouni, is a journalist working for Al Mayadeen, a Lebanese based pan-Arab news channel.
Fatima Ftouni:
I feel I have a responsibility towards my family and my people to document the aggression and crimes of Israel because wherever you step in the South there are crimes and the effects of the aggression. You can hear the sounds of explosions that the Israeli occupation is doing, that you can hear. We hear the sounds of the attacks, without any reaction—this is the natural reaction—we finish. As long as there’s no response to the Israelis, and as long as they are not held to account for these crimes, as long as the international community keeps looking away, it will not only continue its crimes, it will go further and further, in its intentional, purposeful, clear and open criminality. We’re talking about clear aggression—even medical crews, even nurses, even paramedics haven’t escaped these crimes. They killed everything. It’s got to the stage that they are bombing hospitals… Is there something worse that this?
Mohamed Farhat:
I’ve become convinced that Israel will never be held to account. For anything. From the first days of conflict between the various Arab countries and Israel, until today. Shireen Abu Akleh—does anyone doubt that Israel killed her? Israel has not been held to account. What’s happened in Gaza, what’s happened in Lebanon. The Israelis announced that it was them that targeted us in Hasbaya. They announced it! OK, so where is the accountability? Today: Israel is always above the law, and it always has excuses. Israel is protected internationally, and the powers that protect Israel are stronger than the law, stronger than the courts, stronger than everything.
With regards to me, if—God forbid—there was a return to war, of course, I will go and cover. I won’t back down. I won’t stop.
Christina Assi:
Before I knew all this I didn’t really want to live, I wanted to die. The pain was enormous, more than you can imagine. And the morphine wasn’t helping. Yeh, I didn’t want to, I didn’t want—I didn’t want to stay living like this—with all the injuries. The moment I discovered that we lost Issam, this changed everything. It gave me a push: He took the whole hit. If it wasn’t for him, both of us would be dead. The difference of a millimetre or centimetre would have killed us both. So I have to go back and speak and say what happened. Although there’s no point, we’ve been talking since a year now for Issam, for Elie, for all of us.
Amid President Donald Trump’s visit to the Middle East, we continue our interview with DAWN’s Sarah Leah Whitson and HuffPost’s Akbar Shahid Ahmed about Trump’s acceptance of a luxury plane gifted to him by the Qatari government, nuclear negotiations with Iran and Saudi Arabia, a less cooperative relationship with Israel and more. This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final…
We stand here today, as Americans who are fed up with the way the United States government has spent our tax dollars. While several programs across housing, education, and healthcare are gutted, our politicians think the better use of that money should be going towards killing children, massacring families, and leveling churches, schools and hospitals. Instead of taking care of our veterans, we are sending more of our soldiers to fight a population of civilians, putting them in the crosshairs of Israel’s indiscriminate bombing, and giving them a lifetime of PTSD that our government will refuse to treat.
Emojis are never more offensive than ACTUAL FUCKING GENOCIDE (unless you’re attacking Gary Lineker)
Gary Lineker reshared an Instagram post about Zionism. As Jewish Voice for Peace has explained:
Zionism is a form of Jewish nationalism, and is the primary ideology that drove the establishment of Israel.
It adds that:
While it had many strains historically, the Zionism that took hold and stands today is a settler-colonial movement, establishing an apartheid state where Jews have more rights than others.
The Instagram post focused on a powerful speech from lawyer Diana Buttu critiquing Zionism as “the idea of not only creating a Jewish state, but at the expense of the indigenous Palestinian population” – of “privileging and giving exclusive rights to one group of people at the expense of another group of people”. The account – Palestine Lobby – has insisted that:
every individual deserves the right to self-determination, freedom, and equality, regardless of their race, ethnicity, or religion.
However, it had apparently added a rat emoji on top of the video. And genocide apologists have jumped on that fact to go after Lineker, who later unshared it.
Nothing is more dehumanising than genocide itself
Genocide requires dehumanisation of the target population. Nazis famously did that by portraying Jewish people as rats before the Holocaust, and Zionists have done the same with Palestinians both before and during the current genocide in Gaza. Supporters of Israel’s actions have called Palestinians “roaches” and “rats”, for example. Israeli occupation forces actually ran a Telegram account which celebrated images of the massacres in Gaza with text saying things like:
Exterminating the roaches… exterminating the Hamas rats
Western mainstream media outlets have even joined in with dehumanising propaganda to support Israel’s efforts.
Language absolutely matters. And to truly take the moral high ground, we must refuse to dehumanise our enemies (even indirectly) despite the barbaric depths of their atrocities.
Gary Lineker has his heart in the right place, and rightly took action when he became aware of the rat emoji (and its negative connotations) on the post he’d shared. But as he’s previously stressed:
the mass murder of thousands of children is probably something that we should have a little opinion on
And that must absolutely be the focus. Because emojis don’t kill. Indiscriminate airstrikes from genocidal war criminals do.
Emojis haven’t killed at least one Palestinian child every hour in Gaza since October 2023. Israel has. Emojis haven’t murdered around 17,492 children in that time, including about 825 babies, 895 one-year-olds, 3,266 preschoolers, and 4,032 six-to-10-year-olds. Israel has. So if genocide apologists think we should get angry about emojis but not the actual mass murder of children, they can fuck right off.
Hundreds of British Jews from more than 65 synagogues have written to the main representative body of Britain’s Jewish community – the Board of Deputies of British Jews – to condemn what appears to be an attempt to stifle dissent over Israel.
Board of Deputies of British Jews: stifling criticism of Israel
In a letter they addressed to the president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews Phil Rosenberg, the signatories express their dismay at the Board’s very hostile response to a courageous letter critical of Israel. 36 deputies (around 10% of the Board’s elected membership) sent the letter last month to the Financial Times. That letter made:
powerful criticisms of Israel’s conduct of the Gaza war
It cited the:
breaking of the ceasefire, the blocking of food, fuel and medical supplies, and the killing of the 15 paramedics and their hasty burial in a mass grave
Moreover, it added that in the West Bank, extremist settlers, and accelerated settlement-building threaten the livelihood and the lives of Palestinians living there.
Well over 300 members of Liberal, Reform, Masorti and orthodox synagogues across Britain have signed the current letter. This states that:
the 36 deputies are speaking for us and for many other British Jews and that our voices cannot be silenced any longer.
It argues that the Board’s reaction to last month’s Financial Times letter threatens to bring the organisation’s name into disrepute:
Instead of answering their criticisms or even merely acknowledging the Jewish tradition of debate, the Board has chosen to investigate the 36 signatories for alleged breaches of the Board’s Code of Conduct. But it is not their courageous letter in the Financial Times that poses a threat to the good name of the Board or to Jewish communal unity; rather, it is the Board’s disproportionate reaction that is likely to undermine freedom of speech and to bring the Board’s name into disrepute.
Board claiming to represent UK Jewry, while shutting down dissent
The Board of Deputies has argued that the 36 are a tiny minority of the organisation. This is of course a body which claims to represent UK Jewry. In a statement on its website, president Rosenberg wrote that:
Ordinarily, we celebrate this diversity of opinion.
This case is different. Whether intentionally or otherwise, the impression that has now been put forward by certain national and international news outlets is that yesterday’s letter published in the Financial Times, signed by approximately ten percent of Deputies, is the position of the Board of Deputies as an organisation, and therefore the position of the UK Jewish community as a whole. This is emphatically not the case, and as president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, I speak for the organisation as a whole.
a Jewish Policy Research (JPR) poll showed that 56% of British Jews felt ashamed of Israel to some extent
They also highlighted that it showed how:
nearly half felt that the IDF had not done enough to protect Gazan civilians, more than the number who felt that they had done.
Progressive Jews for Justice in Israel/Palestine is a UK pro-peace pro-justice grassroots organisation. The group consists of members of Liberal and Reform synagogues throughout Britain. It has members in three-quarters of Liberal synagogues and a quarter of Reform ones.
So far, some 400 British Jews have signed the open letter. This includes more than 330 members of synagogues in 18 towns and cities across the UK – and from virtually every part of Greater London. The signatories are affiliated to a wide range of Jewish denominations. They are members of more than 65 synagogues (including 19 Reform, 24 Liberal, 14 Orthodox, and 5 Masorti).
Voices cannot be silenced by the Board of Deputies any longer
The Board of Deputies has initiated an investigation into the 36 deputies’ action in publishing last month’s letter in the Financial Times. The process is expected to take several weeks.
The open letter criticises the Board’s move to investigate them. It signs off with the powerful declaration that:
Whatever the outcome of this investigation, you cannot hide the true situation: British Jews are deeply divided about the behaviour of the Netanyahu government, with many of us strongly opposed to the conduct of the Gaza war, believing with good reason that it is being prolonged for political reasons at incalculable cost to the lives of the Gazans, and also to the chances of the hostages being returned. We maintain that this is contrary both to Jewish and universal values, that the 36 deputies are speaking for us and for many other British Jews, and that our voices cannot be silenced any longer.
Palestine solidarity campaigners in west Wales are drawing attention to Dyfed Pension Fund’s (DPF) hundreds of millions in investments linked to Israel’s war crimes. They are collecting signatures for a petition that calls on the DPF to quit these investments and end its complicity.
Dyfed Pension Fund: complicit in Israel’s Gaza genocide
On Thursday 15 May, campaigners will lobby the Board Meeting of the Dyfed Pension Fund (DPF) at County Hall in Carmarthen. There, they will hand over letters requesting the fund to divest. The lobbying action will coincide with the 77th anniversary of the Nakba, the day when the Israeli state evicted some 750,000 Palestinians from their homes and land, and killed many others. Nakba means ‘catastrophe’ in Arabic.
Then, on Monday 23 June, campaigners will once more pressurise the DPF Pension Committee at County Hall in Carmarthen. They will present a petition containing over 1700 signatures from the public in Ceredigion and Carmarthenshire to the Committee Chair. A Pembrokeshire petition with 672 signatures was previously handed over to the Committee in March. It is understood that the committee will commission a report, but campaigners are unclear what the report will be about.
£235m invested in Israel
The Dyfed Pension Fund (DPF) is one of eight local government pension funds in Wales. It manages the pensions of just over 50,000 past and present employees.
Carmarthenshire County Council administers the DPF on behalf of Carmarthenshire, Ceredigion, and Pembrokeshire county councils and other bodies such as Dyfed-Powys Police, Mid & West Wales Fire & Rescue Service, local colleges, town and community councils.
The chair of the DPF Committee is Elwyn Williams, a Plaid Cymru councillor who represents the residents of Llangunnor ward. He is also chair of the Wales Pension Partnership, which administers in a pool the eight local government schemes in Wales on their behalf.
Carmarthenshire also provides the administrative support for the Wales Pension Partnership. So, Carmarthenshire County Council, through Cllr. Williams and senior staff, wield a great deal of influence.
The Palestine Solidarity Campaign’s research proves that DPF has invested £235m in Israel. This is despite the DPF originally telling activists that the sum only amounted to £1.3m.
End genocide complicit pension fund investments
Israel’s war crimes against the Palestinian people in Gaza and the Occupied West Bank has galvanised campaigners across west Wales. In the last 20 months Israel has killed tens, if not hundreds of thousands of Palestinians. It has destroyed Gaza’s life sustaining infrastructure, including hospitals, water sanitation facilities and agricultural land. Now Israel is deliberately starving the 1.9 million who remain. It has allowed no food in for two months. Children, the sick, and vulnerable are already dying.
The International Court of Justice has ruled that Israel is in breach of international law. Yvonne Redfern of the Carmarthenshire Palestinian Solidarity Campaign said:
Therefore, councils must avoid procuring from, or investing in, companies that facilitate Israel’s lawbreaking. These include companies producing weapons and military technology used by Israel in its attacks on Palestinians; financial institutions providing investment and loans to these arms companies; and companies conducting business activity in Israel’s illegal settlements on stolen Palestinian land in the occupied West Bank.”
The campaign demands that Dyfed Pension Fund (DPF):
Remove investments from companies included in the UN Human Rights Office’s list of business enterprises active in Israel’s illegal settlements (A/HRC/43/71).
Publish procedures to ensure the fund is not complicit in the Israeli government’s violations of Palestinian human rights and international law. This includes outlining what robust time-limited engagement practices are in place where complicit companies are identified, and what subsequent action can be taken if companies do not respond to engagement processes.
Implement a robust investment strategy statement/statement of investment principles, to ensure that the DPF cannot be invested in companies that contribute to a breach of international law or are complicit in human rights abuses.
A lack of ‘democratic accountability and transparency’
The campaign includes the Carmarthenshire and Ceredigion branches of the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign, Solidarity with Palestine Pembrokeshire, Palestine Solidarity Aberystwyth, Palestine Solidarity West Wales, and the Narberth Gaza Support Group.
Groups began the campaign with the launch of petitions across west Wales in October 2023, soon after Hamas’s attack on 7 October. Since then, they have written letters to leaders of the three councils, emails sent to councillors, council employees engaged, street stalls and film showings held to highlight what is being done to the Palestinians.
However, campaigners and pensioners are angry that the councils say they have no influence on how the Dyfed Pension Fund (DPF) manages its money.
Activists asked to make a presentation and hand over a petition to Pembrokeshire County Council, which said it was not an issue for them.
Dinah Mulholland of Ceredigion PSC said:
Activists are unhappy with this seeming lack of democratic accountability and transparency. The three county councils in west Wales are partners in the pension fund. The councils represent workers and former employees who have paid into the pension fund. But both present and future beneficiaries of the fund don’t appear to have much say over how their pensions are invested.
Notably, the DPF has said its investment decisions follow the advice of Robeco, an independent asset management company. However, the groups believe the fund is using Robeco as an excuse to hide behind and to avoid ethical decisions on investments that support Israel.
The fund has said it had no provision for members of the public to make presentations or to accept petitions. But at the March committee meeting, Cllr Williams did accept the Pembrokeshire petition and at the next meeting in June, campaigners from Carmarthenshire and Ceredigion intend to present their petitions too.
This response also contrasts with the response from pension funds. Elsewhere, campaigners in have formally met councillors to make the case for divestment. Some pension funds in England have already agreed to change their investment policies, such as on weapons manufacture and arms sales.
British journalist Richard Medhurst, who was arrested last year and questioned under Britain’s draconian Terrorism Act, is facing a possible “terrorism” prosecution for journalism that is highly critical of Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza.
The move comes amid indications that cracks are appearing in the wall of steadfast Western establishment backing for Israel no matter what outrages the Jewish state commits.
Whether Britain’s Crown Prosecution Service actually recommends a prosecution of Medhurst will be a test as to how far Western leaders are willing to go to violate their own so-called democratic principles to uphold a clearly corrupt relationship with Tel Aviv.
Israeli soldier and American citizen Edan Alexander was released today by the Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s armed wing, which had held him captive in Gaza since October 2023. The Israeli public broadcasting service confirmed on Monday afternoon that Alexander was handed over to the International Red Cross in the southern Gaza town of Khan Younis.
Earlier in the day, an Israeli military helicopter transported several of Alexander’s family members to the Israeli Re’im military base on the outskirts of Gaza in preparation to receive the captive soldier as U.S. Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff arrived in Israel.
Rights groups and charities gathered outside the Royal Courts of Justice on Tuesday to support a legal challenge against the UK government’s continuing export of F-35 fighter jet parts for use by Israel.
Holding Palestinian flags and signs calling on the government to “stop arming Israel”, dozens of campaigners joined the lawyers leading the case to demand an end to all UK arms exports to the country as its war in Gaza enters its 20th month with more than 52,000 Palestinians killed.
Groups present at the protest included Palestinian rights group Al-Haq, which bought forward the current case with the support of the Global Action Legal Network (GLAN), Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and Oxfam.
At the 2025 National Membership Meeting of Jewish Voice for Peace in Baltimore, thousands of anti-Zionist Jews gathered to reaffirm their opposition to Israel’s occupation of Palestine and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians—and to reject the antisemitic notion that the political ideology of Zionism represents all Jews. In this vital and wide-ranging discussion recorded during the JVP gathering in Baltimore, TRNN’s Marc Steiner sits down with self-identified Palestinian Jews Esther Farmer and Ariella Aïsha Azoulay to discuss the complexities of Jewish identity and belonging today, the historical origins of Israel, and “the way that Zionism destroyed both Palestine and the diverse modes of Jewish life” that predate and reject the Zionist project.
Ariella Aïsha Azoulay is a Palestinian Jew of African origins, film essayist, curator, and professor of modern culture and comparative literature at Brown University. She is the author of numerous books, including: Potential History: Unlearning Imperialism; The Civil Contract of Photography; and From Palestine to Israel: A Photographic Record of Destruction and State Formation, 1947-1950. Esther Farmer is a Palestinian Jew and native Brooklynite passionate about using theater as a tool for community development. She is former Ombudsman and Manager for the New York City Housing Authority, former United Nations representative for the International Association for Community Development and was an original founder of Teamsters for a Democratic Union. She is also a Jewish Voice for Peace NYC chapter leader and the director and playwright of “Wrestling with Zionism.”
Studio Production: Cameron Granadino, David Hebden Audio Post-Production: Alina Nehlich
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Marc Steiner:
Welcome to the Marc Steiner Show here in The Real News. I’m Marc Steiner. It’s good to have you all with this. Jewish Voice for Peace is having their national convention right here in Baltimore, and the real news is there to bring you the story. Two of the leading participants in JVP are joining me in studio here at The Real News, Ariella Aïsha Azoulay is Professor of modern culture and media and comparative literature, and a film essayist and curator of archives and exhibitions. Her books include Potential History: Unlearning Imperialism; Civil Imagination: The Political Ontology of Photography; The Civil Contract of Photography; and From Palestine to Israel: A Photographic Record of Destruction and State Formation, 1947-1950. Among her films: Un-Documented: Unlearning Imperial Plunder, and Civil Alliance: Palestine 47-48. Among her exhibitions: “Errata” in Barcelona and HKW in Berlin; “Enough! The Natural Violence of the New World Order” that was done in Leipzig.
And we’re also joined by Esther Farmer, who is a Palestinian Jew, a native Brooklynite whose passion is using theater as a tool for community development. She’s the director of “Wrestling with Zionism,” a reader’s theater project in New York City, as well as the author of several published articles on theater and community development. Esther is an active member and part of the leadership team of Jewish Voice for Peace in New York City. And they join us here in studio. So welcome both of you. It’s good to have you here. I’m really happy you could take the time from the conference to join us here for a little bit. One of the things that fascinated me about the two of you as I was going through all of your work, not all of it, but going through your work, is that you both identify as Palestinian Jews. Can we talk about what that means? That’s a word You never hear that maybe in certain circles you do, but in the rest of the world you don’t hear that notion idea of Palestinian Jew and what that means and why. That’s the way you identify.
Esther Farmer:
So my father was born in Hebron, Palestine. My grandfather was a Turkish Jew who went to Palestine pretty much to avoid the draft from World War I. He was a draft dodger,
Marc Steiner:
Didn’t want to fight for the Turkish army.
Esther Farmer:
He was a progressive Jew, didn’t believe in war. I found out much later that the penalty for avoiding the draft was to be hung. So several Jews actually left, but he did not realize that since Palestine was a Turkish protector, he was drafted anyway, and that’s why they came to the United States. They came to New York. So this was way before the Nakba and way before 1948, my family was, they lived on the Lower East Side. They were very poor and they were very anti-Zionist. So my family’s existence gives the lie to all Jews loved Israel, and certainly Ariella’s work really ties into that, that before the Holocaust, most Jews were not Zionists. So what does it mean to be a Palestinian Jew is that there was a country called Palestine, and it was Muslim, Christian, and Jewish. It was very diverse, and the vast majority at that time, 80% were not Jewish. They were Muslim. So Israel was a creation of people who did not live there for their own interest.
Marc Steiner:
I want to get to that point because that’s really a critical point. People don’t get about it, what Israel is and why it is. Ariella?
Ariella Aïsha Azoulay:
Yeah. So I think that first of all, we have to be reminded that the category of identity is a colonial category. And I was born into the Zionist colony in Palestine, and an identity was imposed on me at birth called Israeli identity. And this identity was fabricated in 14 years since, I mean 14 years before I was born, which means synthetic identity that was meant to cultivate or to create a factory of Israeli babies, that their identity is predicated on their opposition to other who lived in this country, who lived in this place, which were defined Palestinians. So when I’m speaking about these kind of human factories in the Zionist colony in Palestine, I’m speaking about the way that Zionism destroyed both Palestine and the diverse modes of Jewish life. Part of them took place in Palestine. My family moved to Palestine, my maternal from maternal side, they were expelled together with Muslims when the first white Christian state was created in Spain, when Jews and Muslims were expelled from Spain. So they moved from Spain to Portugal, France, Austria, Bulgaria, and then Palestine, way before the Zionist movement started to colonize or to aspire to colonize Palestine. So they were Palestinian Jews in the very factual way. They were part of Palestine. And this is not a colonial identity, this is a form of belonging. And when I’m saying that I’m a Palestinian Jew, it is a way of undoing, first of all, the identity that was imposed on me at birth, that I’m not recognizing myself in it, and all the other colonial identities that await for me like American or like French. So claiming that I am a Palestinian Jew is claiming a form of belonging. That was the form of belonging of my maternal ancestors. From my paternal side, we were Algerian Jews and both identities were destroyed. Both forms of belonging, sorry, not identities were destroyed through two colonial project, the French colonization of Algeria on the one hand and the Zionist colonization of Palestine. So being an Algerian Jew, a Palestinian Jew, a Muslim Jew is a mode of reclaiming my ancestral modes of belonging.
Marc Steiner:
I love that. Both of you really interesting stories, very powerful stories, and I want to dive back into that. But I was thinking as you were talking that, and I’ve wrestled this a lot and I’ve written about this, which is that if there had been no Holocaust there, there’d be no Israel. I mean, that’s the fundamental, most Jews were not interested in being Zionists. They were in this socialist movements here. They were doing whatever they were doing, whatever we were.
Esther Farmer:
I don’t know about that.
Marc Steiner:
Okay, please go ahead.
Esther Farmer:
I mean, I don’t know how we could know that, but there’s an assumption there that the imperialist powers at that time wouldn’t have. I mean, they certainly used the Holocaust and the sympathy of the world, or the Zionist claimed that they absolutely had to have Israel to, and it was seen as some kind of reparation or something. But as my father used to say, also, I love Avila’s work because it kind of puts a context to things that my family would say is that the Zionists love Israel and they hate Jews. And I think that says a lot. So I don’t know that the imperialists wouldn’t have created Israel one way or another. I don’t know. I just think it’s an assumption.
Marc Steiner:
Good.
Esther Farmer:
Yeah,
Ariella Aïsha Azoulay:
Maybe I can complete it from a different perspective. Yeah, please. I think that we cannot say that if there will not, Holocaust won’t be the state of Israel. We have to ask ourself what is the continuity between the Holocaust and the state of Israel in order to reply that we have to go back in time because the Holocaust didn’t arrive from nowhere.
Okay, if it didn’t arrive from nowhere, we have to ask ourself what did Europe wanted from the Jews in order to have the Holocaust and then to force on the Jews all over the world to be represented by the Zionists that destroyed Palestine and created the state of Israel as the destiny of the Jewish people. For that, I invite in my book, the Jewelers of the Umai, have it here with me, a potential history of the Jewish Muslim world. What I invite people to look at is in the wake of the French Revolution, when the modern citizenship was invented, Jews who lived in France were not part of the citizenship they were given with this citizenship a few years after the French Revolution. But what interests me is not the fact that the Jews were naturalized in the wake of the French Revolution. What interests me is the price that they had to pay in order to become citizens.
They had to forget that they were Jews and forgetting that they were Jews. This was a European project. So eliminating the Jews either by assimilating them into the Christian world or assimilating them into what the Euro-American powers invented in the wake of World War II as the Judeo-Christian tradition, or eliminating the Jews through extermination. All these are part of the same project, what to do with the Jews. Europe invented the Jews as a question, as a problem. And at the same time that Europe invented the Jews as a problem, they also invented the solution with quotation mark to make out of diverse Jewish communities, a Jewish people with a destiny. This brings us to the beginning of the 19th century, the beginning of the 19th century. They invent Palestine as a question, and they invent the Jews as a question, and they merge both questions. Napoleon, Napoleonic Wars already saw the possibility of transferring the Jews to Palestine.
So this connection between Palestine and the Jews is something that Europe invented way before the Nakba. And the last point in time that I would like to bring to our conversation is in the wake of World War ii, after the Holocaust, Euro-American powers imposed what they called New World Order. They created the UN as the organ to facilitate their solutions to different people. The Jews were in displaced person camps in Europe from 45 to 48. The Zionist movement was a marginal movement in the life of Jews, worldwide marginalized movement. In the Jewish Muslim world, it has almost no presence. And Europe that was responsible for the extermination of the Jews add to innocent itself, making Europe innocent, making Europe, one of the liberating powers add to what was relied on the exceptional of the Nazi, which legitimized all the European colonies and the exceptional of the Jewish suffering, this double exceptional and the recognition of the Zionist as representative of the Jews, which means those who were mandated to destroy Jewish, a diverse Jewish life all over the world in Asia, in North Africa, in many other places. And the Zionists were mandated to destroy Palestine. This was part of Europe and your American powers part of their response, what to do with the Jews. So if we speak about the final solution by the Nazi as an extermination, the final, final solution or the post final solution was to impose on the Jews a state that will be for them at the price of Palestine, at the price of the destruction of diverse Jewish communities,
Esther Farmer:
Which is fascinating to me because it’s like it’s the way that Zionism is so deeply antisemitic. It is antisemitic, obviously by
Marc Steiner:
Homogenizing. Jump to that. Please go ahead.
Esther Farmer:
Well, just by homogenizing, and now it’s being used tangible form of Jewish life except the Zionist one, right? And it’s like this way of Jews being used. I mean, that was something that my family taught me very deeply in my DNA, that Jews are used by the imperialists for their own interests. And the creation of Israel was so much about that. And yet, we’re all supposed to say that as Jews, we all love Israel, which is the most antisemitic thing possible. And of course for me, as someone who comes from a very strong leftist Jewish background, what Israel is doing is a travesty. And back to that question of the Jews love the Zionists, love Israel and hate Jews. That incident that happened when it was a boatload of refugees and they were coming to the United States and they were turned away.
They weren’t interested in going to Israel. They wanted to come to the United States. And the United States turned them away, and the Zionists were fine with that as long as the United States supported Israel. So it’s just a perfect example in your face of how Jews in Israel is not the same thing, but we have been inundated with propaganda to make our identities. And I mean, Ella’s work is so fascinating to me because they’ve literally erased our memories and have just changed the narrative and the dialogue to the point where it’s unrecognizable as to who people are. And now Christian nationalists are telling us what it is to be a Jew, which the IRA definition says that you’re only a Jew if you support Zionism. So they’re literally erasing our memories and history.
Ariella Aïsha Azoulay:
Yeah, no, this goes back to Napoleonic Wars Napoleon, who codified what is Judaism, who invented the Jewish consi story, who created Jewish life as a pyramidal modes of being who are entangled being Jew with the state in a way that the state, the states, different states can tell us today, what does it mean to be Jew? And there are bad Jews, and good Jews and the anti-Zionists are being considered the bad Jews. And those are Christians who never reckoned with their antisemitism or anti Judaism with their racism toward many groups that are telling us what does it mean to be Jew? And I would like just to add that Europe, in order to innocent itself from its crimes against the Jews, first of all, imposed the state of Israel or imposed the Zionist as representative of the Jews, but also exchanged with the enemy of the Jews and created Palestinians, Arab and Muslims as the enemies of the Jews.
And these were never our enemies. If the Jews added systematic enemy, this was Europe. For centuries, Jews were expelled from one place to another in Europe. And it ended up with a project that is being called as a euphemistic term to describe. It was called the emancipation of the Jews in the 18th century, in the 19th century. What is this emancipation? This emancipation meant to kill the Jew within the Jew. I think that here in the us, we have to think about it as similar to the project of killing the indigenous within the indigenous, right? It’s like the boarding schools. So on a global scale, Europe killed the Jew within the Jew, and many of the members of what is being called here in a way that always surprise me, American Jewry, many of the members of this community don’t even remember that they belong to other communities that were destroyed by Europe, right? American Jewry is an invention, is an amalgamation, is another amalgamation that is built on the European amalgamation of the Jewish people in the 19th century. So we have to be reminded also that Zionism started as a Christian movement. The colonization of Palestine was a Christian ideology before it became a Zionist, a Jewish Zionist ideology.
Esther Farmer:
It’s interesting that I remember when Biden said, if we didn’t have Israel, we would have to invent
Marc Steiner:
It,
Esther Farmer:
Which is again, the most antisemitic thing in the world telling are you saying that Jews are not safe where they are? So we’re not safe here. So we have to create Israel. And you support that. I mean, you can’t get more antisemitic than that, but where are the Zionists? Where’s the outrage from the Zionist around that statement?
Marc Steiner:
You both have just said so much that we can stay here for hours, just pulling it all apart and really taking a deep dive here into all of it that you’ve said. I mean, what both of you have pointed out on one level, a number of levels you have on one level is how antisemitism drove Zionism in many ways to create Israel for the power of the West, as I put it once a long time ago, is to force refugees, to create refugees. And what you’ve all described, how do you take that and make it understood both politically and socially in this country? So some of the Zionist leaders will immediately call you and me self hating Jews. That’s the first thing they’ll say. But how do you take what you’ve just described and get people to really understand and put their hands around what it really means, how Israel, Israel created, what it stands for and what it’s done to us?
Esther Farmer:
Well, we are doing this conference now where we have 2000 anti-Zionist Jews in a womb 15 years ago. Be lucky if you got 15 anti-Zionist Jews in the room. So this is happening right now because the impact of what Zionism has done is war militarism and imperialism. And that’s being seen now throughout the whole world. So our job in JVP is to move Jews and everyone away from Zionism, and that’s happening. The issue is that the narrative, I mean, I’ve been doing this work for 50 years, and I have never seen the narrative the way it is right now. It has substantially changed, and that took a tremendous amount of work, and we’re proud of that work. So that’s happening. And yet the policies of the United States are still the same. So that says a lot about what so-called democracy is, when the majority of the country is with us pole after pole is saying they are not supporting what Israel is doing, but yet that’s still the policy. So I think these issues of identity and the relentless propaganda that has gone on since this Zionist, I dunno what you want to call it, experiment, has been both so destructive to Palestinians and to Jews, really, really destructive. And that’s why it’s so important for us to have this as Naomi Klein says it, Exodus away from Zionism.
Marc Steiner:
Yeah,
Ariella Aïsha Azoulay:
No, I think that just maybe we have to remind ourselves that there is genocide going on. It’s almost two years, and there are some common ways to understand what is genocide, which is related to what was done by Lemkin and the convention against genocide. But I think that we have to maybe ask other questions about genocide rather than defining what is genocide. Understanding that settler colonial regimes are genocidal regimes, and the state of Israel is a genocidal regime that serve the west, serve the West to solve with quotation mark the Jewish question another time in its history and serve the West to have its mercenaries in the form of Israelis. And I think that it became very clear that since October, 2023, without the arms and the money and the propaganda machine all over the world, in the western world in what you called policies in state apparatuses, the persecution of voices that are denouncing the genocide without all these western power,
The genocide will not last more than 1, 2, 3 weeks. Israel does not have the power to have a genocide. Israel itself would not survive in 48 without the destruction of Jewish diverse communities without forcing the Jews in Europe, the survivors to go to Palestine rather than to rebuild their communities in Europe without inciting violence in the Jewish Muslim world and making the life of Jews in the Jewish Muslim world impossible in a way that they slowly, slowly, this world was dismantled and Jews had to leave. Most of them did not want to go to Palestine. The case of Algeria in 62, at the moment of the end of the War of Independence
Marc Steiner:
For Algeria
Ariella Aïsha Azoulay:
Only 20% in Algeria, only 20% of the Jews were forced to leave Algeria because two colonial projects forced them to leave Algeria, only 20% went to the Zionist colony in Palestine. The rest of them went to Canada and France. So they were not Zionists. So we have to understand that the state of Israel was sustained with Western power. It was not an expression of a Jewish liberation project. It was a European project, Euro-American project to reorganize the entire world to create what they called the Jewish Judo Christian tradition, which never existed to remove the Jews from the Jewish Muslim world,
Marc Steiner:
Which did exist
Ariella Aïsha Azoulay:
To create Palestine as allegedly a state for the Jews and to turn Palestinians into exterminate group. So when I relate to the term genocide, when I wrote several texts during the beginning of the genocide, I put aside the legal definition of genocide. And I am trying to reconstruct how the genocide against Palestinians started. And it started in the wake of World War ii when Western power through the mediation of the UN, decided that Palestinians are experiment for the sake of Zionist, for the sake of creating a Zionist state. So rather than speaking about genocide as an event, I speak about genocidal regime, I speak about genocidal technologies, and when you understand the genocidal regime, you understand that already the nakba was the beginning of the genocide because Palestinians were exter amenable. They had to pay the price, they could be exterminated because their presence, there was an obstacle for the imposition of the new world order with quota mark, which was a Euro-American project of enting Europe of its crimes against the Jews and of its crimes against other colonies. We have to be reminded that in 45 European powers, and we’re speaking about the British, the French, Spanish, they still had colonies in different places in the world. So by exceptionalizing, the Nazi, by exceptionalizing the suffering of the Jews, they actually continue to run the world and not to reckon with their crimes against the Jews and against other racialized communities.
Esther Farmer:
One of the things that gets me always is when people say, well, Israel has a right to exist as if the country was established by God. I mean countries are created by the that be for their own interests. When I was growing up, there was no Bosnia.
This was created generally not created by the people that live in these places. It’s created as Ariela was saying, by the western world for their imperialist interest. So I don’t know why this country of Israel has any more right to exist than anybody else. And I think there’s a difference between these countries and the people that live in them, but this idea that countries, that Israel has a right to exist, it’s just so interesting. It’s an example of how the assumptions and how we’ve been trained to think in these ways around nation states and the creation of these things that just has nothing to do with our actual lived experience and history.
Marc Steiner:
So you both have said so much and given such deep analysis about where this is in some ways, I think that is not heard very often and really original. I mean, it’s not the way people describe what is being faced at this moment. And as you were speaking, 10 things were going through my head. One was, how do you take the analytical description that you both have given us and popularize that message so people understand it so people can grasp it? Because the way you describe, it’s very simple, very clear about what created this, I’m sorry, go ahead.
Ariella Aïsha Azoulay:
No, no. It just occurred to me to think about it not as we would do this work. JVP does an incredible work, but it is not only about people doing this work, the genocide made it clear to millions
That this is a genocide and Israel is a genocidal regime. I can write this book and this book and you can do your work, et cetera. But people are not stupid. And there is a moment when people understand they cannot do an accelerated lessons that you take with someone who already did the work, but with the beginning of the genocide, millions went to the street, right, took it to the street to say, this is a genocide and they’re being persecuted constantly. All these draconian laws, all these draconian policies of the Trump administration is because there are millions who are saying that this is a genocidal regime. So the question is not how you bring these ideas. The question is maybe how we exit, as Nole said Zionism, but how we exit the structures that imperial powers created as benign structures. Museums, archives, nation, states, borders, naturalization, all these structures are against people.
So the questions are much bigger than how you transmit the lies of Zionism to other people. For me, the main question is outcome. That all the crimes that were committed against the Jews as if they never existed because the Jews were received with quota state or the Jews received a citizenship. The question is how to bring the Jews to participate in the anti-colonial, general global anti-colonial struggle to decolonize this world. So it’s not only how you convince your parents or your siblings, it’s about how we exit from those institutions that were normalized as benign institutions, but actually they are reproducing the destruction of the world.
Marc Steiner:
So one of the things I think about as you all describe where we are and why we’re here, I think about historically here in this country that 70% of all the civil rights workers in the South when I was a civil rights worker in the South as a young man were Jews. 70% of all the whites civil rights workers, civil rights workers in the south were Jews. And that we were the heart of the labor movement. We were the heart of the revolutionary movements. In Europe, there’s a different spirit I think that has to be grasped and put out there a different heritage and tradition of who we are as opposed to having it being defined by this kind of Zionist domination that was pushed and created by the imperial powers as you were talking about. So they have a beachhead in the Middle East and they figured out what to do with the Jews.
Ariella Aïsha Azoulay:
But the example that you bring is very interesting because Jews participated in the civil rights movement. They were in solidarity with the black.
They didn’t fight their own struggle as part of it. And I think that what JVP maybe today offer is how to think about the liberation aspirations of the Jews together with the liberation aspirations of other groups. And I think that what happened with the us, what happened with this kind of erasure of what Europe did to us, what Euro-American did to us is the removal of the Jews from the history of colonization in a way that the Jews from a long time did not have a project of decolonization while they were still colonized. To act only as a blank American citizen in the movement for the civil rights movement means not understanding how much Jews were still colonized. So they could act as blank citizens, but not as Jews who are affirming this as their own struggle. They struggle for black Americans. And I think that here there is a very interesting things for Jews to do in the US is to reclaim their histories outcome that they became American Jews outcome, that their history is a very short history, the history of their life in America.
Where is their history in Europe, what was taken from them? There are traditions, there are beliefs, there are many things were taken from them. There are possibility to live their life there. So I’m not speaking about in terms of returning to Europe, but I’m speaking about reclaiming their histories. If the Jews will reclaim their histories, they will not be blank citizens in empire only joining others struggles. And I think the JVPs that maybe the first time that there is a kind of broad Jewish movement in the US where Jews are speaking about what was taken from them and cementing Zionism as their identity is part of what was taken from them. But there is much more to that.
Esther Farmer:
I mean, I feel very personally angry at Zionism from my experience as a leftist Jew. My father was a union organizer, and I grew up with that history of, as you say, in the labor movement. And Jews and I have always felt, and I have seen this with my own eyes, how this Zionist project has moved Jews to the right in the way that you are describing has moved Jews in the direction where it’s unrecognizable. To me, that’s the other way in which I see Zionism as so antisemitic. The whole history of Jews being for justice, even in the biblical text and stuff, it’s just completely thrown away by only us only. My mother used to say, we are Jews for justice, not just us.
Marc Steiner:
And
Esther Farmer:
That was the history, what it meant to me to be a Jew. So I feel like Zionism was, and in Ella’s work, it’s like a deliberate attempt to erase an understanding of Jews as standing with the oppressed in the world. That’s interesting what you said about from my family, I did experience that connection between what happened to the Jews and other people, that solidarity. I did feel that, and I think that there were other people who did feel that, but I also think that there was a deliberate attempt to break that memory in some ways though I think that’s what’s so interesting about what we’re talking about.
Marc Steiner:
Yeah, I think the reason, I’m not usually at a loss for words how I make my living, but one of the things that really struck me about this conversation we’ve had so far is that it’s one that doesn’t take place in very many places where there’s an introspection about Jewish history and Jewish life and what it means in what we face today and how we’ve become sucked into this imperial world oppressing Palestinians. And when I was a kid, it was the fight against Jewish store owners in inner city neighborhoods that we used to boycott and go after because of what they were doing. But now that becomes, it becomes a prominent aspect of American jewelry at this moment. And I think the way you two describe this, the depth of which you describe, this is something I think that people need to wrestle with. Beyond JVP.
Ariella Aïsha Azoulay:
There are many initiatives. If we see millions in the street protesting against the genocide, many of them are organized in different collectives. Strike MoMA, making, munches, kohenet, so many collectives, smalls middle size that are reclaiming, they are Jewish heritage and reclaiming. They are Jewish heritage is saying, we are not white try to whiten us. This is what they’re saying. But Jews were never white. So while accepting as part of the Jewish identity in the us, it’s something that always strike me accepting this category that the Jews are white is accepting to erase their history. They were first racialized, their histories were destroyed in order to tell them, we give you the passage to passage white, but Jews are not white. So I think that we cannot see the millions in the street protesting against the genocide and believe that there is only JVP. JVP is very powerful, very broad because you have branches in different cities, but there are many, many initiatives all over to reclaim what was taken from the Jews and what was taken from the Jews.
Part of it is major part of it today. There are history as victims of genocide, and now the Zionists are perpetrating genocide that implicate the entire Jewish community because of a long history of conflating between Zionists and Jews. Because when the West recognized the Zionist as representing the Jewish people with no reason to recognize them, but it served the interest of the West, it created a kind of conflation. And this conflation took from the Jews many things that people are struggling to today to introduce a distance from them and from this identification or this false mode of being represented by the state of Israel and the Zionist without announcing the responsibility to continue the struggle against the genocidal regime.
Marc Steiner:
So as we conclude here, I was thinking about this kind of neofascist regime that exists in Israel and this neofascist regime that’s taking over the country that we live in here, and all the experience the two of you have had and the creative work you’ve done and the political work you’ve done, and where you see the hope and where we’re going, where you see the struggle going and what we face right now. I mean, seeing JVP grow as it has is amazing, and other groups are there, but the right is really on the rise. And in many ways, as almost as you were alluding to the right, often uses Jews and people get sucked into the right. So where do you both think this takes us all, after all your years of struggle and being parts of movements in your work,
Esther Farmer:
I mean, hits the horror and the hope every second.
Marc Steiner:
Yeah,
Esther Farmer:
Right. I mean, across the street you’ve got 2000 anti-Zionist. That’s the hope. And we have this fascistic things. Is this really happening right now? Again, I think it’s a really interesting moment when the majority of the country is with us, and yet we still have these policies now that contradiction is only going to grow. I think there’s so much grassroots organizing going on, not just from JVP in so many areas, and it’s really important. I think this concept of intersectionality and solidarity is extremely important. And that’s the hope is the solidarity and the intersectionality of our movements. And as Ariella was saying, it’s a worldwide thing. It’s not only about Israel, it’s not only about Palestine. It’s this whole way of understanding even how nation states are organized. I struggle with that myself because I come from a time when national liberation struggles were a very progressive thing and people wanted independence. And then there are these states that exist and have they helped the world? Have they not helped the world? What does that mean to have the world organized by these nation states? Is there a difference between anti-colonial and decolonial? These are interesting questions that are coming up right now for me anyway. So yeah, I think there is hope. There is organizing going on. People are moving and both sides are moving very fast. They are,
Ariella Aïsha Azoulay:
Yeah. So if I may just pick on something that you said right now, I don’t think that these were a national liberation movement. These were anti-colonial movements that were intercepted by the colonizers to become national liberation movements. All the process of decolonization of Africa was intercepted by the West through the creation of the un. We have to be reminded that in 45 there were several 40, 45 states in the world. Today we have 200 states, which means that the decolonization of Africa, decolonization of Asia, rather than being decolonized from the imperial powers, the imperial powers created international organization that imposed that the only way to decolonize a place would be to create a nation state.
Esther Farmer:
That’s very interesting.
Ariella Aïsha Azoulay:
So I don’t think that these were national liberation struggles. These were anticolonial liberation struggle that were intercepted by the West in Algeria. It’s very typical. It was an anticolonial struggle and it ended up with an independent state from where the Jews, Algerian Jews had to live because this was the model that is built on the purification of the body politic from elements that do not fit there. So the Jews didn’t fit here, and the Jews didn’t fit there, and the Jews didn’t fit there and others didn’t fit there. And we got the new World order. One comment about what you said, I don’t think that in Israel it is a neo fascist regime. Israel is, as I said earlier, a genocidal regime to begin with. The fact that Netanya ran this genocide cannot make us forget that the genocide against Palestinians started in 48. The destruction of Palestine, the destruction of the Palestinian society didn’t start with Netanya.
And this phase of the genocide is horrible and is the highest in terms of casualties, but it is not the highest in terms of the destruction of the Palestinian society. And when you ask about hope, if there is hope is in a global decolonial transformation of the world, because all these structures that enabled in 45 to impose another settler colonial state as a liberation project for the Jews, while it was a project of liberation of Europe from its crimes to appear in the world as the liberator. So I think that the fact that those organs continue to exist as benign organs, museums, for example, that looted so much of ancestral worlds of black, of Jews, of Muslims, and impose themselves as the guardians of this culture while they participated in the decimation of the material culture of so many people. So I think that there is a lot of work to be done in order to undo imperial planter, to undo the imperial organization of the world, and not only to speak about throwing away this or that government, it’s about stopping the genocidal regimes that are still being recognized as benign democratic regime with an accident with side project that should be reformed.
Israel cannot be reformed. Israel is a genocidal regime and Israeli state apparatuses should be dismantled in order to allow the return of Palestine in which Jews will also be part of it as one of the minority groups and not as the governor, the masters of the land.
Marc Steiner:
I want to say that this has been one of the best conversations I’ve had in a long time, and mostly because I didn’t do much talking at all, but which is great. I think you both brought a very profound and different analysis to this conversation that’s not often heard, and I wish we could sit here for the next three hours, but we can’t. And I just want to say thank you to Ariel Zuli and to you both farmer for being here today and being part of this conversation.
Ariella Aïsha Azoulay:
Thank you for inviting us. It was a pleasure. Yes. Thank you so much for having us to share the flow with you.
Marc Steiner:
I deeply appreciate it. Really the joke from my friends that were listening, mark, you didn’t say anything. It’s okay. Because what came out of this, I think was something that people have to really wrestle with about where our future is going, not just as Jews, not just as Israel Palestine, but in terms of where the world is going and why this is so central to all of that.
Esther Farmer:
And there’s something very liberating about thinking about the world without nation states or thinking about the world without borders. Can we have those imaginations? Can we think beyond what they’ve given us, that we have to think that way? Can we think beyond that? And now maybe is a moment the horror and the hope where we can think in different ways.
Marc Steiner:
We have to thank you both so much for taking all this time.
Esther Farmer:
Thank you. Thank you.
Marc Steiner:
See you back at the JVP conference. Once again, thank you to Ariella, Aisha Azule and Esther Farmer for joining us today. And thanks to David Hebdon and Cameron Grino for running the program and audio editor, Alida Nek and producer for always working for Magic behind the scenes. And everyone here at The Real News for making this show possible. Please let me know what you thought about what you heard today and what you’d like us to cover. Just write to me at mss@therealnews.com and I’ll get right back to you. Once again, thank you to Ella Aisha Azule and Esther Farmer for being our guest today here on the Mark Steiner Show on the Real News. And remember, we can’t do this without you, so please share, join our community by clicking on the subscribe button right below here and support the Real News Network. Do it now. So for the crew here at The Real News, I’m Mark Steiner. Stay involved. Keep listening, and take care.
MPs from the Independent Alliance have challenged the media to push UK prime minister Keir Starmer harder on the British government’s involvement in Israel’s genocide in Gaza. They accuse Starmer of complicity in war crimes, evading legal obligations, engaging in secretive and potentially unlawful military support, denying genocide despite overwhelming evidence, and blocking efforts for democratic accountability. And they encourage journalists to take the risk of holding him to account for all this.
Independent Alliance: “Journalism During a Genocide“
Here in Britain, journalists may damage personal relationships or hamper their professional ambitions. In an ongoing genocide, these risks are surely worth taking.
For too long, this government has avoided real scrutiny over the full scale of its complicity in crimes against humanity. The media has a responsibility to hold the government to account and expose the truth.
In particular, they stressed that the “numerous press conferences” Starmer has held since becoming prime minister give journalists the opportunity to hold him to account.
Today, the Independent Alliance delivered media handbooks to mainstream press outlets, suggesting basic ways they could hold the Prime Minister to account over Gaza.
Because “transparency and accountability are cornerstones of democracy”, the MPs asserted, “the public deserves to know the full scale of the UK’s complicity in crimes against humanity”, particularly via “the sale of weapons, the supply of intelligence and the use of Royal Air Force (RAF) bases in Cyprus”. Indeed, one report called RAF Akrotiri “a foundational asset for genocide”, saying Britain is “engaged in military actions without being subject to parliamentary scrutiny”.
The MPs also accused the government of “knowingly and openly making an exception to its legal obligations” regarding the sale of arms. This comes a week after a new report showed Israel recording the entry of 8,630 items of death and destruction from the UK in recent months despite despite Starmer’s team supposedly banning items the occupying power could use for its war crimes in Gaza.
The Independent Alliance added that:
both the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary have… have made statements denying the existence of genocide in Gaza, contradicting the claim that it is for the courts, not governments, to make that determination
And they stressed that “the government is yet to respond” to a March call for “a full, public, independent inquiry into the UK’s involvement” in Gaza.
There are also accusations of the government ignoring a request for the arrest of Israeli foreign minister Gideon Sa’ar on a recent visit, and of hypocrisy for sanctioning Russia widely “for breaches of international law” but not doing so with Israel.
Journalists: ask these questions
The MPs suggested that journalists ask, among others, the following questions:
Is it the government’s position that it cannot – or will not – bring the F-35 programme in line with the UK’s legal obligations?
Is RAF Akrotiri being used as a route for weapons to be deployed in Gaza?
Has the government sought legal advice over the continued use of RAF Akrotiri to support Israeli military operations?
Have Israeli F-35 jets been stored and/or repaired at RAF bases?
Have you received any advice on the definition of genocide and its applicability to the situation in Gaza? If so, are their comments in line with your advice?
When will any advice be made public? If you have not offered any such advice, why not?
Why have you ignored the demand for an independent inquiry?
We strongly urge mainstream journalists with a conscience, and access to press conferences, to push Starmer and his government to answer these questions. They can access the full document here. It includes links, further details, and more questions.
Israel’s blockade on humanitarian aid has entered its third month, pushed Gaza to the grip of starvation. Food supplies are dwindling rapidly, shops are stripped bare — even of the most basic essentials – and bakeries have shut down. Finding anything to quiet our growling stomachs has become a daily struggle, especially as the prices of basic food supplies continue to soar. Flour, one of the most…